API overview

SmartCGMS is a framework with one central element - the scgms library. This library, formerly known as scgms factory, is an entry point for creating and managing SmartCGMS entities, configuring and controlling the simulation and resource management. The library itself is compiled as a dynamic library (scgms.dll on MS Windows, libscgms.so on Linux-based systems, libscgms.dylib on macOS, etc.) and exports a number of functions, further listed on a separate page. These functions are often called through the supplied C++ SDK.

The SmartCGMS entity API definition consist of two basic interface definitions:

• library interface - a library must export a set of functions to indicate, that it contains the implementation of given entity and is able to create an instance of it
• entity interface - any entity must comply with the interface definition of its kind (e.g.; filter must implement scgms::IFilter interface, etc.)

The scgms library expects the following directory structure (demonstrated on MS Windows naming conventions):

• filters
  • customfilter.dll
  • data.dll
  • metrics.dll
  • ...
• scgms.dll
• frontend.exe (optional, just to demonstrate the usual placement)

It is important to note, that scgms library loads only dynamic libraries, placed in the filters subdirectory, following the platform-specific shared object naming conventions.

For example, if a developer intends to introduce a new filter, he has to create a new dynamic library (or enhance an existing one), export do_get_filter_descriptors and do_create_filter and place it into the filters directory just next to the library itself. The scgms library then registers the newly created dynamic library as a part of SmartCGMS and loads descriptors from it. The developer then needs to create a descriptor of the entity he intend to implement, assign an unique GUID (preferably using a generator) and let the appropriate function return it. When the user creates a configuration, that contains the newly developed filter, the scgms library calls the matching create_filter function. The developer thus needs to implement this function to create a new entity, complying with the scgms::IFilter interface (further described here).