Methods and apparatus for streaming DICOM images through data element sources and sinks

A method for communicating digital data from a first device to a second device using a fixed amount of memory, wherein the digital data defines data elements and data values, comprising:

• defining a limited number of data values to be stored in a data stream;
• incrementally reading a set of data elements from a first device so that each data element is read one at a time;
• extracting a data value from each data element;
• creating a data stream with only a limited number of the data values;
• if the predefined limit of data values is reached, then transmitting the data stream containing the limited number of data values to a second device;
• and
• extracting the data values from the data stream.

A method for communicating a file containing digital data from a first device to a second device using a fixed amount of memory, wherein the digital data defines data elements and data values, comprising:

• receiving a file containing digital data from a first device;
• extracting a data value from each data element to be communicated;
• creating a data stream containing data values for the file containing digital data;
• creating a data element source based on the data stream;
• incrementally processing the data values one at a time from the data stream through the data element source;
• and transmitting the data values to a second device.

An apparatus for streaming digital data between two devices in a network using a fixed amount of memory, comprising:

• a communications module comprising,
• a data element source configured for providing a set of data elements from a first device, and further configured for incrementally reading a single data element at a time from the set of data elements;
• a communications engine configured for transmitting each data element from the data element source;
• and
• a data element sink configured for incrementally receiving data elements from the data communications engine for encoding each data element into a data stream, and further configured for transmitting the encoded data stream to a second device.