Data Source

After following the steps outlined in Getting Started, you'll notice that the OHIF Viewer has data for several studies and their images. You didn't add this data, so where is it coming from?

By default, the viewer is configured to connect to a remote server hosted by the nice folks over at dcmjs.org. While convenient for getting started, the time may come when you want to develop using your own data either locally or remotely.

Set up a local DICOM server

ATTENTION! Already have a remote or local server? Skip to the configuration section below.

While the OHIF Viewer can work with any data source, the easiest to configure are the ones that follow the DICOMWeb spec.

1. Choose and install an Image Archive
2. Upload data to your archive (e.g. with DCMTK's storescu or your archive's web interface)
3. Keep the server running

For our purposes, we will be using Orthanc, but you can see a list of other Open Source options below.

Requirements

• Docker
  • Docker for Mac
  • Docker for Windows (recommended)
  • Docker Toolbox for Windows

Not sure if you have docker installed already? Try running docker --version in command prompt or terminal

If you are using Docker Toolbox you need to change the PROXY_DOMAIN parameter in platform/viewer/package.json to http://192.168.99.100:8042 or the ip docker-machine ip throws. This is the value WebPack uses to proxy requests

Running Orthanc

Start Orthanc:

# Runs orthanc so long as window remains openyarn run orthanc:up

Upload your first Study:

1. Navigate to Orthanc's web interface at http://localhost:8042/app/explorer.html in a web browser.
2. In the top right corner, click "Upload"
3. Click "Select files to upload..." and select one or more DICOM files
4. Click "Start the upload"

Orthanc: Learn More

You can see the docker-compose.yml file this command runs at <project-root>/.docker/Nginx-Orthanc/, and more on Orthanc for Docker in Orthanc's documentation.

Connecting to Orthanc

Now that we have a local Orthanc instance up and running, we need to configure our web application to connect to it. Open a new terminal window, navigate to this repository's root directory, and run:

# If you haven't already, enable yarn workspacesyarn config set workspaces-experimental true
# Restore dependenciesyarn install
# Run our dev command, but with the local orthanc configyarn run dev:orthanc

Configuration: Learn More

For more configuration fun, check out the Essentials Configuration guide.

Let's take a look at what's going on under the hood here. yarn run dev:orthanc is running the dev:orthanc script in our project's package.json. That script is:

cross-env NODE_ENV=development PROXY_TARGET=/dicom-web PROXY_DOMAIN=http://localhost:8042 APP_CONFIG=config/docker_nginx-orthanc.js webpack-dev-server --config .webpack/webpack.pwa.js -w

• cross-env sets three environment variables
  • PROXY_TARGET: /dicom-web
  • PROXY_DOMAIN: http://localhost:8042
  • APP_CONFIG: config/docker_nginx-orthanc.js
• webpack-dev-server runs using the .webpack/webpack.pwa.js configuration file. It will watch for changes and update as we develop.

PROXY_TARGET and PROXY_DOMAIN tell our development server to proxy requests to Orthanc. This allows us to bypass CORS issues that normally occur when requesting resources that live at a different domain.

The APP_CONFIG value tells our app which file to load on to window.config. Here is what that configuration looks like:

<project-root>/platform/viewer/public/config/default.js

window.config = {  routerBasename: '/',  servers: {    dicomWeb: [      {        name: 'Orthanc',        wadoUriRoot: 'http://localhost:8899/wado',        qidoRoot: 'http://localhost:8899/dicom-web',        wadoRoot: 'http://localhost:8899/dicom-web',        qidoSupportsIncludeField: false,        imageRendering: 'wadors',        thumbnailRendering: 'wadors',      },    ],  },};

To learn more about how you can configure the OHIF Viewer, check out our Configuration Guide.

Open Source DICOM Image Archives

Our example uses Orthanc, but there are a lot of options available to you. Here are some of the more popular ones:

Archive	Installation
DCM4CHEE Archive 5.x	W/ Docker
Orthanc	W/ Docker
DICOMcloud (DICOM Web only)	Installation
OsiriX (Mac OSX only)	Desktop Client
Horos (Mac OSX only)	Desktop Client

Feel free to make a Pull Request if you want to add to this list.