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Scope of Project

Scope​

Cornerstone3D is a javascript library that enables 3D rendering of medical images using purely web standards. The library employs WebGL for GPU accelerated rendering whenever possible. Cornerstone3DTools is a peer library to Cornerstone3D and contains a number manipulation and annotations tools that are used to interact with the images.

The Cornerstone3D scope DOES NOT encompass dealing with image/volume loading and metadata parsing. The Cornerstone3D scope DOES include image rendering and caching. Proper image loaders should be registered TO the cornerstone3D using imageLoader.registerImageLoader and volumeLoader.registerVolumeLoader. Examples of such image loaders are wadors loader using cornerstoneDICOMImageLoader for DICOM P10 instances over dicomweb and wadouri for the DICOM P10 instances over HTTP.

In addition, Cornerstone3D has a metadata registration mechanism that allows metadata parsers to be registered TO the Cornerstone3D using metaData.addProvider. Using cornerstoneDICOMImageLoader, its image loaders and metadata providers self-register with the Cornerstone3D. You can always checkout the example helpers to see how an end-to-end example from metadata parsing to image loading and image rendering can be achieved.

Typescript​

Since all libraries in the Cornerstone3D monorepo are written in Typescript, they provide a type-safe API. This means that you can use the library in a TypeScript environment and using type information, you can be assured that the parameters being passed to any method match what is expected.

Browser Support​

Cornerstone3D uses the HTML5 canvas element and WebGL 2.0 GPU rendering to render images which is supported by all modern browsers. Our advanced volume rendering has recently been revamped to allow for better performance and memory management and without the requirement of using sharedArrayBuffer which previously was a requirement for rendering volumes.

  • Chrome > 68
  • Firefox > 79
  • Edge > 79

If you are using an older browser, or don't have any graphics cards, your device might not be able to render volumetric images with Cornerstone3D. However, you can still render stack images using the CPU fallback that we have implemented in Cornerstone3D for such scenarios.

Monorepo hierarchy​

Cornerstone3D is a monorepo that contains the following packages:

  • /packages/core: The core library responsible for rendering images and volumesand caching.
  • /packages/tools: The tool library for manipulation, annotation and segmentation rendering and tools.
  • /packages/dicom-image-loader: The image loader for wadors and wadouri DICOM P10 instances over HTTP.
  • /packages/nifti-volume-loader: The image loader for NIfTI files.
  • /packages/docs: Documentation for all the packages including guides, examples, and API reference.