Features

Alida provides a framework for easy development and usage of data analysis procedures.
Below an overview of its main features is given.

Operator Concept

• common interface for all implemented operators: unified access to all operator parameters, standardized operator invocation procedures
• various parameter types: input, output and combined input/output parameters
• support for operator class inheritance and operators as parameters
• dynamic addition and removal of parameters at runtime
• callback functions attached to parameters and invoked in case of parameter value changes
• support for controllable operators which can be paused/continued and stopped by the user
• extensible provider framework for data type I/O with built-in support for native data types, enumerations, collections, ...
• simple definition of new user-defined I/O data types by parameterized classes
  
  

Automatic Process Documentation

• inherent self-documentation of all calls to operators, i.e. of entire analysis procedures
• each result data object accompanied by individual history graph in XML format
• history graph exploration tool Chipory, a comfortable graph visualization tool for exploring graph data structures based on Chisio, however, extended to meet the special requirements of Alida's history graphs.
  
  

User Interfaces

• automatic generation of user interfaces for command line and graphical applications
• flexible command line parser supporting regular expressions and various I/O channels (file, console)
• handy configuration and control windows for configuring and running operators in graphical environments
• support for saving/loading operator configuration parameters in XML format
• batch mode option in GUIs to apply operators to sets of input data objects
  
  

Grappa - The Graphical Workflow Editor

• graphical combination of operator nodes into workflows
• built-in compatibility checks on dragging edges
• provider framework for automatic data type conversions
• user-friendly visual feedback about node states (unconfigured, ready to run, terminated, etc.)
• different workflow execution modes (complete workflows, sub-workflows, individual nodes)