dcmsend - Online in the Cloud

PROGRAM:

NAME

dcmsend - Simple DICOM storage SCU (sender)

SYNOPSIS

dcmsend [options] peer port dcmfile-in...

DESCRIPTION

The dcmsend application implements a Service Class User (SCU) for the Storage Service
Class. In contrast to the well-known storescu utility, dcmsend has less options and is,
therefore, easier to use - this also explains the term 'simple' in the title. The main
purpose of this application is to send a whole bunch of DICOM files to a Storage Service
Class Provider (SCP). dcmsend supports both multiple associations (one after the other)
and decompression of DICOM SOP instances if needed to transfer them.

PARAMETERS

peer hostname of DICOM peer

port tcp/ip port number of peer

dcmfile-in DICOM file or directory to be transmitted

OPTIONS

general options
-h --help
print this help text and exit

--version
print version information and exit

--list-decoders
list transfer syntaxes of decoders and exit

--arguments
print expanded command line arguments

-q --quiet
quiet mode, print no warnings and errors

-v --verbose
verbose mode, print processing details

-d --debug
debug mode, print debug information

-ll --log-level [l]evel: string constant
(fatal, error, warn, info, debug, trace)
use level l for the logger

-lc --log-config [f]ilename: string
use config file f for the logger

+v --verbose-pc
show presentation contexts in verbose mode

input options
input file format:

+f --read-file
read file format or data set

+fo --read-file-only
read file format only (default)

-f --read-dataset
read data set without file meta information

input files:

+rd --read-from-dicomdir
read information on input files from DICOMDIR

+sd --scan-directories
scan directories for input files (dcmfile-in)

+sp --scan-pattern [p]attern: string (only with --scan-directories)
pattern for filename matching (wildcards)

# possibly not available on all systems

-r --no-recurse
do not recurse within directories (default)

+r --recurse
recurse within specified directories

processing options
transfer syntax conversion:

-dn --decompress-never
never decompress compressed data sets

+dls --decompress-lossless
only decompress lossless compression (default)

+dly --decompress-lossy
decompress both lossy and lossless compression

deflate compression level:

+cl --compression-level [l]evel: integer (default: 6)
0=uncompressed, 1=fastest, 9=best compression

other processing options:

-nh --no-halt
do not halt on first invalid input file
or if unsuccessful store encountered

-nip --no-illegal-proposal
do not propose any presentation context that does
not contain the default transfer syntax (if needed)

-nuc --no-uid-checks
do not check UID values of input files

network options
application entity titles:

-aet --aetitle [a]etitle: string
set my calling AE title (default: DCMSEND)

-aec --call [a]etitle: string
set called AE title of peer (default: ANY-SCP)

association handling:

+ma --multi-associations
use multiple associations (one after the other)
if needed to transfer the instances (default)

-ma --single-association
always use a single association

other network options:

-to --timeout [s]econds: integer (default: unlimited)
timeout for connection requests

-ta --acse-timeout [s]econds: integer (default: 30)
timeout for ACSE messages

-td --dimse-timeout [s]econds: integer (default: unlimited)
timeout for DIMSE messages

-pdu --max-pdu [n]umber of bytes: integer (4096..131072)
set max receive pdu to n bytes (default: 16384)

--max-send-pdu [n]umber of bytes: integer (4096..131072)
restrict max send pdu to n bytes

output options
general:

+crf --create-report-file [f]ilename: string
create a detailed report on the transfer
(if successful) and write it to text file f

NOTES

Typical Usage
A typical use case of dcmsend is to send arbitrary SOP instances that are stored as DICOM
files to a storage SCP. The following command does exactly this:

dcmsend --verbose <peer> <port> *.dcm

If the DICOM files are stored in a hierarchy of directories below the directory 'IMAGES',
the following command can be used:

dcmsend -v <peer> <port> --scan-directories --recurse IMAGES

It is also possible to specify multiple directories and to combine the aforementioned
approaches (using both file and directory names):

dcmsend -v +sd +r <peer> <port> IMAGES_1 IMAGES_2 test.img *.dcm

If the SOP instances are referenced from a DICOMDIR file, option --read-from-dicomdir (or
+rd) can be used to send all referenced DICOM files without loading them already for the
association negotiation:

dcmsend -v <peer> <port> --read-from-dicomdir DICOMDIR

And again, all of the above approaches can be combined like this:

dcmsend -v +sd +r +rd <peer> <port> IMAGES_1 IMAGES_2 test.img DICOMDIR *.dcm

The default option --read-file-only makes sure that only DICOM files (i.e. the ones with
meta-header and magic word 'DICM' after the preamble) are processed. Usually, if
processing a whole bunch of files, it is also a good idea not to halt on the first invalid
input file or if an unsuccessful store was encountered. This can be accomplished by using
option --no-halt. Please note, however, that 'unsuccessful store' does not mean that the
DIMSE status of the C-STORE response indicates an error. It means that the C-STORE request
could not be sent to the storage SCP.

If more than 128 presentation contexts are needed, which is the maximum number allowed
according to the DICOM standard, a new association is started after the previous one has
been completed. In cases where this behavior is unwanted, it can be disabled using option
--single-association. In addition, whether only lossless compressed data sets are
decompressed (if needed), which is the default, or also lossy compressed data sets can be
specified using the --decompress-xxx options.

In order to get both an overview and detailed information on the transfer of the DICOM SOP
instances, option --create-report-file can be used to create a corresponding text file.
However, this file is only created as a final step if the application did not terminate
before (with an error).

Scanning Directories
Adding directories as a parameter to the command line only makes sense if option --scan-
directories is also given. If the files in the provided directories should be selected
according to a specific name pattern (e.g. using wildcard matching), option --scan-pattern
has to be used. Please note that this file pattern only applies to the files within the
scanned directories, and, if any other patterns are specified on the command line outside
the --scan-pattern option (e.g. in order to select further files), these do not apply to
the specified directories.

Thus, the third of the above examples will recurse over directories IMAGES_1 and IMAGES_2
and transmit files that are contained in these two folders and all their subfolders (due
to option +r). Additionally, dcmsend will transfer 'test.img' and all files with extension
'dcm' from the current working folder. Note that providing directory names without
enabling option +sd does not make sense.

DICOM Conformance
Basically, the dcmsend application supports all Storage SOP Classes as an SCU, including
private ones. By default, the application checks the SOP Class UID of the DICOM file in
order to make sure that only valid SOP instances are sent. With option --no-uid-checks
this check can be disabled.

The dcmsend application also supports all Transfer Syntaxes that are defined in the DICOM
standard. Private transfer syntaxes can only be used if the UID check is disabled with
option --no-uid-checks. Please note, however, that only a limited number of transfer
syntaxes are supported for converting them to the default transfer syntax (Implicit VR
Little Endian). With option --list-decoders the transfer syntaxes supported natively or by
decoders are listed. The output typically looks like the following:

Transfer syntaxes supported natively:
- Little Endian Implicit
- Little Endian Explicit
- Big Endian Explicit

Transfer syntaxes supported by decoders:
- Deflated Explicit VR Little Endian
- JPEG Baseline
- JPEG Extended, Process 2+4
- JPEG Spectral Selection, Non-hierarchical, Process 6+8
- JPEG Full Progression, Non-hierarchical, Process 10+12
- JPEG Lossless, Non-hierarchical, Process 14
- JPEG Lossless, Non-hierarchical, 1st Order Prediction
- JPEG-LS Lossless
- JPEG-LS Lossy (Near-lossless)
- RLE Lossless

Since dcmsend tries to be as simple as possible for the user, by default presentation
contexts might be proposed to the SCP that are strictly speaking 'illegal'. This is
because, according to the DICOM standard, the SCU always has to propose the default
transfer syntax in at least one presentation context associated with each abstract syntax
(i.e. SOP class). This requirement is waived when the SCU only has access to the SOP
instance in lossy compressed form. With option --no-illegal-proposal the strict DICOM-
conformant behavior can be enforced, i.e. no possibly illegal presentation context will be
proposed but the corresponding SOP instance will be rejected (if needed).

Please note, however, that the default transfer syntax for 'Lossless JPEG Compression',
'Lossy JPEG Compression' and so on are not always proposed as also required by the DICOM
standard. The same limitation applies to other compression schemes. See DICOM PS 3.5
section 10 for details.

LOGGING

The level of logging output of the various command line tools and underlying libraries can
be specified by the user. By default, only errors and warnings are written to the standard
error stream. Using option --verbose also informational messages like processing details
are reported. Option --debug can be used to get more details on the internal activity,
e.g. for debugging purposes. Other logging levels can be selected using option --log-
level. In --quiet mode only fatal errors are reported. In such very severe error events,
the application will usually terminate. For more details on the different logging levels,
see documentation of module 'oflog'.

In case the logging output should be written to file (optionally with logfile rotation),
to syslog (Unix) or the event log (Windows) option --log-config can be used. This
configuration file also allows for directing only certain messages to a particular output
stream and for filtering certain messages based on the module or application where they
are generated. An example configuration file is provided in <etcdir>/logger.cfg.

COMMAND LINE

All command line tools use the following notation for parameters: square brackets enclose
optional values (0-1), three trailing dots indicate that multiple values are allowed
(1-n), a combination of both means 0 to n values.

Command line options are distinguished from parameters by a leading '+' or '-' sign,
respectively. Usually, order and position of command line options are arbitrary (i.e. they
can appear anywhere). However, if options are mutually exclusive the rightmost appearance
is used. This behavior conforms to the standard evaluation rules of common Unix shells.

In addition, one or more command files can be specified using an '@' sign as a prefix to
the filename (e.g. @command.txt). Such a command argument is replaced by the content of
the corresponding text file (multiple whitespaces are treated as a single separator unless
they appear between two quotation marks) prior to any further evaluation. Please note that
a command file cannot contain another command file. This simple but effective approach
allows one to summarize common combinations of options/parameters and avoids longish and
confusing command lines (an example is provided in file <datadir>/dumppat.txt).

EXIT CODES

The dcmsend utility uses the following exit codes when terminating. This enables the user
to check for the reason why the application terminated.

general
EXITCODE_NO_ERROR 0
EXITCODE_COMMANDLINE_SYNTAX_ERROR 1

input file errors
EXITCODE_CANNOT_READ_INPUT_FILE 20 (*)
EXITCODE_NO_INPUT_FILES 21
EXITCODE_INVALID_INPUT_FILE 22
EXITCODE_NO_VALID_INPUT_FILES 23

output file errors
EXITCODE_CANNOT_WRITE_OUTPUT_FILE 40 (*)
EXITCODE_CANNOT_WRITE_REPORT_FILE 43

network errors
EXITCODE_CANNOT_INITIALIZE_NETWORK 60
EXITCODE_CANNOT_NEGOTIATE_ASSOCIATION 61
EXITCODE_CANNOT_SEND_REQUEST 62
EXITCODE_CANNOT_ADD_PRESENTATION_CONTEXT 65

(*) Actually, these codes are currently not used by dcmsend but serve as a placeholder for
the corresponding group of exit codes.

ENVIRONMENT

The dcmsend utility will attempt to load DICOM data dictionaries specified in the
DCMDICTPATH environment variable. By default, i.e. if the DCMDICTPATH environment variable
is not set, the file <datadir>/dicom.dic will be loaded unless the dictionary is built
into the application (default for Windows).

The default behavior should be preferred and the DCMDICTPATH environment variable only
used when alternative data dictionaries are required. The DCMDICTPATH environment variable
has the same format as the Unix shell PATH variable in that a colon (':') separates
entries. On Windows systems, a semicolon (';') is used as a separator. The data dictionary
code will attempt to load each file specified in the DCMDICTPATH environment variable. It
is an error if no data dictionary can be loaded.

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