ANNOUNCEMENT

Version 3.7.0 of the OFFIS DCMTK (DICOM ToolKit) software is now available for
public release.  This release includes the following main changes over the
previous version 3.6.9:

- DCMTK 3.7.0 builds correctly on older and up-to-date versions of GNU gcc
  (10.5.0 to 14.2.0), Clang (14.0.6 to 18.1.8), Apple Clang (17.0.0),
  and Microsoft Visual Studio (2017 to 2022).

- Tested with the following operating systems/environments:
  - Android on arm64
  - FreeBSD on x86_64
  - Linux on x86_64, x86 and s390x
  - MacOS X on x86_64 and arm64
  - NetBSD on x86_64
  - OpenBSD on x86_64
  - OpenIndiana on x86_64
  - Windows (including MinGW) on x86_64 and x86

  For a complete list of tested systems and compilers, see the INSTALL file.

- Updated DICOM data dictionary, list of SOP classes, well-known frame of
  references, transfer syntaxes, code definitions, supported context group
  classes, and directory record types for DICOM standard release 2025e.

- Added initial support for the Deflated Image Frame Compression Transfer
  Syntax, i.e. reading and writing of DICOM files and datasets that are
  encoded with this new transfer syntax as well as basic network support.

- Added support for the DICONDE Storage SOP Class for ultrasonic waveforms
  introduced with DICOM 2025b (based on a revised version of ASTM E2663).

- Added support for creating, writing and reading Labelmap Segmentation Storage
  objects to the "dcmseg" module.

- Added new command line tools "dcmencap" and "dcmdecap" that handle the
  encapsulation and decapsulation of all currently defined Encapsulated
  Document Storage SOP Classes in DICOM.  The older tools "pdf2dcm", "cda2dcm",
  "stl2dcm", "dcm2pdf" and "dcm2cda" are now deprecated and will be removed in
  a future version of DCMTK.

- Added new command line tool "json2dcm" that converts the contents of a DICOM
  dataset in JSON encoding to a binary DICOM file or dataset.  The JSON
  document is expected to conform to the "DICOM JSON Model" as defined in
  DICOM Part 18, Section F.

- The command line tool "dcm2json" can now create BulkDataURIs and related bulk
  data files.

- Improved the handling of JPEG image files as input to "img2dcm".  Several
  special cases such as different types of component subsampling, or lossy JPEG
  images in RGB or CMYK color (instead of YCbCr) are now correctly handled.

- The "storescp" tool can now limit the number of network associations handled
  in parallel when operating in "fork mode", on all supported platforms.

- Enhanced Specific Character Set support of the command line tool "dcm2xml"
  when converting DICOMDIR files.

- Added support for the optional Patient's Age attribute from the Patient
  Study Module to the "dcmsr" module.  This attribute is now written to and
  read from a DICOM dataset as well as to/from the "dcmsr"-specific XML
  document format (see "dsr2xml.xsd").

- Enhanced support for TLS in command line tools "dcmqrscp" and "movescu".
  Query/Retrieve can now be completely performed over TLS.

- Added support for IPv6 in DCMTK's association acceptors.  The support for
  DICOM network connections over IPv6 is now considered complete.  Both
  association requestors and association acceptors can choose between IPv4
  only, IPv6 only, and dual-stack mode.  The default behavior of the command
  line tools is unchanged (i.e. IPv4 only.)

- Added APIs that allows the user to set the Implementation Class UID and
  Implementation Version Name at runtime while writing a DICOM file, processing
  an incoming network association request or configuring an outgoing network
  association request.

- Added "putAndInsertXXX()" helper methods for the still rather new 64-bit VRs
  "SV", "UV" and "OV" to the "DcmItem" class.

- Improved handling of invalid DICOM images when processing with the
  "DicomImage" class or the "dcm2img" command line tool.

- Improved performance of the "DcmList" class that is used internally for the
  DICOM dataset parser.

- Further clean-up of configure tests that checked for features that are not
  used anymore in DCMTK or that are not in use anymore on any of the supported
  operating systems (e.g. pre-POSIX APIs and header files).

- Fixed various other issues that occurred after the official 3.6.9 release,
  and further improved the performance.  See CHANGES file for details.

Many people have contributed to this new release of DCMTK, appearing here in
alphabetical order.  Thank you very much for your support!

  Ben Chen <Ben.Chen@intusurg.com>
  Chuang Zhao <zhaocccchuang@163.com>
  Ding zhengzheng <xiaozheng.ding399@gmail.com>
  Drak <dr4k.sec@gmail.com>
  Emmanuel Tacheau of the Cisco Talos team <vulndiscovery@external.cisco.com>
  Jean-Christophe Fillion-Robin <jchris.fillionr@kitware.com>
  Jez Cooke <jez.cooke@hamamatsu.eu>
  Kade Rashid <kade.rashid@hamamatsu.eu>
  Khang Tran <khangthk@gmail.com>
  Mathieu Malaterre <mathieu.malaterre@gmail.com>
  Matt Hancock <mhancock@innolitics.com>
  Oliver Klerx <klerx@phoenix-pacs.de>
  Simeon Stoykov <simeon@microdicom.com>
  Sobhita Mercy <sobhitamercy@gmail.com>
  Vasyl Horbatenko (GitHub user doskachok)
  Zou Dikai <zoudikai@outlook.com>

  DCMTK forum users "cschreib", "hapap", "OliWe", "pierrechatelier",
    "pintagliata", "saltcreek" and "Shaeto"

  GitHub users "luk1337", "mrbean-bremen", "nbeck-SMT", "Oss-Auditor",
    "parasite-lost", "reunanen" and "Vovasch"

Members of the DCMTK Team who have worked on this release are:

  Joerg Riesmeier <dicom@jriesmeier.com>
  Marco Eichelberg <eichelberg@offis.de>
  Michael Onken <onken@open-connections.de>
  Tingyan Xu <tingyan.xu@offis.de>

The DCMTK software can be downloaded via:

  https://dicom.offis.de/dcmtk or https://www.dcmtk.org/

OFFIS e.V., Oldenburg, Germany, 2025-12-15
