From: Robb Matzke <matzke@llnl.gov> Subject: HDF5 - Hierarchical Data Format Beta Announcement Date: Mon, 21 Sep 1998 10:34:32 GMT -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- HDF5 is a new, experimental version of the Hierarchical Data Format (HDF) that is designed to address some of the limitations of the current version, HDF4, and to address current and anticipated requirements of modern systems and applications. The beta version of HDF5 is freely available in source format from ftp://hdf.ncsa.uiuc.edu/pub/DIST/HDF5/ and a web site is under construction at http://hdf.ncsa.uiuc.edu/HDF5/. We urge you to look at this new version of HDF and give us feedback on what you like or do not like about it, and what features you would like to see added to it. Why HDF5? The development of HDF5 is motivated by a number of limitations in the current HDF format, as well as limitations in the library. Some of the improvements upon HDF4 are: * A file can have a 64-bit address space and be a single file or a collection of smaller files (HDF4 files were limited to 2GB). * Dataset sizes are 64-bit quantities and the number of datasets per file is limited only by the file size (HDF4 allowed at most 20,000 complex objects in a 2GB file). * HDF5 has a simpler, more comprehensive data model that includes only a few basic classes: datasets, spaces, types, groups, and files (the HDF4 data model had inconsistencies and more classes than necessary). * HDF5 was designed with an object oriented philosophy and the source size is approx. 1/3 of HDF4 but includes all the major functionality of HDF4. * HDF5 supports parallel I/O effectively using MPI-IO. The beta release includes most of the basic functionality that is planned for the first release of the HDF5 library. However, the library does not implement all of the features detailed in the format and API specifications. Here is a listing of some of the limitations of the current release: * Some functions for manipulating data spaces have not been implemented. * Some data types such as variable length types, pointers, and times are not yet implemented. * Deletion (unlinking) and renaming objects is not yet implemented. * The library is not currently thread aware although we have planned for that possibility and intend eventually to implement it. - -- Robb Matzke L-170 #include <disclaimer.h> Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory Voice/Fax: +1 812 949 7318 Livermore, CA 94550 Cellular: +1 502 396 8547 - -- This article has been digitally signed by the moderator, using PGP. http://www.iki.fi/mjr/cola-public-key.asc has PGP key for validating signature. Send submissions for comp.os.linux.announce to: linux-announce@news.ornl.gov PLEASE remember a short description of the software and the LOCATION. This group is archived at http://www.iki.fi/mjr/linux/cola.html -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.3i Charset: latin1 iQCVAgUBNgYrv1rUI/eHXJZ5AQE2VgQA0gZ9b5wSS68/xcAa18GcgXzqDYIVtI7i QeJPu3onGltbnjYzWcfCLuX8GTsxU2CWwPtE5DdBHea8HX/5tbFFaiz+qqMo0HxK tpPTDY6dzs+CfLnCXWZchl9Wq27gCdKcrXB2r0tP1HoMfC2fnGNxIlkFuJ4Va635 JZaT1khOK4k= =Dv1m -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----