The Uniforce Saga

Chapter 1 A Dark and Stormy Night

People always ask me how I started Uniforce. Well we need to jump into the time machine way back to July of 1986 I just became unemployed and was feeling very low. I had no job and no prospects. So one dark and stormy night (I have always wanted to start a story like this) I was having a Jack Daniels, actually I believe consumption, at that point it was almost a full bottle of Jack Daniels Whiskey when something magical happened. My Welsh Pembroke Corgi, Auggie the dog, spoke to me. He advised me that I should stop feeling sorry for myself, get out of my jammies and off the couch and start a company. This company should be in image processing business. I nearly fell off my chair, wow a talking dog!

After I got my composure back I then had a couple more Jack Daniels. Things became much clearer, maybe my dog had something. So the very next day I started making some phone calls. I found three benefactors that were willing for me to be their reps hence the beginning of Uniforce Sales and Engineering.

You could say I was the “Uni” in the Uniforce. Prior to becoming unemployed I had put money in the bank for a rainy day. I knew that the company would not be solvent for a period of three years. Well, to make a long story short, our first year in business we made $19.00. Twenty four years later we are a multimillion dollar company with multiple offices in multiple states.

We are recognized as one of the pioneers of image processing. Our products and services are shipped worldwide. Our cameras have been to the bottom of the ocean, taking images of the Titanic, and literally out of this world. They are on the space station, mars rovers and in deep space. We will go where no man has gone before such is the voyage of the starship Uniforce. I love that line.

Image processing projects can be as simple as counting how many sausages are in a TV dinner to as complicated as robotic surgery on tumors within the brain. We supply cameras, frame grabbers, lighting, lenses and image processing products and expertise to over 400 companies worldwide.

Uniforce sales and engineering gets involved in projects in many different areas from Archaeology to Zoology (i.e. A to Z).

It has always been Uniforce policy place the customer first. We try to walk in your shoes before walking in ours. That is why we are successful.

We are constantly striving to keep up with today's technology. This allows us to give the customer, state-of-the-art solutions at affordable costs. Due to the recession that now plagues our country many companies do not have the resources to carry out image processing projects. The cost of an image processing specialist is well over $150,000 per year, not to mention all the risk of potentially fatal project. We can help solve those issues cost effectively.

- Ben

I enjoy a two way conversation with readers so please feel free to leave a comment and get in touch.

Chapter 2 The Lean years (coming soon to a blog near you)

MIL Distribution

“Sometimes I am confused by what I think is really obvious. But what I think is obvious obviously isn’t obvious.” Michael Stipe.

MIL offers an extensive set of options when it comes to licensing. From selecting the type of license used to choosing if the license is even visible to an end user, a good understanding of those options is key. To take advantage of MIL to its fullest, we strongly suggest that you take a few minutes the read the following:

MIL imaging software is a powerful image acquisition and processing software development package widely used in the semiconductor industry, medical imaging, research laboratories, production, industrial, aerospace and scientific industries to name a few.

MIL is available in two different versions – MIL-Lite and MIL Development toolkit.

MIL-Lite can be described as “baby MIL” i.e. shorter version of the MIL Development toolkit. MIL-Lite is basically used to acquire live images and carry out limited processing.

MIL Development toolkit is a comprehensive software development toolkit with image acquisition and processing features. Some of the processing features present are: blob analysis, geometric model finder, edge finder, pattern matching, coder reader and OCR (optical character recognition), image processing, measurement and calibration module, color analysis, string reader, graphical processing image, 3D calibration and reconstruction package, and metrology package. Run-time licenses are required in addition to the MIL Development toolkit in order to enable some of these features. We will discuss this further in detail in the next blog. For now we will focus on distribution.

[Note: At any instant of time, only one copy of MIL can be present on a system. MIL licensing is not automatic – the user using “MIL Config” needs to install (activate) the license.]

MIL Distribution

In many cases after an application has been developed using MIL Development toolkit we would like to deploy this application on other computers either in our own laboratories or our client’s laboratory/site without any modification or debugging. In these cases MIL distribution serves as an important tool.

Components needed for MIL Distribution

1) MIL/MIL-Lite DLLs

2) MIL/MIL-Lite device drivers (drivers for Matrox frame grabber)

3) License for appropriate modules/features known as a run-time license. [Note: Matrox has combined several modules together for economic benefits. Please contact Uniforce Sales and Engineering to learn more about combinations.]

Redistributing MIL

MIL DLLs and drivers can be distributed in two different ways:

1) Using original MIL/MIL-Lite DVD: if you are deploying MIL application within your lab or within an easily accessible range then the original MIL/MIL-Lite DVD can be used.

Procedure: Run MIL/MIL-Lite set-up program and choose run-time options.

2) Custom set-up is of two different types:

a. Interactive or normal distribution

b. Silent redistribution

Interactive or normal redistribution

As the word indicates, “Interactive” means interaction between the user and the software. In interactive redistribution your application set-up program calls MIL/MIL-Lite set-up program and prompts the user to proceed with the installation of the DLLs and drivers.

The procedure involved:

• Copy the contents of MIL/MIL-Lite to your installation directory

• Have the redistribution program call the setup.exe file located in the installation directory

• Run the setup.exe (client should select only .MIL-Run-time)

If you want to limit the content of MIL/MIL-Lite in your installation then Redist.exe program can be used.

Silent Redistribution

As the word indicates, “Silent” means the installation of the MIL/MIL-Lite takes place automatically without the knowledge of the user. It uses a response file to set-up the necessary parameters for the intended computer. Silent redistribution is intended to be used when the developer does not wish the Matrox imaging dialog box to appear during the installation.

If you have any questions on MIL redistribution please leave a comment.

- Sudeep

Next blog from me: Different Types of Licensing

Brief History of CCD cameras

The credit of designing and developing a CCD sensor goes to W.S Boyle and G.E Smith from Bell Telephone laboratories. The idea of developing an analogous device using a semiconductor struck Jack Morton, Vice president of Bell Laboratories, after the development of the magnetic bubble memory. During the same time picture phone, using diode array silicon, was also being developed. The amalgamation of these two technologies gave rise to the CCD sensor.

The first three phase device consisted of 100 micron metal plate separated by 3 micron spacing. The first gate electrode was used to inject charges into the second plate and the ninth plate was used to detect charge. Plates 2-8 were clocked to demonstrate the transfer process.

The Bucket Brigade Device (BBD) from Philips Research Laboratory was also being developed at the same time, but for various reasons BBD was never considered seriously as an imaging device.

In conclusion to this blog let's take a quick look at the data transfer rate for various interfaces (click to enlarge):

As always, please feel free to comment or contact me.

- Sudeep