-------------------------------------------------------------------------- To subscribe/unsubscribe to the hdfnews mailing list, please send your request to ncsalist@ncsa.uiuc.edu with the appropriate command (e.g. subscribe hdfnews, unsubscribe hdfnews, help) in the *body* of the message. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Newsletter #68 July 12, 2002 CONTENTS ******************************* . Release of HDF5-1.4.4 * * - New Features and Changes * Visit the HDF home page * - Platforms Tested * for up-to-date information * * * . Release of H4toH5 version 1.0 * http://hdf.ncsa.uiuc.edu/ * * * . Support for BZIP2 Compression ******************************* . Cray Support to Continue - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Release of HDF5-1.4.4 ===================== HDF5-1.4.4 is now available for download. You can obtain the HDF5-1.4.4 software from the HDF5 home page at: http://hdf.ncsa.uiuc.edu/HDF5/ The HDF5 documentation is included in the source code and can also be downloaded from: http://hdf.ncsa.uiuc.edu/HDF5/doc/ This is a fully tested release. The configuration features supported in this release can be viewed at: http://hdf.ncsa.uiuc.edu/HDF5/release/SuppConfigFeats.html New Features and Changes ------------------------ Important changes in HDF5 include: o Numerous performance changes were made to the HDF5 sequential and parallel libraries. In general, the library should make fewer and larger I/O requests when accessing a file. Additionally, improvements to the parallel I/O portions of the library should reduce the communications and barriers used in various internal algorithms, improving the performance of the library. However, with the extensive changes to some portions of the library that were required for these improvements, some errors or unanticipated results may have been introduced. Please report any problems encountered to hdfhelp@ncsa.uiuc.edu. Hopefully these improvements will benefit all HDF5 applications, but if there are particular I/O patterns that appear to be slower than necessary, please let us know and include a sample program showing the problem behavior. o The H4 to H5 tools have been removed from the main source and are now included in the H4toH5 conversion library. The "--with-hdf4" command-line option during configure is no longer valid. o Support for the Intel compilers has been added to HDF5. Intel C++ and Intel F90 version 6.0 are both supported on Linux 2.4, and Intel C++ version 6.0 is supported on Windows 2000. o Support for zlib 1.1.4 has been added. o zlib has been removed from the Windows source release. Users can download the zlib library for windows from the NCSA ftp server at: ftp://ftp.ncsa.uiuc.edu/HDF/gzip/windows/ The Windows binary release was built with zlib 1.1.3. o Several corruption problems were fixed. Please refer to the RELEASE.txt file that comes with the source code for detailed information: ftp://ftp.ncsa.uiuc.edu/HDF/HDF5/current/src/unpacked/release_docs/RELEASE.txt Platforms Tested ---------------- AIX 4.3.3.0 (IBM SP powerpc) xlc 5.0.2.0 mpcc_r 5.0.2.0 xlf 07.01.0000.0002 mpxlf 07.01.0000.0002 AIX 4.3 (IBM SP RS6000) C for AIX Compiler, Version 5.0.2.0 xlf 7.1.0.2 poe 3.1.0.12 (includes mpi) AIX 5.1 xlc 5.0.2.0 xlf 07.01.0000.0002 mpcc_r 5.0.2.0; mpxlf_r 07.01.0000.0002 Cray T3E sn6711 2.0.5.57 Cray Standard C Version 6.5.0.3 Cray Fortran Version 3.5.0.4 Cray SV1 10.0.1.1 Cray Standard C Version 6.5.0.3 Cray Fortran Version 3.5.0.4 FreeBSD 4.6 gcc 2.95.4 g++ 2.95.4 HP-UX B.10.20 HP C HP92453-01 A.10.32.30 HP F90 v2.3 HP-UX B.11.00 HP C HP92453-01 A.11.01.20 HP F90 v2.4 HP-UX B.11.00 SysV HP C HP92453-01 A.11.01.20 HP F90 v2.4 HP MPI [not a product] (03/24/2000) B6060BA IRIX 6.5 MIPSpro cc 7.30 IRIX64 6.5 (64 & n32) MIPSpro cc 7.3.1.3m F90 MIPSpro 7.3.1.3m (64 only) Linux 2.4.18 gcc 2.95.3 g++ 2.95.3 Intel(R) C++ Version 6.0 Intel(R) Fortran Compiler Version 6.0 MPICH 1.2.2 Linux 2.2.18smp gcc 2.95.2 gcc 2.95.2 with mpich 1.2.1 g++ 2.95.2 pgf90 3.2-4 OSF1 V5.1 Compaq C V6.4-014 Compaq Fortran V5.5-1877-48BBF gcc version 3.0 for C++ SunOS 5.7 WorkShop Compilers 5.0 98/12/15 C 5.0 (Solaris 2.7) WorkShop Compilers 5.0 98/12/15 C++ 5.0 WorkShop Compilers 5.0 98/10/25 FORTRAN 90 2.0 Patch 107356-04 SunOS 5.8/32 Sun WorkShop 6 update 1 C 5.2 2000/09/11 (Solaris 2.8) Sun WorkShop 6 update 1 Fortran 95 6.1 Patch 109503-07 2001/08/11 Sun WorkShop 6 update 1 C++ 5.2 Patch 109508-04 2001/07/11 SunOS 5.8/64 Sun WorkShop 6 update 1 C 5.2 2000/09/11 (Solaris 2.8) Sun WorkShop 6 update 1 Fortran 95 6.1 Patch 109503-07 2001/08/11 Sun WorkShop 6 update 1 C++ 5.2 Patch 109508-04 2001/07/11 TFLOPS r1.0.4 v4.2.2 i386 pgcc Rel 3.1-4i with mpich-1.2.3 with local modifications IA-32 Linux 2.4.9 cc Intel 5.0.1 gcc 2.96 Intel(R) C++ Version 6.0 Intel(R) Fortran Compiler Version 6.0 IA-64 Linux 2.4.16 ia64 gcc version 2.96 20000731 Intel(R) C++ Version 6.0 Intel(R) Fortran Compiler Version 6.0 Windows 2000 (NT5.0) MSVC++ 6.0 DEC Visual Fortran 6.0 Windows NT4.0 MSVC++ 6.0 DEC Visual Fortran 6.0 Windows NT4.0 Code Warrior 6.0 Release of H4toH5 version 1.0 ============================= Version 1.0 of the H4 to H5 conversion library is now available, and can be downloaded from: http://hdf.ncsa.uiuc.edu/h4toh5/libh4toh5.html It includes the h4toh5 and h5toh4 utilities, as well as a library of functions for converting HDF4 objects into HDF5 objects. We encourage users to try this software and we welcome feedback regarding it. Support for BZIP2 Compression ============================= We have done a performance study of using bzip2 with an HDF5 file. The study focused on the performance comparison between bzip2 and gzip. One important goal of this study was to help the HDF5 group decide whether or not HDF5 should support bzip2 compression. Based on the report, the following was observed: Although bzip2 is always better than gzip in compression ratio within a few percentage points, bzip2 always takes more processing time than gzip, especially for decoding time. Therefore, the HDF group has decided not to officially support the bzip2 library at this time. However, we have provided an example to show how to use the bzip2 filter in a user application. Details regarding this can be found at: http://hdf.ncsa.uiuc.edu/HDF5/papers/bzip2/ Cray Support to Continue ======================== In our last newsletter we had mentioned that we were considering dropping support for the Cray computers. We received several responses regarding this, as well as help procuring new Cray accounts, and will be able to continue supporting the Crays. -------------------------------------------------------------- For questions regarding these or other HDF issues, contact: hdfhelp@ncsa.uiuc.edu