Packlib, an interactive environment to develop modular software for data processing

Abstract

In this paper, we present a software concept and implementation allowing to develop modular software, i.e. a single software composed of modules written by different people and then joined together. We begin by establishing a set of rules that should be verified to obtain a powerful environment: modular code, powerful graphic capabilities, compiled code to reach maximum speed, mechanism to easily modify the parameters of the modules. We apply these rules, introduce the concepts of the environment called Pacldib and describe a graphical tool, grapher, which implements the Packlib concepts. As a demonstration of the capabilities of Packlib, we show an example/tutorial of a Kohonen simulator and describe briefly the modules needed: data generation module, then data processing (the kohonen module) and finally graphic output (cgraph). To control all the parameters of the simulation, a module (panel) allows to design a graphical user interface with control panels, sliders, buttons, menus, etc.