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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
---------------------------------------------------

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