New IDL Object Classes

The following new object classes were added to IDL in this release. See the following topics in the IDL Reference Guide for complete reference information unless otherwise noted.

IDLgrFilterChain

This object lets you apply a series of image filtering shaders to an image object. You can add IDLgrShader objects or objects subclassing from IDLgrShader to this specialized filter chain container. When the sequence of shaders are executed, the output from the first shader is passed to each subsequent shader in the chain until the last shader is reached at which point the result is drawn to the destination device.

IDLgrShader

This object exposes the hardware-based OpenGL Shader Language (GLSL) code within an IDL object graphics application, taking advantage of the flexibility and power offered by completing computationally intensive tasks on a suitable graphics card processing unit instead of the CPU.

IDLgrShaderBytscl

This object is a subclass of IDLgrShader that can be associated with an IDLgrImage, letting you quickly perform a BYTSCL operation on the image data as it is drawn to the screen. This object takes advantage of the advanced processing power of the hardware-based OpenGL Shading Language (GLSL) if an appropriate graphics card is available, or provides a software-based alternative if suitable hardware is not found.

IDLgrShaderConvol3

This convolution shader object is a subclass of IDLgrShader that can be associated with an IDLgrImage object via the SHADER property to perform general 3x3 convolution operations such as smoothing and edge detection on the image data as it is drawn to the screen. If hardware shader support is available, IDL will use it. Otherwise, this object performs the operation using a software-based alternative.

IDLnetOGCWCS

This object lets you access a Web Coverage Service (WCS) server that supports the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) standards. Using this object, you can return unrendered geospatial data containing sensor data, hyperspectral data, elevation data, or imagery from a WCS server. Given a valid URL to an OGS WCS server, this object handles the details of establishing a connection to the server, making requests, receiving responses (and errors, when applicable), and parsing the responses into structures that can be accessed in IDL.

IDLnetOGCWMS

This object lets you access a Web Map Service (WMS) server that supports the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) standards. Using this object, you can return one or more layers of data as a rendered map image. In addition, you can request information on map features if supported by the server and if available.

IDLnetURL

This object allows IDL to act as a client to an HTTP or FTP server. The object handles:

Opening a connection to a remote HTTP or FTP server.

Creating and sending HTTP requests to the remote HTTP or FTP server.

Receiving responses from the remote HTTP or FTP server.

Receiving and writing large data files to disk at a user-specified location.