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Enhanced ImageButler Supporting Multiple VolumesDate of Tech Note: 13 Feb 2000 DescriptionThe ImageButler is being used more and more by clients. As this is the case, the hard drives that are in use are being filled up, and additional hard drives are being purchased. This means that MediFile needs to support a way to determine the path to the file for all platforms for multiple hard drives. To support this a Look up table for ImageButler volumes has been added. The code for this has been added to. This tech note is to describe how you need to set up MediFile’s ImageServer information. This is for setting up where new images are to be saved, as well as to set up how to determine the pathname for volumes used previously. There specific items covered in this tech note are: 1. Determining the Volume for the Images for a Workstation This technical note is somewhat technical. You need to have an understanding of how your computers describe where a file is saved. Once you understand this it is rather easy to follow. We cannot set the volume names automatically because different sites set up their ImageServers and the mapping of those drives differently. Therefore we have had to design MediFile to be flexible. Detail1. Determining the Volume for the Images for a WorkstationMediFile saves every image file in the ‘Image’ folder (directory) on the ImageServer computer. Within the ImageServer there is a folder for the year, then the date, and then all the files saved on that date. The instructions to the computer as to where a specific file is save is called the pathname. The pathname is a complete description telling the computer where to find the file. An example could be: In the example above it tells us that the image file is stored in the Images folder. Inside the Images folder there is a folder called ‘2000’. Inside this folder there is another folder called ‘Feb3’. Inside this folder is our file called ‘10939-12394-1.tif’. This interpretation is excatly the same for both platforms. Note there are only two differences in the pathname between MacOS and Windows. Note that for the MacOS the pathname’s folders are seperated by colons (‘:’). On Windows the pathname’s folders are seperated by a slash (‘\’). The other difference is the volume name (hard drive name). For the MacOS the volume name is assigned by the server. Therefore every MacOS computer will see this volume as the same. As well the volume name can be a word or words up to 32 characters in length. In this case it is ‘ImageServer’. On Windows each workstation assigns a letter to the mapped (mounted) volume. Therefore each workstation must mount the volume and assign it the same drive letter. We recommend that the first volume name be ‘I:’ then next ‘J:’ etc. So in the example above the volume with the Images folder should be mapped on the local workstation as ‘I:’. Refer to the operating system manual for your respective computer platform to determine how to mount / map the volume with the Images on each of the computers. It is best to have these volumes mount automatically when the computer is started up. If you are not sure what the volume should be for your images folder you can easily determine what it should be. This method works for both a Windows NT and MacOS ImageServer from a MacOS workstation. MacOS:
2. - Highlight the file by clicking on it once. 3. - From the File menu select Get info.
4. - When the Information window opens note the pathname to the file. This information is located beside the item called ‘Where:’.
5. - So in this example the volume name for the location where this file is found is ‘ImageServer’. Windows This method works the same for both a Windows NT and MacOS ImageServer from a Windows workstation. Find an Image record by double clicking on ‘MyComputer’ and then the ImageServer hard drive icon and continuing through until you get to an Image file.
In the diagram shown here the pathname to the image is: L:\Images\2000\Jan3\1-1-2.jpeg. This is shown in the Address area of the window. If the Address does not show on your workstation you need to turn this feature on for the computer. You do this by selecting it from the View menu as shown here.
Summary For the two examples shown here we have determined that the image path volumes for each of the workstations are as follows: MacOS: ImageServer 2. Setting Admin Preferences for Saving Image RecordsWhen an Image is saved by a scanning computer it is saved to a specific hard drive and location. MediFile determines this location for the scanning person. It does this so that there will be a very logical and specific location. Additionally this assures that a scanning person does not accidently save an image file in the wrong spot. Before you can save images to the ImageButler you need to set up the Administration preferences for where the image records are to be stored. This setting will stay the same until you fill up a hard drive and need to change the location (hard drive) where the images will be saved. This is set by going to the following are of MediFile. File --> Administration --> Page 3 --> Preferences --> Images Page.
In this area enter the name of the volume for where you want the images to be saved. In our example shown above you would set the information as shown in this diagram. As well, put in a word like ‘Do’ in the Conversion Option. Setting the preferences as shown above will instruct the workstation doing the Image saving to save the images in the following locations: MacOS: ImageServer volume This administration setting is required to save images and connect them to patients in MediFile. 3. Setting the Cross Platfrom Look Up Table for Image VolumesThis area is the new part of MediFile that you need to setup to use image serving. This is required from the Feb 8th 2000 version of MediFile and later. The purpose of this file in MediFile is to provide a lookup table to all workstations so that they can determine the volume that the Image file you want is stored on. Remember that since all images are stored in the same way from the ‘Images’ folder on, we only need to know the volume name for the image from the workstation’s point of view. For example if there are two hard drives (volumes) that the images are stored on then you need to create two records in the Image Volumes file. For our example we will assume that the volumes for each of the platforms are: MacOS: ImageServer Windows 95/98: I: To set the Image Volume look ups go to: 1. File --> Administration --> Page 3 --> Images popup --> Image Volumes.
2. From the File menu select New, to create a new record.
Save this record and create the next record as follows:
You should now have two records in the ImageVolume file.
4. How it WorksUsing the examples shown here when a computer saves a image record it will save it with a pathname appropriate to its platform. Therefore the pathname saved in MediFile will be: MacOS: ImageServer:Images:2000:Feb13:file name Windows: I:\Images\2000\Feb13\file name With the pathnames saved as shown above the workstation will convert the pathname so that it can be used for the type of computer it is. If the workstation is a MacOS workstation and the pathname is now a Windows valid pathname MediFile will do the following: Pathname: I:\Images\2000\Feb13\file name Pathname: J:\Images\2000\Feb14\file name If the workstation is a Windows workstation and the pathname is now a MacOS valid pathname MediFile will do the following: Pathname: ImageServer:Images:2000:Feb13:file name Pathname: LaCie50:Images:2000:Feb14:file name |
