It’s Alive!
Well, almost. The next version of the KnowledgeLake Image Viewer is in the last stages of testing but we are close enough to release that I can take this time to blog about it. Since this version has not officially been released yet of course items you see here are subject to change.
Back in the development area in KnowledgeLake’s St Louis office the Imaging Team has been working on a new version of the KnowledgeLake Image Viewer. This version is more then an evolution of the previous viewer. It is a complete rewrite from the ground up on new technology. For those of you already running a “previous” version of the viewer, you are going to be amazed with all the features and functionality that are available in the 2.0 version.
Because no one is going to read a mile long blog here is a quick and short list of features and functionalities you will find in the 2.0 version of the KnowledgeLake Image Viewer:
Thin Client – no Java or ActiveX controls required on the client
Supports Tif, PNG, BMP, GIF and JPG.
New updated user interface
AJAX-enabled
Integration with SharePoint products
View and Update Document Library Metadata
Tif annotations
Extensible
Today I want to take a quick look at version that KnowledgeLake will be releasing in the very near future. To start with this version of the viewer is build around Windows SharePoint Services and SharePoint Portal Server. Although this version is built around SPS and WSS the team is already extending the viewer to support other environments. Figure 1 displays a KnowledgeLake Document Imaging Library ( part of the KnowledgeLake Imaging products). Notice the Viewer icon? Simply click on the Viewer icon to view your tif, png, bmp, gif or jpg in the KnowledgeLake Image Viewer.
Figure 1 – KnowledgeLake Document Imaging Library with Viewer Icon (Click here for larger image)
Clicking on the Viewer icon associated with the HJPO00023857.tif document results with the HJPO00023857.tif opening on the client machine in the KnowledgeLake Image Viewer 2.0. Figure 2 below shows the KLPO33445.tif document opened in the KnowledgeLake Image Viewer 2.0. If you look closely you will noticed that the viewer opens up in Internet Explorer – no Java or ActiveX controls required!
Figure 2 – KnowledgeLake Image Viewer displaying KLPO33445.tif (Click here for larger image)
The KnowledgeLake Image Viewer 2.0 displays both thumbnails and the image in the viewer. Thumbnails become more important when working with multi-page tif files. The thumbnails can be used to preview the pages quickly as well opening the associated page in the viewer. For anyone who would prefer not to have thumbnails at all you can easily turn them off by selecting the “None” checkbox un the Thumbnail area of the toolbar. Navigating the pages of a tif file can also be done using the Page controls in the toolbar.
The new Image Viewer also supports multiple ways to zoom your view of the document. Use the zoom slider bar, one of the magnifying glass icons or one of three quick select options. Figure 3 below shows the image zoomed in to allow for easier editing. The nice thing about the zoom or even changing pages is that it is all done using AJAX technology to support quick and smooth update of the image.
Figure 3 – Zoomed in using AJAX technology for easy viewing (Click here for larger image)
This version of the viewer is based on SharePoint technologies. Figure 1 displayed the document library that contains the tif we are viewing. Displaying documents and images from a document library is not the only feature that integrates with SharePoint. Figure 4 displays the viewer with it’s property pane displaying the metadata associated with this particular tif file. The KnowledgeLake 2.0 viewer allows users with the correct permissions to modify the document metadata easily without requiring the user to navigate back to the containing document library.
Figure 4 – Viewer with open property pane (Click here for larger image)
Figure 5 displays the property pane after the user added a value to the MNEMONIC metadata field. Afterclicking the Save button the new metadata value is saved in the SharePoint document library. Figure 6 shows the updated piece of metadata.
Figure 5 – User adding metadata (Click here for larger image)
Figure 6 – Updated document metadata (Click here for larger image)
Today I have provided a brief look at KnowledgeLake Image Viewer 2.0. We really only covered the user interface. In my next post on the new viewer we will drill down and take a first look at the KnowledgeLake Image Viewer 2.0 annotation implementation.