Inkjet System Development

The Inkjet System Development group of the client company provides Large Format Graphics solutions for users of Inkjet Printers and Electrostatic Printers. Towards this end, it is responsible for the design and development of various software products. These products support SUN Solaris, Macintosh, Windows 95/98 and Windows NT platforms.

The main objective of this software project is to provide a productive system for printing large format graphics from a PC class workstation using the Microsoft Windows NT operating system environment.

The goals of the 1.0 release were:

  • Provide a low-cost system
  • Provide printing to large format Ink Jet printers
  • Increase material sales ( ink and media )
  • Leverage existing software technologies
  • Maintain competitive advantage for Commercial Graphics customers and sales
  • Force provide a vehicle for OEM sales of software

These goals have been achieved by:

  • Utilizing existing legacy code
  • providing Windows NT support, and
  • integration of Adobe PostScript level 3

Color Table Manager, Version 1.0, is an independent unit of this software. It is a utility for customers of the Scotchprint GraphicMaker and Inkjet software packages. It will provide customers with a simplified method of color lookup table creation and calibration. This application may be delivered as a component of both of these systems.

The User Interface for Rip and Print Queues, Version 1.0 is a major component of the NT software. It provides a GUI for the user to manipulate and perform various functions on the RIP and print queues.

Skills Required

  • Working Knowledge of the Windows 95/NT Operating Systems
  • Design and Development of Windows Applications using Java and C++
  • Porting C/C++ applications from Unix to Windows NT environment
  • Design and Development of Native C++ and Java Virtual Machine (JVM) Applications
  • Usage of Microsoft Visual C++ IDE, and Borland Jbuilder IDE, and Purify NT Software
  • Usage of Installshield 5.1 Software package and its scripting language

Services Used

Embedded Systems was involved in the following software projects/units of the Inkjet System development:

Large Format Graphics Software for Windows NT version 1.0

Embedded Systems was responsible for successfully porting the Unix-based, RIP (Raster Image Processing) and print Queue Library to Windows NT. The Library was developed originally using C and C++ and Unix system calls. Windows equivalents were developed for each of these Unix calls.

Cactus NT software is a set of interdependent Java Applications. Some of them are designed as independent utilities (e.g. Color Table manager). An optimum Launch method had to be evolved to provide the Java Virtual Environment for each of the applications. Embedded Systems was responsible for evolving this method and also for the design and development of a generic C++ based Windows application to provide the JVMs.
The NT software was packaged into a user-friendly setup application using Installshield 5.1 and a suitable software media was built to burn into CDs.

NT Software, User Interface for Rip and Print Queues, Version 1.0

Embedded Systems was responsible for successfully porting the Unix-based, Queue Access Library to Windows NT. The Queue Access Library comprises routines that use the queue Library to manipulate the Queue database.

The Graphic User Interface (GUI) was being developed using Java and the existing Queue libraries were in C++. It was required to develop a suitable Java Native Interface (JNI) between these two layers. The entire JNI layer between the NT Queue GUI and the Queue library was designed and developed by Embedded Systems using novel algorithms.

Color Table manager, Version 1.0

Embedded Systems was responsible for maintaining this software and providing a suitable Java Virtual Machine to launch it as an independent Java Application. Later, Color Table Manager was added as a component to the NT Software. The Filechooser component of this software was enhanced. The existing Unix based Java Application was configured as a Jbuilder project for Windows NT.
Project Size

13 Man Months

Customer

A Technology Company in St Paul, MN