Note: This section is written in first person (by TEMPO author) for the release of version 1.2.0 of software.
I wrote first version of TEMPO software during 1995 and 1996, while working on my master thesis at the University of Belgrade (http://www.bg.ac.yu/) under lead of Prof. Dusan Starcevic. At the time, OpenGL library was not yet widely deployed on PC machines, so first TEMPO version employed dedicated implementation of scan-line hidden surface removal algorithm for 3D graphics. After lots of use of this software for various EEG related research at the University of Belgrade, an improved and adapted version was eventually sold to Cadwell Laboratories Inc., Kennewick, WA (http://www.cadwell.com/).
During next years, my research interests shifted away (actually, I was never particularly interested in EEG, but primarily in computer graphics), but I did take some part in couple of pilot projects at University of Belgrade considering implementation of 3D topographic mapping software based on OpenGL library for fast rendering. Most interesting of these certainly was project based on VRML and Java programming language, taken during 1998 under lead of Prof. Emil Jovanov. Anyway, none of these projects materialized to its end (in the sense of commercializing it or publishing it under an open source license) and on the other side time was passing and original TEMPO code base was not updated at all.
Thus, finally having some spare time near the end of summer 2003, I decided to update original TEMPO code, this time utilizing OpenGL library, and to publish it under GPL license. Eventually, I decided also to use EDF as a rather standard input format instead of only supporting proprietary format of EEG recording devices that we used during initial research, then to utilize GTK+ toolkit for graphical user interface, and finally to give my FFT routines face lift too. So, the net result was that new version of TEMPO contained practically no code from original version. Publishing such updated TEMPO code (labeled as version 1.1.0) on SourceForge site (http://tempo.sourceforge.net/) generated lots of good interest initially; however, it became apparent soon that choice of GTK+ toolkit wasn't particularly good idea, primarily because most of people interested in TEMPO were interested in having it working under Windows, while GTK+ isn't particularly well supported under Windows. This unfortunate situation lasted for while, until GPL-ed version of Qt toolkit for Windows announced near the end of 2004. Having good experience with Qt toolkit on some commercial projects I worked on, I decided then to port TEMPO to Qt. An empty time slot appeared near the end of spring 2005, thus version 1.2.0 of TEMPO is born and is generally available now.
Apart from GUI code, not much changed between GTK+ and Qt TEMPO version, thus tradeoffs against original code are still as follows: TEMPO code base looks much better now than ever before (after all, I'm now almost 9 years more experienced programmer), but it is again not tested at all. Former will hopefully benefit some of you, gentle readers, to eventually understand, improve and extend TEMPO code; regarding later, hopefully some other among you will help TEMPO author with testing with your own data files and sending suggestions and bug reports.
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