1dcmsend(1) OFFIS DCMTK dcmsend(1)
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6 dcmsend - Simple DICOM storage SCU (sender)
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10 dcmsend [options] peer port dcmfile-in...
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13 The dcmsend application implements a Service Class User (SCU) for the
14 Storage Service Class. In contrast to the well-known storescu utility,
15 dcmsend has less options and is, therefore, easier to use - this also
16 explains the term 'simple' in the title. The main purpose of this
17 application is to send a whole bunch of DICOM files to a Storage
18 Service Class Provider (SCP). dcmsend supports both multiple
19 associations (one after the other) and decompression of DICOM SOP
20 instances if needed to transfer them.
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23 peer hostname of DICOM peer
24 port tcp/ip port number of peer
26 dcmfile-in DICOM file or directory to be transmitted
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30 general options
31 -h --help
32 print this help text and exit
33 --version
35 print version information and exit
36 --list-decoders
38 list transfer syntaxes of decoders and exit
39 --arguments
41 print expanded command line arguments
42 -q --quiet
44 quiet mode, print no warnings and errors
45 -v --verbose
47 verbose mode, print processing details
48 -d --debug
50 debug mode, print debug information
51 -ll --log-level [l]evel: string constant
53 (fatal, error, warn, info, debug, trace)
54 use level l for the logger
55 -lc --log-config [f]ilename: string
57 use config file f for the logger
58 +v --verbose-pc
60 show presentation contexts in verbose mode
61 input options
63 input file format:
64 +f --read-file
66 read file format or data set
67 +fo --read-file-only
69 read file format only (default)
70 -f --read-dataset
72 read data set without file meta information
73 input files:
75 +rd --read-from-dicomdir
77 read information on input files from DICOMDIR
78 +sd --scan-directories
80 scan directories for input files (dcmfile-in)
81 +sp --scan-pattern [p]attern: string (only with --scan-directories)
83 pattern for filename matching (wildcards)
84 # possibly not available on all systems
86 -r --no-recurse
88 do not recurse within directories (default)
89 +r --recurse
91 recurse within specified directories
92 processing options
94 transfer syntax conversion:
95 -dn --decompress-never
97 never decompress compressed data sets
98 +dls --decompress-lossless
100 only decompress lossless compression (default)
101 +dly --decompress-lossy
103 decompress both lossy and lossless compression
104 deflate compression level:
106 +cl --compression-level [l]evel: integer (default: 6)
108 0=uncompressed, 1=fastest, 9=best compression
109 other processing options:
111 -nh --no-halt
113 do not halt on first invalid input file
114 or if unsuccessful store encountered
115 -nip --no-illegal-proposal
117 do not propose any presentation context that does
118 not contain the default transfer syntax (if needed)
119 -nuc --no-uid-checks
121 do not check UID values of input files
122 network options
124 application entity titles:
125 -aet --aetitle [a]etitle: string
127 set my calling AE title (default: DCMSEND)
128 -aec --call [a]etitle: string
130 set called AE title of peer (default: ANY-SCP)
131 association handling:
133 +ma --multi-associations
135 use multiple associations (one after the other)
136 if needed to transfer the instances (default)
137 -ma --single-association
139 always use a single association
140 other network options:
142 -to --timeout [s]econds: integer (default: unlimited)
144 timeout for connection requests
145 -ta --acse-timeout [s]econds: integer (default: 30)
147 timeout for ACSE messages
148 -td --dimse-timeout [s]econds: integer (default: unlimited)
150 timeout for DIMSE messages
151 -pdu --max-pdu [n]umber of bytes: integer (4096..131072)
153 set max receive pdu to n bytes (default: 16384)
154 --max-send-pdu [n]umber of bytes: integer (4096..131072)
156 restrict max send pdu to n bytes
157 output options
159 general:
160 +crf --create-report-file [f]ilename: string
162 create a detailed report on the transfer
163 (if successful) and write it to text file f
164
166 Typical Usage
167 A typical use case of dcmsend is to send arbitrary SOP instances that
168 are stored as DICOM files to a storage SCP. The following command does
169 exactly this:
170 dcmsend --verbose <peer> <port> *.dcm
172 If the DICOM files are stored in a hierarchy of directories below the
174 directory 'IMAGES', the following command can be used:
175 dcmsend -v <peer> <port> --scan-directories --recurse IMAGES
177 It is also possible to specify multiple directories and to combine the
179 aforementioned approaches (using both file and directory names):
180 dcmsend -v +sd +r <peer> <port> IMAGES_1 IMAGES_2 test.img *.dcm
182 If the SOP instances are referenced from a DICOMDIR file, option
184 --read-from-dicomdir (or +rd) can be used to send all referenced DICOM
185 files without loading them already for the association negotiation:
186 dcmsend -v <peer> <port> --read-from-dicomdir DICOMDIR
188 And again, all of the above approaches can be combined like this:
190 dcmsend -v +sd +r +rd <peer> <port> IMAGES_1 IMAGES_2 test.img DICOMDIR *.dcm
192 The default option --read-file-only makes sure that only DICOM files
194 (i.e. the ones with meta-header and magic word 'DICM' after the
195 preamble) are processed. Usually, if processing a whole bunch of files,
196 it is also a good idea not to halt on the first invalid input file or
197 if an unsuccessful store was encountered. This can be accomplished by
198 using option --no-halt. Please note, however, that 'unsuccessful store'
199 does not mean that the DIMSE status of the C-STORE response indicates
200 an error. It means that the C-STORE request could not be sent to the
201 storage SCP.
202 If more than 128 presentation contexts are needed, which is the maximum
204 number allowed according to the DICOM standard, a new association is
205 started after the previous one has been completed. In cases where this
206 behavior is unwanted, it can be disabled using option --single-
207 association. In addition, whether only lossless compressed data sets
208 are decompressed (if needed), which is the default, or also lossy
209 compressed data sets can be specified using the --decompress-xxx
210 options.
211 In order to get both an overview and detailed information on the
213 transfer of the DICOM SOP instances, option --create-report-file can be
214 used to create a corresponding text file. However, this file is only
215 created as a final step if the application did not terminate before
216 (with an error).
217 Scanning Directories
219 Adding directories as a parameter to the command line only makes sense
220 if option --scan-directories is also given. If the files in the
221 provided directories should be selected according to a specific name
222 pattern (e.g. using wildcard matching), option --scan-pattern has to be
223 used. Please note that this file pattern only applies to the files
224 within the scanned directories, and, if any other patterns are
225 specified on the command line outside the --scan-pattern option (e.g.
226 in order to select further files), these do not apply to the specified
227 directories.
228 Thus, the third of the above examples will recurse over directories
230 IMAGES_1 and IMAGES_2 and transmit files that are contained in these
231 two folders and all their subfolders (due to option +r). Additionally,
232 dcmsend will transfer 'test.img' and all files with extension 'dcm'
233 from the current working folder. Note that providing directory names
234 without enabling option +sd does not make sense.
235 DICOM Conformance
237 Basically, the dcmsend application supports all Storage SOP Classes as
238 an SCU, including private ones. By default, the application checks the
239 SOP Class UID of the DICOM file in order to make sure that only valid
240 SOP instances are sent. With option --no-uid-checks this check can be
241 disabled.
242 The dcmsend application also supports all Transfer Syntaxes that are
244 defined in the DICOM standard. Private transfer syntaxes can only be
245 used if the UID check is disabled with option --no-uid-checks. Please
246 note, however, that only a limited number of transfer syntaxes are
247 supported for converting them to the default transfer syntax (Implicit
248 VR Little Endian). With option --list-decoders the transfer syntaxes
249 supported natively or by decoders are listed. The output typically
250 looks like the following:
251 Transfer syntaxes supported natively:
253 - Little Endian Implicit
254 - Little Endian Explicit
255 - Big Endian Explicit
256 Transfer syntaxes supported by decoders:
258 - Deflated Explicit VR Little Endian
259 - JPEG Baseline
260 - JPEG Extended, Process 2+4
261 - JPEG Spectral Selection, Non-hierarchical, Process 6+8
262 - JPEG Full Progression, Non-hierarchical, Process 10+12
263 - JPEG Lossless, Non-hierarchical, Process 14
264 - JPEG Lossless, Non-hierarchical, 1st Order Prediction
265 - JPEG-LS Lossless
266 - JPEG-LS Lossy (Near-lossless)
267 - RLE Lossless
268 Since dcmsend tries to be as simple as possible for the user, by
270 default presentation contexts might be proposed to the SCP that are
271 strictly speaking 'illegal'. This is because, according to the DICOM
272 standard, the SCU always has to propose the default transfer syntax in
273 at least one presentation context associated with each abstract syntax
274 (i.e. SOP class). This requirement is waived if the SCU only has access
275 to the SOP instance in lossy compressed form or if the decompressed
276 pixel data would be too large to be encoded. With option --no-illegal-
277 proposal the strict DICOM-conformant behavior can be enforced, i.e. no
278 possibly illegal presentation context will be proposed but the
279 corresponding SOP instance will be rejected (if needed). Please note,
280 however, that the size of the decompressed pixel data is not checked.
281 Please note, however, that the default transfer syntax for 'Lossless
283 JPEG Compression', 'Lossy JPEG Compression' and so on are not always
284 proposed as also required by the DICOM standard. The same limitation
285 applies to other compression schemes. See DICOM PS 3.5 section 10 for
286 details.
287
289 The level of logging output of the various command line tools and
290 underlying libraries can be specified by the user. By default, only
291 errors and warnings are written to the standard error stream. Using
292 option --verbose also informational messages like processing details
293 are reported. Option --debug can be used to get more details on the
294 internal activity, e.g. for debugging purposes. Other logging levels
295 can be selected using option --log-level. In --quiet mode only fatal
296 errors are reported. In such very severe error events, the application
297 will usually terminate. For more details on the different logging
298 levels, see documentation of module 'oflog'.
299 In case the logging output should be written to file (optionally with
301 logfile rotation), to syslog (Unix) or the event log (Windows) option
302 --log-config can be used. This configuration file also allows for
303 directing only certain messages to a particular output stream and for
304 filtering certain messages based on the module or application where
305 they are generated. An example configuration file is provided in
306 <etcdir>/logger.cfg.
307
309 All command line tools use the following notation for parameters:
310 square brackets enclose optional values (0-1), three trailing dots
311 indicate that multiple values are allowed (1-n), a combination of both
312 means 0 to n values.
313 Command line options are distinguished from parameters by a leading '+'
315 or '-' sign, respectively. Usually, order and position of command line
316 options are arbitrary (i.e. they can appear anywhere). However, if
317 options are mutually exclusive the rightmost appearance is used. This
318 behavior conforms to the standard evaluation rules of common Unix
319 shells.
320 In addition, one or more command files can be specified using an '@'
322 sign as a prefix to the filename (e.g. @command.txt). Such a command
323 argument is replaced by the content of the corresponding text file
324 (multiple whitespaces are treated as a single separator unless they
325 appear between two quotation marks) prior to any further evaluation.
326 Please note that a command file cannot contain another command file.
327 This simple but effective approach allows one to summarize common
328 combinations of options/parameters and avoids longish and confusing
329 command lines (an example is provided in file <datadir>/dumppat.txt).
330
332 The dcmsend utility uses the following exit codes when terminating.
333 This enables the user to check for the reason why the application
334 terminated.
335 general
337 EXITCODE_NO_ERROR 0
338 EXITCODE_COMMANDLINE_SYNTAX_ERROR 1
339 input file errors
341 EXITCODE_CANNOT_READ_INPUT_FILE 20 (*)
342 EXITCODE_NO_INPUT_FILES 21
343 EXITCODE_INVALID_INPUT_FILE 22
344 EXITCODE_NO_VALID_INPUT_FILES 23
345 output file errors
347 EXITCODE_CANNOT_WRITE_OUTPUT_FILE 40 (*)
348 EXITCODE_CANNOT_WRITE_REPORT_FILE 43
349 network errors
351 EXITCODE_CANNOT_INITIALIZE_NETWORK 60
352 EXITCODE_CANNOT_NEGOTIATE_ASSOCIATION 61
353 EXITCODE_CANNOT_SEND_REQUEST 62
354 EXITCODE_CANNOT_ADD_PRESENTATION_CONTEXT 65
355 (*) Actually, these codes are currently not used by dcmsend but serve
357 as a placeholder for the corresponding group of exit codes.
358
360 The dcmsend utility will attempt to load DICOM data dictionaries
361 specified in the DCMDICTPATH environment variable. By default, i.e. if
362 the DCMDICTPATH environment variable is not set, the file
363 <datadir>/dicom.dic will be loaded unless the dictionary is built into
364 the application (default for Windows).
365 The default behavior should be preferred and the DCMDICTPATH
367 environment variable only used when alternative data dictionaries are
368 required. The DCMDICTPATH environment variable has the same format as
369 the Unix shell PATH variable in that a colon (':') separates entries.
370 On Windows systems, a semicolon (';') is used as a separator. The data
371 dictionary code will attempt to load each file specified in the
372 DCMDICTPATH environment variable. It is an error if no data dictionary
373 can be loaded.
374
376 dcmrecv(1), storescu(1), storescp(1)
377
379 Copyright (C) 2011-2018 by OFFIS e.V., Escherweg 2, 26121 Oldenburg,
380 Germany.
381Version 3.6.4 Thu Nov 29 2018 dcmsend(1)