DICOM dictionary duplicate

[Mathieu Malaterre]

I was about to write an interface that would allow to match a DICOM Name
to a DICOM Tag and the contrary but I found out that thay are two
duplicates in the DICOM definition:

1.
Referenced Overlay Sequence
Could be either 0008 1130 or 50xx 2600

2.
Referenced Print Job Sequence
Could be either 2100 0500 or 2120 0070

Is there any particular reason why those elements have the exact same
name ? Could it be possible to get one of each to be RETIRED ?

Thanks
Mathieu

[Bas Revet]

Hi Mathieu,

You are completely right. The attribute names are used twice in both
cases. Making complex standards is (still) done by humans with no more
tools the word processors.

The fact that two attribute tags has the same attribute name do not
harm in practice, because the tag nummer (gggg,eeee) identifies the
attribute, the attribute name is only for human eyes to help them
recognize the attribute without using a dictionary.

So I think that this artifact will stay in the standard. Changing the
attributes names will cause more confusion then keeping them. Only
databases that use the attribute name to lookup an attribute tag need
top cope with them.

Regards,
Bas.

[Mathieu Malaterre]

Hi Bas,

Thanks for taking the time to answer.

> You are completely right. The attribute names are used twice in both
> cases. Making complex standards is (still) done by humans with no more
> tools the word processors.

...or do you mean humans using only word processors, make standards
complex ;-P

> The fact that two attribute tags has the same attribute name do not
> harm in practice, because the tag nummer (gggg,eeee) identifies the
> attribute, the attribute name is only for human eyes to help them
> recognize the attribute without using a dictionary.

Yes and no, because in the end it's a human who will read/enter the
information.
As a side note is there a document explaining the difference in between
those tags (are they indeed different?) ?

> So I think that this artifact will stay in the standard. Changing the
> attributes names will cause more confusion then keeping them. Only
> databases that use the attribute name to lookup an attribute tag need
> top cope with them.

I know it's not a big deal, I'll make my reverse lookup fail on a very
small subset of DICOM name (those two, Source Image Ids, and the 50xx,
60xx group).

Thanks anyway
Mathieu