A formalization for the specification and systematic generation of computer graphics systems (Q1096430)

Much effort has been devoted by the computer graphics research community towards standardization in this field. But emergence of the first computer graphics international standard GKS (ISO-7942), besides great benefits, rises some implementations problems also. The paper deals with one of these problems: the generation of workstation drivers. Based on the concept of logical viewing pipeline defined in GKS and introducing a rather sophisticated formalization, a method to generate workstation drivers, using information such as the required characteristics of the workstation and the capabilities of physical devices, is presented. The intention to develop means for the generation of adaptive graphics systems, with emphasis on automatic generation of workstation drivers, is presented in the first two sections, together with the functional treatment of the GKS viewing pipeline model. The rest of the paper seems less pragmatic. A rather theoretical approach with sophisticated notations and very few examples, gives only little help to the common GKS implementer. The algorithm for the conversion of logical operation sequences (LOSs) of workstations into physical operation sequences (POSs) of the graphic devices, is given in the appendix in a global form which makes it seem very hard to implement. As a formal approach to the high level specification of computer graphics systems (not only GKS), the paper constitutes a valuable starting point for discussion and development of methods for the systematic generation of such systems, and for the study of the architecture of pipeline-based graphic devices needed to meet computer graphics standards functionality.