HDF Newsletter #149

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                             Newsletter #149
                              May 13, 2016
CONTENTS
  . Release of HDF5-1.8.17

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Release of HDF5-1.8.17

The HDF5-1.8.17 release is now available. It can be downloaded from The HDF
Group Downloads page:

    https://www.hdfgroup.org/downloads/

It can also be obtained from:

    https://www.hdfgroup.org/HDF5/release/obtain5.html

HDF5-1.8.17 is a minor release with a few new features and changes. Important
changes include:

  o Improvements were made to the High Level C and C++ Packet Table APIs,
    including:

    - The H5PTcreate function was added to provide control over creation
      properties. It replaces the H5PTcreate_fl function. The corresponding
      change in C++ is the addition of a new overloaded constructor to
      FL_PacketTable that takes a property list identifier.

    - H5PTget_dataset was added to return the identifier of the dataset
      associated with a packet table. The corresponding member function added
      for C++ is PacketTable::GetDataset().

    - H5PTget_type was added to return the identifier of the datatype used
      by a packet table. The corresponding member function added for C++ is
      PacketTable::GetDatatype().

    - C++ member functions with "char*" as an argument now include overloaded
      functions to provide a "const char*" argument.

    - The source code was cleaned up to remove the obsolete variable length packet
      table code. This included the following changes:

        o H5PTis_varlen() was made available again. The corresponding C++
          function VL_PacketTable::IsVariableLength() was moved to PacketTable.

        o H5PTfree_vlen_readbuff() was renamed H5PTfree_vlen_buff(). The
          corresponding C++ function VL_PacketTable::FreeReadBuff() was
          renamed to PacketTable::FreeBuff().

  o The H5Pset/get_efile_prefix() functions were added for controlling the
    search path for dataset external storage that has been configured with
    H5Pset_external(). Additionally, the HDF5_EXTFILE_PREFIX environment
    variable was added to control the search path.

  o The following new member functions were added to C++:

    - DSetCreatPropList::setNbit() sets up N-bit compression for a dataset.

    - New overloaded "const" member functions were added to ArrayType:
      ArrayType::getArrayNDims() const and ArrayType::getArrayDims() const

  o Overloaded C++ methods with parameters that were not "const" (but
    should have been) were removed.

  o Support was added for Mac OS X 10.11.4 (El Capitan).

This release contains many other changes that are not listed here. Please be
sure to read the Release Notes for a comprehensive list of new features and
changes:

    https://www.hdfgroup.org/ftp/HDF5/current/src/hdf5-1.8.17-RELEASE.txt

Changes that affect maintainers of HDF5-dependent applications are listed on
the HDF5 Software Changes from Release to Release page. See:

    https://www.hdfgroup.org/HDF5/doc1.8/ADGuide/Changes.html

Future Changes to Supported Compilers and Platforms
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After this release we will be dropping support for Mac OS X 10.8.

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For questions regarding these or other HDF issues, contact:

    help@hdfgroup.org