Scientific Visualization Comparison of Visualization Packages

Comparison of Visualization Packages

This appendix contains an overview of the possibilities of the four general visualization packages compared. It is not meant to be complete. For a more detailed description of the packages we refer to the documentation of the visualization packages. In the following tables a `+' indicates that a feature is available or supported and a `-' indicates that the feature is not available or supported. Data Visualizer and IRIS Explorer have been abbreviated to DV and IE respectively.

• Table 1. Minimum physical memory size needed to run the visualization packages.

  
  
    ________________________________________________________________
  |								  |
  |  Minimum physical memory size in Mbytes to run the package   	  |
  |_________________________________________________________________|
  |                     |          |          |          |          |
  |                     |  DV 3.0  |  IE 3.0  |  AVS 5.0 |  DX 2.1  |
  |_____________________|__________|__________|__________|__________|
  |                     |          |          |          |          |
  | memory size         |    16    |    24    |    16    |    32    |
  |_____________________|__________|__________|__________|__________|
  
  
  
  
  
  

• Table 2. Estimates of the memory consumption for the visualization of an isosurface. Included actions are: reading the 3D scalar field, coloring the field, extracting the isosurface, and displaying the result. The dimension of the data field is 30 * 50 * 50. Memory consumption on the Silicon Graphics VGX, on which we run DV, IE, and AVS, was measured using the 'gr_osview' utility. DX prints its memory use in a debug window.

   _________________________________________________________________
  |								  |
  |  Memory consumption in Mbytes for a typical visualization   	  |
  |_________________________________________________________________|
  |                     |          |          |          |          |
  |                     |  DV 3.0  |  IE 3.0  |  AVS 5.0 |  DX 2.1  |
  |_____________________|__________|__________|__________|__________|
  |                     |          |          |          |          |
  | memory consumption  |   4.4    |   7.0    |   5.8    |   10.0   |
  |_____________________|__________|__________|__________|__________|
  
  
  
  

• Table 3. The support for functional extension.

   ___________________________________________________________________
  |			  					    |
  |                            Support for functional extension	    |
  |___________________________________________________________________|
  |                       |          |          |          |          |
  |                       |  DV 3.0  |  IE 3.0  |  AVS 5.0 |  DX 2.1  |
  |_______________________|__________|__________|__________|__________|
  |                       |          |          |          |          |
  | functional extension  |    -     |    +     |    +     |    +     |
  | module builder        |    -     |    +     |    +     |    +     |
  | Fortran support       |    -     |    +     |    +     |    +     |
  | C support             |    -     |    +     |    +     |    +     |
  | C++ support           |    -     |    +     |    -     |    -     |
  | API                   |    -     |    +     |    +     |    +     |
  |_______________________|__________|__________|__________|__________|
  
  
  
  

• Table 4. The support for distributive processing and computational steering.

   ______________________________________________________________________
  |								       |
  |       Support for distributive processing and computational steering |
  |______________________________________________________________________|
  |                          |          |          |          |          |
  |                          |  DV 3.0  |  IE 3.0  |  AVS 5.0 |  DX 2.1  |
  |__________________________|__________|__________|__________|__________|
  |                          |          |          |          |          |
  | distributive processing  |    -     |    +     |    +     |    +     |
  | computational steering   |    -     |    +     |    +     |    +     |
  |__________________________|__________|__________|__________|__________|
  
  
  
  

• Table 5. The support for some general data file formats.

   _________________________________________________________________
  |								  |
  |  Minimum physical memory size in Mbytes to run the package   	  |
  |_________________________________________________________________|
  |                     |          |          |          |          |
  |                     |  DV 3.0  |  IE 3.0  |  AVS 5.0 |  DX 2.1  |
  |_____________________|__________|__________|__________|__________|
  |                     |          |          |          |          |
  | netCDF              |    +     |    -     |    -     |    +     |
  | HDF                 |    -     |    +     |    -     |    +     |
  | PDB                 |    -     |    +     |    +     |    -     |
  | PLOT3D              |    +     |    +     |    +     |    -     |
  | AVS field           |    +     |    +     |    +     |    -     |
  | Wavefront object    |    +     |    -     |    +     |    -     |
  |_____________________|__________|__________|__________|__________|
  
  
  
  

• Table 6. The support for reading custom data file formats.

   ___________________________________________________________________
  |								    |
  |                 Support for reading custom data file formats      |
  |___________________________________________________________________|
  |                       |          |          |          |          |
  |                       |  DV 3.0  |  IE 3.0  |  AVS 5.0 |  DX 2.1  |
  |_______________________|__________|__________|__________|__________|
  |                       |          |          |          |          |
  | data reader software  |    +     |    +     |    +     |    +     |
  | general data parser   |    -     |    +     |    +     |    +     |
  |_______________________|__________|__________|__________|__________|
  
  
  
  

• Table 7. The standard support for some general image file formats (W=write, R=read).

   _________________________________________________________
  |							  |
  |               Supported general image file formats   	  |
  |_________________________________________________________|
  |             |          |          |          |          |
  |             |  DV 3.0  |  IE 3.0  |  AVS 5.0 |  DX 2.1  |
  |_____________|__________|__________|__________|__________|
  |             |          |          |          |          |
  | RGB         |    -     |   W/R    |    -     |   W/R    |
  | TIFF        |    -     |   W/R    |    -     |   W/R    |
  | GIF         |    -     |    -     |    -     |    -     |
  | CGM         |    -     |    -     |    -     |    -     |
  | PostScript  |    W     |    -     |    W     |    W     |
  |_____________|__________|__________|__________|__________|
  
  
  
  

• Table 8. The standard available animation techniques.

   
   _________________________________________________________
  |							  |
  |                  Animation techniques   		  |
  |_________________________________________________________|
  |             |          |          |          |          |
  |             |  DV 3.0  |  IE 3.0  |  AVS 5.0 |  DX 2.1  |
  |_____________|__________|__________|__________|__________|
  |             |          |          |          |          |
  | keyframe    |    +     |    -     |    -     |    -     |
  | flipbook    |    +     |    -     |    +     |    +     |
  |_____________|__________|__________|__________|__________|
  
  
  
  

• Table 9. The standard available visualization techniques.

   __________________________________________________________________
  |						  	           |
  | 			  Visualization techniques   		   |
  |__________________________________________________________________|
  |                      |          |          |          |          |
  |                      |  DV 3.0  |  IE 3.0  |  AVS 5.0 |  DX 2.1  |
  |______________________|__________|__________|__________|__________|
  |                      |          |          |          |          |
  | isosurfaces          |    +     |    +     |    +     |    +     |
  | cutting planes       |    +     |    +     |    +     |    +     |
  | scalar glyphs        |    +     |    +     |    +     |    +     |
  | vector glyphs        |    +     |    +     |    +     |    +     |
  | particle advection   |    +     |    +     |    +     |    +     |
  | streamlines          |    +     |    -     |    +     |    +     |
  | streaklines          |    -     |    +     |    -     |    +     |
  | textures             |    +     |    +     |    +     |    +     |
  | ray casting          |    +     |    -     |    +     |    +     |
  | splatting            |    -     |    +     |    -     |    -     |
  | 3D texture mapping   |    -     |    -     |    +     |    -     |
  |______________________|__________|__________|__________|__________|
  
  
  
  

• Table 10. The standard available annotation techniques.

   _____________________________________________________________
  |							      |
  | 		     Annotation techniques   		      |
  |_____________________________________________________________|
  |                 |          |          |          |          |
  |                 |  DV 3.0  |  IE 3.0  |  AVS 5.0 |  DX 2.1  |
  |_________________|__________|__________|__________|__________|
  |                 |          |          |          |          |
  | axis            |    +     |    +     |    +     |    +     |
  | boundary        |    +     |    +     |    +     |    +     |
  | color legend    |    +     |    +     |    +     |    +     |
  | text label      |    +     |    +     |    +     |    +     |
  | histogram       |    -     |    +     |    +     |    +     |
  | plot            |    +     |    +     |    +     |    +     |
  |_________________|__________|__________|__________|__________|
  
  
  
  

• Table 11. Some links to module repositories and/or interesting sites with information. There are also newsgoups on the different software packages.

   ________________________________________________________________________
  |							     	        |
  | 		     Interesting sites   		     		 |
  |________________________________________________________________________|
  |		     |					     		 |
  | Data Visualizer    |					     		 |
  |		     |					     		 |
  | information	     | -	     					 |
  | module repository  | -	     					 |
  | newsgroup	     | news:comp.graphics.apps.wavefront 		 |
  |____________________|___________________________________________________|
  |		     |					     		 |
  | Iris Explorer      |					     		 |
  |		     |					     		 |
  | information	     | http://www.nag.co.uk:70/visual/IE/iecbb/IEC.html  |
  | module repository  | http://www.nag.co.uk/1h/visual/IE/iecbb/Upload    |
  | newsgroup	     | news:comp.graphics.apps.iris-explorer       	 |
  |____________________|___________________________________________________|
  |		     |					     		 |
  | AVS    	     |					      	  	 |
  |		     |					     		 |
  | information	     | http://www.avs.com/	     			 |
  | module repository  | http://iac.ncsc.org/IAC/ftpsite.html	     	 |
  | newsgroup	     | news:comp.graphics.apps.avs 			 |
  |____________________|___________________________________________________|
  |		     |					     		 |
  | Data eXplorer (DX) |					     		 |
  |		     |					     		 |
  | information	     | http://www-i.almaden.ibm.com/dx/	     		 |
  | module repository  | http://www.tc.cornell.edu/DX/	     		 |
  | newsgroup	     | news:comp.graphics.apps.data-explorer 		 |
  |____________________|___________________________________________________|