BitFlow Software Development Kit
Supporting all of our current frame grabbers, BitFlow's Software Development Kit (SDK) allows imaging application developers to take full advantage of the host computer's capabilities. Development libraries provide hardware access and display functions. Working example applications, complete with source code, enable developers to quickly demonstrate BitFlow's products and subsequently integrate them into their applications. The SDK supports the robust multitasking and multiprocessing performance benefits of Windows XP/2003/Vista. The same SDK supports both 32-bit and 64-bit operating systems, making it easy to make the move to 64 bits when the time is ready for your application. The Common Camera Interface Library (Ci) allows for seamless integration with all of BitFlow's products. In addition, the high level Buffer management library (BufIn) makes the task of writing an asynchronous, multiple host buffer application trivial.
There are two version of the SDK, the full version and the drivers only version. For more information see the Drivers, click here
Features
- Supports 32 and 64 bit versions of Windows XP/2003/Vista
- Supports all of BitFlow's current frame grabbers
- Asynchronous, interrupt-driven, multitasking, multi-threaded operation
- C/C++ 32-bit interface for 32-bit version of Windows
- C/C++ 64-bit interface for 64-bit version of Windows
- Acquisition event (e.g. end of frame, end of DMA, loss of sync) notification via a non-polling interrupt signals
- High-level API supports complete setup and acquisition with less than 10 function calls; Low level API supports total control of the camera interface and includes sophisticated line rate and exposure time control
- Very low latency DMA reset code, allows for tight spacing of continuous variable-size imaging targets
- Complete API error tracking system, with all error message destinations under full program control
- Support for building DMA chains of host buffers that are automatically filled during acquisition
- Full observability of the board's current state: line number, maximum line number (for variable size images), acquisition state, trigger status, etc.
- Camera configuration and test utilities
- Example applications with source code for viewing, processing, buffer management and sequence acquisition
- Extensive built-in diagnostics to assist during support incidents
Example Applications
- BiFlow - Sequence capture application using our new BufIn API
- Circ - Circular buffer management application
- BayView - Bayer Filter Color viewing application
- Ci/BiSimple - console based applications
- CiView - Real-time display application*
- BiProces - Real-time processing application
- SysReg - System configuration utility*
- CamVert - Camera configuration file editor
- CamEd - Interactive Camera configuration file editor*
- CiBench - tests PCI DMA throughput capabilities of the host computer*
- BFCom - HyperTerminal-like application allowing direct access to a Camera Link camera through the board's serial port
* Indicates applications included in driver-only installations. The remaining applications are available through the one-time purchase of our SDK.
API Layers
The BitFlow API is broken into tiers. User application can access any tier, higher levels offer more functionality with fewer calls, lower levels offer custom control of the board. Click here for more information.
- Buffer Interface (BufIn): Supports high-level buffer management.(more info)
- Camera Interface level (Ci): Gives applications a common view of the all of our product famile and therefore access to all of the supported analog, digital and Camera Link cameras. Allows the user to control multiple frame grabbers simultaneously.
- High-level interface: Provides the simplest way to initialize the a board and acquire and/or display images. It's the quickest way to verify operation of the interface with a particular camera.
- Middle-level interface: Gives the user more efficient and customized control. Provides real-time access to specialized camera features.
- Low-level interface: Provides the most direct access to board control and status registers and memory. This level fully exposes the boards architecture to the user, something not available in many competing products.
SDK Support
The BitFlow SDK supports Windows Windows XP/2003/Vista on Intel-compatible PC platforms. All BitFlow libraries are native, 32-bit/64-bit implementations directly supported by Microsoft Visual C++ or Visual Studio. However they are are callable from Win32-compliant programming language or application. Contact BitFlow for additional operating systems support.
Drivers are available for off-the-shelf image processing packages such as A&B Software's ImageWarp, MVTec's HALCON, Stemmer Imaging's Common Vision Blox, Media Cybernetics' Image Pro PlusTM, National Instrument's LabView and IO Industries' Video Savant. See the 3rd party software page for the latest drivers. Also see the Ci Drivers page for Common Interface Drivers for 3rd party software.
