HDF5 Document Index and HDF Links 
Introduction to HDF5 
HDF5 Tutorial 
 HDF5 User Guide 
HDF5 Reference Manual 
HDF5 Glossary

HDF LogoHDF5 Release 1.2 Documentation
PDF and PostScript Versions

This page provides links to PDF and PostScript versions of the HDF documentation set. These versions, derived from the original HTML documents, are intended to provide the following features:

Note that these versions were created in response to user feedback; the HDF Group is eager to hear from HDF and HDF5 users so that we can better meet our users' needs. Send comments, requests, and bug reports to the HDF Help Desk at hdfhelp@ncsa.uiuc.edu.

A combined document, including
     Introduction to HDF5, HDF5 Tutorial,
     User's Guide for HDF5 and HDF5 Reference Manual,
is available locally in PDF format. 		PDF
Individual files for each document, in both PDF and PS formats, are available from the HDF5 Doc Development site.

The PS and PDF formatted documents presented here are from Release 1.2. Several small but important changes (see below) were made for Release 1.2.1 and Release 1.2.2 and are included in the HTML document set that is distributed with the HDF5 software and is available from the HDF5 documents index.

Significant Changes in Release 1.2.1 and Release 1.2.2 Document Sets

This section lists the changes in the HDF5 documents, from Release 1.2 to Release 1.2.1 and Release 1.2.2, that affect technical understanding. Minor grammatical and formatting changes are not included. None of these changes below are reflected in the PS and PDF versions referenced above.
New documents::
HDF5 Application Developer's Guide, which includes the following:
HDF5 Image and Palette Specification
HDF5 File XML DTD: Design Notes and a link to the HDF5 file XML DTD
Mapping HDF4 Objects to HDF5 Objects
HDF5 Technical Notes
An informal but highly technical document intended for HDF5 library developers.

General change:
Changed references to the HDF5 file's  boot block to refer to the  super block.

In the HDF5 Reference Manual:
H5 -- General Library Functions
H5garbage_collect: New function.
H5A -- Attributes Interface
H5Acreate: Restructured and expanded the description section, with particular attention to the fact that the attribute name specified in H5Acreate must be unique.
H5Aiterate: Corrected function return type to herr_t.
H5D -- Dataset Interface
H5Dcreate: Added paragraph explaining that name must be unique.
H5Dopen: Corrected description of loc_id parameter.
H5Dclose: Corrected return type to herr_t.
H5Dcreate: Inserted missing spaces in function syntax statement.
H5E -- Error Interface
H5Ewalk: Added H5E_walk_t prototype and prototype parameter descriptions.
H5F -- File Interface
H5Fclose: Corrected behavior description.
H5Fcreate and H5Fopen: Clarified description of file access flags in parameters section.
H5Freopen: Corrected description of file_id parameter. Added comment about eventually closing returned identifier. Added clarification that function cannot open closed files.
H5G -- Group Interface
H5Giterate: Corrected operator parameter datatype to H5G_iterate_t. Made minor corrections to H5G_iterate_t prototype syntax. Added note that H5Giterate behavior is undefined if the group structure or membership changes during the iteration.
H5P -- Property List Interface
H5Pset_mpi: Corrected purpose section.
H5Pset/get_cache: Added missing rdcc_nelmts parameter. Corrected inconsistent references to rdcc_wo parameter. Clarified purpose and description sections.
H5Pget_sec2: Corrected return type to herr_t.
H5Pget_chunk: Changed max_ndims parameter description to IN.
H5Pget/set_gc_references: Corrected signature errors. Added missing parameter description and values.
H5Pget/set_family: These functions were removed; they have not been implemented.
H5Pget/set_hyper_cache: Corrected signature and parameter expressions. Added missing parameter description.
H5Pset_buffer: Added units for parameter size.
H5Pget/set_split: Corrected misnamed parameters.
H5Pset_alignment and H5Pset_core: Added statement regarding "special case" effect of setting threshold to 0 (zero). Added clarification that threshold is non-negative and alignment and increment are both positive.
H5Pget/set_vlen_mem_manager: Corrected cross-reference to H5Dvlen_reclaim. Clarified circumstances under which the contents of a parameter are ignored.
H5S -- Dataspace Interface
H5Sget_simple_extent_dims: Added statement that either or both of dims and maxdims may be NULL.
H5T-- Datatype Interface
H5Tconvert: Added missing plist_id parameter.
H5Tget_class: Added H5T_VLEN to class identifiers list. Corrected H5T_ENUM and H5T_REFERENCE entries in class identifiers table (they were reversed).
H5Tget/set_fields: Added missing spos parameter.
H5Tregister: Corrected possible pers values to H5T_PERS_HARD (was HARD) and H5T_PERS_SOFT (was SOFT).
H5Tfind: Corrected pcdata parameter IN/OUT designation.
HDF5 Tools
h5dump: Added -V option, which displays version information.

In the HDF5 User's Guide:
The Dataset Interface (H5D)
Removed H5Pset_compression and changed the example which used it to use H5Pset_deflate.
The Datatype Interface (H5T)
H5Tconvert: Added plist_id parameter where this function is used in code examples.
Reviewed confusing references to simple datatypes; where the intended meaning is atomic datatypes, that term is now used.
The Attribute Interface (H5A)
H5Aiterate: Corrected function return type to herr_t.
Filters in HDF5
Added reference in Section 4 to the zlib website.
Palette Specification
This specification was moved to HDF5 Image and Palette Specification in the HDF5 Application Developer's Guide.

In the Introduction to HDF5:
Reviewed confusing references to simple datatypes; where the intended meaning is atomic datatypes, that term is now used.

NCSA Logo
The National Center for Supercomputing Applications
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

HDF Help Desk
Last modified: 8 June 2000
Describes HDF5 Release 1.2.2, June 2000