Welcome to the spring issue of the IDELIX Technology Update.

We'd also like to thank all of you who stopped by the IDELIX booth at Geo Tec 2003 held during March in Vancouver, British Columbia. Kudos to Matt Ball, Tracy Brighthaupt, Jo Treadwell and the rest of the organizers who, once again, put on an amazing conference!

Congratulations to Steven Relkov from Viewscape3D Graphics, who was sent home with a selection of top BC wines. Other winners included Tom Sohier from the Regional District of Nanaimo, who had the luck of the Irish and was the proud recipient of our St. Paddy's Day "Special Brew."

That's Steven Relkov pictured to the right. He is accepting his prize from IDELIX Director of Marketing, Stacy Gorkoff.

Check out our online photo gallery and see if you can spot someone you know!

"Doug has a proven track record for developing and executing solid sales strategies," commented IDELIX CEO, Bijan Sanii. "We welcome him to IDELIX and look forward to the leadership and experience he brings to our business development team."

On February 17, 2003, Science World British Columbia officially launched an innovative equity program with IDELIX one of the first companies to sign on. Read the media release on www.idelix.com.

"The integration of high-performance computing and visualization of data management are the essence of information superiority. To fight the enemy, you have to visualize the enemy. You have to know the terrain, you have to know the threats and you even have to know the weather. The issue is reducing the time to insight."

—Bob Bishop, Chairman and CEO of SGI

"The addition of .NET compatibility to our PDT Software Development Kits will extend PDT functionality to systems integrators and developers creating distributed applications for the Internet on the Windows platform," says Dr. David Baar, CTO of IDELIX. "There is an increasing importance of internet-based applications in the GIS, CAD, Image Analysis, and Defense sectors and IDELIX is ready for developers working to address these needs."

The PDT Software Development Kits are currently written in C++, and are built for target platforms such as Linux, IRIX, Windows, Windows CE, and Mac OS-X.

Interested in trying out the PDT SDK 2.1 or PDT 3d SDK? Apply to the IDELIX Partner Program to receive an evaluation SDK. Have questions about our technology? Check out our FAQ's or Whitepapers and Technical Descriptions.

The PDT lens enables you to roam your image set viewing a secondary layer in the lens. The layer appearing within the lens, such as an aerial image or a secondary level of detail, can give pertinent analysis information. The second layer can be geo-coded and aligned with an actual map of the area making additional information such as coordinates available and giving a more informed view of your area of interest.

Download the new PDT Layers Demo, and imagine how PDT can help you analyze and edit related image sets.

Multi-Image Viewing: Read the Function Junction section in this newsletter to find out more!

Download a video demo of PDT for multi-image viewing from our website.

PDT and multiple images Download the video!

This example of a time-sensitive search operation allows image analysts to quickly compare regions of interest in detail as part of tasks such as change detection, while still maintaining contextual awareness of the surroundings.

Chained lenses can also be extended to satellite images geo-referenced with vector maps. Instead of overlaying a satellite image on a map, images can be displayed side-by-side, with chained lenses enabling detailed simultaneous views of the same geo-referenced region.

Interested in adding multi-lens viewing to your application? Apply to our Partner Program and stay tuned for the coming release of the PDT SDK 3.0 beta.

As reported in last month's newsletter, a COM wrapper for the PDT SDK will be released with the next version of the SDK. In order to create COM interfaces, the IDELIX team worked hard to encapsulate most of the functionality of the SDK in a few C++ classes. These classes are known as PDTfi. It was soon determined that due to the common return types and simple parameter types, a wrapper around PDTfi could also be developed to target the .NET Common Language Runtime (CLR) environment. By using "Managed Extensions to C++," it is now possible to create a .NET managed PDTfi object even though PDTfi is written in ANSI C++.

With the increasing popularity of .NET, and the desire to create distributed applications and software solutions, having the .NET compatible functionality in the SDK will make the PDT SDK more valuable. It will also be easier for developers to integrate PDT into current or future software projects due to the different options now available to them (COM, .NET, ANSI C++). As of the release of PDT SDK 3.0 it will be possible for software developers to use the programming language that they are most comfortable with to develop with PDT as long as their programming language of choice supports the .NET CLR.

PDTfi also simplifies many aspects of developing an application with PDT. No longer is there the need to understand how reference counting is handled in the SDK, how mouse events and keyboard events are processed by the MDLC components, or how the PDT lenses relate to the anmWarp classes. Now a developer can simply call methods to add new lenses, change warp renderers, reconfigure lenses, and even manipulate the vertices of the mesh through the PDTfi interface. The power of the PDT SDK is still available but it has become much easier to use with PDTfi.

Check out the PDT Integration Overview for more information on integrating PDT functionality into your application. Email us to become a PDT SDK 3.0 Beta Tester.

Recent Coalition attacks targeted Iraqi TV and radio buildings in Baghdad. [Image courtesy ©DigitalGlobe]

• Intuitive search tools for efficient access to relevant information in high-density data and multiple layers of information
• Real-time visualization to address specialized analysis, targeting and situational awareness needs
• New ways to collaborate and communicate information that will lead to accuracy gains and more informed decisions for both command and control and troops in the field
• Productivity enhancing tools for existing imagery analyst workflow tasks such as battle damage assessment, change detection, multi-image comparisons, and distance/target measurement

Detail-in-context visualization is one solution to these "screen real estate" problems. Pliable Display Technology (PDT) enables OEMs and system integrators to incorporate the associated efficiency gains of detail-in-context viewing and editing capabilities into their software applications. Processing large amounts a data more efficiently saves time and money, making integrator's applications a better investment for the end user. PDT was identified by NIMA as a critical component to the Soft Copy Search Program, and can directly impact the efficiency and accuracy of tasks such as:

• Change Detection and Difference Analysis
• Battle Damage Assessment
• Situational Awareness in the Battlefield
• Tactical Communication and Collaboration
• Targeting via Forward Observation for Artillery
• Photogrammetry and Feature Extraction

If you are interested in receiving a full copy of this PDT Whitepaper, please contact marketing@idelix.com.

Check out the latest PDT video demo on change detection.

May 6-8, 2003
TechNet International 2003
Washington, DC

IDELIX joins hundreds of the world's leading technology organizations at AFCEA's TechNet International.

May 12-14, 2003
SGI® Global Developer Conference
San Jose, CA

Ali Solehdin, IDELIX's Business Development Manager, is representing IDELIX at SGI's conference for IRIX® OS and Linux® OS developers.

May 19-21, 2003
GeoSpatial World 2003
New Orleans, LA

IDELIX CTO and founder, Dr. David Baar will present PDT integrated within Intergraph's GeoMedia in the Military and Government track of this year's Geospatial World. Join us for his presentation:

May 22, 2003
Monte Jade: The 3rd Annual Entrepreneur Workshop & Luncheon
Vancouver, BC

IDELIX CEO Bijan Sanii is a panel member at this year's entrepreneur workshop.
 

For the full list of events, visit our website Events page.

Would you like to meet us? Find out more about PDT? Find out more about these events? Email Tiffany Chester, Communications Coordinator, to set up an appointment for any of these events.