From unrza3@cd4680fs.rrze.uni-erlangen.de Tue May 3 14:11:32 1994 X-VM-Summary-Format: "%n %*%a %-17.17F %-3.3m %2d %4l/%-5c %I\"%s\"\n" X-VM-Labels: nil X-VM-VHeader: ("Resent-" "From:" "Sender:" "To:" "Apparently-To:" "Cc:" "Subject:" "Date:") nil X-VM-Bookmark: 4 Status: RO X-VM-v5-Data: ([nil nil nil nil nil nil nil nil nil] ["1311" "Tue" " 3" "May" "1994" "12:47:30" "+0200" "Markus Kuhn" "unrza3@cd4680fs.rrze.uni-erlangen.de" "<2q5a42E2f4@uni-erlangen.de>" "26" "Re: time series data (real time)" "^From:" nil nil "5" "1994050310:47:30" "time series data (real time)" (number " " mark " Markus Kuhn May 3 26/1311 " thread-indent "\"Re: time series data (real time)\"\n") "<2q3mi4$pqv@zip.eecs.umich.edu>"] nil) Path: saips.cv.nrao.edu!hearst.acc.Virginia.EDU!caen!usenet.cis.ufl.edu!usenet.ufl.edu!usenet.fiu.edu!MathWorks.Com!europa.eng.gtefsd.com!howland.reston.ans.net!usenet.ins.cwru.edu!nigel.msen.com!zib-berlin.de!fauern!rrze.uni-erlangen.de!not-for-mail Newsgroups: sci.data.formats Organization: Regionales Rechenzentrum Erlangen, Germany Message-ID: <2q5a42E2f4@uni-erlangen.de> References: <2q3mi4$pqv@zip.eecs.umich.edu> Reply-To: ftpebs@rrze.uni-erlangen.de NNTP-Posting-Host: cd4680fs.rrze.uni-erlangen.de Lines: 26 Keywords: time series, real time From: unrza3@cd4680fs.rrze.uni-erlangen.de (Markus Kuhn) Subject: Re: time series data (real time) Date: Tue, 3 May 1994 12:47:30 +0200 rasmussn@jupiter.eecs.umich.edu (Craig E Rasmussen) writes: >We have a project which is displaying data in real time from remote sites >via the internet. Currently we are distributing data using NeXT's >Portable Distributed Objects (PDO). However, we are consdering ways to >make our software more widely accessible and are considering using HDF or >netCDF. I'm not an expert on HDF or netCDF, but there is a scientific standard file format (EBS: extensible bio-signal file format) which has among other things been designed to allow processing of growing and extremely huge time series files. It is a very simple but also quite flexible file format which introduces some concepts I have been missing in many other file formats. If you want to read the specification, you'll get it with anonymous ftp from ftp.uni-erlangen.de the file pub/ebs/ebs.doc. There is also a comfortable X11 viewer called xebs for Unix available freely on request which supports viewing growing EBS files in real time and other public domain tools are in development. Please contact ftpebs@rrze.uni-erlangen.de for more information if you are interested. Markus -- Markus Kuhn, Computer Science student «°o°» University of Erlangen, Germany Internet: mskuhn@cip.informatik.uni-erlangen.de | X.500 entry available From mfolk@ncsa.uiuc.edu Mon May 23 12:34:23 1994 Status: RO X-VM-v5-Data: ([nil nil nil nil nil nil nil nil nil] ["2605" "Mon" "23" "May" "1994" "10:15:28" "+0300" "Mike Folk" "mfolk@ncsa.uiuc.edu" "" "59" "Re: Whats going to happen to HDF ?" "^From:" nil nil "5" "1994052307:15:28" "Whats going to happen to HDF ?" (number " " mark " Mike Folk May 23 59/2605 " thread-indent "\"Re: Whats going to happen to HDF ?\"\n") "<1994May18.142537.20161@cc.ic.ac.uk>"] nil) Path: saips.cv.nrao.edu!hearst.acc.Virginia.EDU!concert!news-feed-2.peachnet.edu!emory!europa.eng.gtefsd.com!howland.reston.ans.net!vixen.cso.uiuc.edu!palenque.ncsa.uiuc.edu!user Newsgroups: sci.data.formats Followup-To: sci.data.formats Organization: University of Illinois at Urbana Lines: 59 Message-ID: References: <1994May18.142537.20161@cc.ic.ac.uk> NNTP-Posting-Host: palenque.ncsa.uiuc.edu From: mfolk@ncsa.uiuc.edu (Mike Folk) Subject: Re: Whats going to happen to HDF ? Date: Mon, 23 May 1994 10:15:28 +0300 In article <1994May18.142537.20161@cc.ic.ac.uk>, atae@spva.ph.ic.ac.uk (Ata Etemadi) wrote: > As you may know Chris Houck from NCSA has left to join Mosaic > Communications Corp. Does anyone know whow this will effect the > development of HDF 4.0 ? > > best regards > Ata <(|)>. > -- Good question, Ata. Our original plans were to have a full beta version of HDF 4.0 ready by mid-summer. Chris's departure last week will surely affect the speed with which we complete HDF 4.0, and it may even affect the feature list. (See below for specifics.) In the five weeks before he departed, Chris did an outstanding job of transferring his special knowledge and insights about HDF to the rest of the HDF staff. This will help a great deal as we work toward completing the HDF 4.0 implementation. Chris's position will most likely be taken over by George Velamparampil, an HDF graduate student developer over the past two years. Our net loss due to Chris' departure will therefore be 1/2 person. (This of course does not tell the whole story. Chris has been a tremendous asset to the HDF project during the 2.5 years that he was with us. He added the netCDF interface to HDF, made SDS compatible with the netCDF and CDF data models, and made countless improvements and fixes to the HDF code. Chris contributed valuable advice on HDF-related problems and issues. In addition to all this, Chris provided continuous support to the growing population of HDF users.) But what about HDF 4.0? The defining characteristic of HDF 4.0 is that it support multi-file and multi-object access to all major HDF objects, just as it now supports such access for SDS objects. The full list of features we have planned for HDF 4.0 includes the following: 1. Interfaces that support multi-file/multi-object access for raster images and annotations, similar to the current SDS interface. 2. Support for n-bit integer data within the SDS interface. 3. Support for parallel I/O on the Thinking Machines' CM-5. 4. Limited support for reading CDF files. 5. Support for compression for SDSs. 6. Support for chunked storage of SDSs. 7. Source code support for FORTRAN and ANSI C only. This week we hope to release an alpha version of HDF 4.0 that includes items #2, 3, 4 and 7. We are considering postponing one or more of the other features (probably the chunked storage, maybe the multi-file support for annotations) in order to speed up the release, but have not decided yet for sure. We welcome your thoughts about these features. Mike Folk HDF Project Lead From atae@spva.ph.ic.ac.uk Thu May 26 00:27:49 1994 Status: RO X-VM-v5-Data: ([nil nil nil nil nil nil nil nil nil] ["2146" "Tue" "24" "May" "1994" "15:55:39" "BST" "Ata Etemadi" "atae@spva.ph.ic.ac.uk" "<1994May24.155539.17679@cc.ic.ac.uk>" "44" "Re: Whats going to happen to HDF ?" "^From:" nil nil "5" "1994052414:55:39" "Whats going to happen to HDF ?" (number " " mark " Ata Etemadi May 24 44/2146 " thread-indent "\"Re: Whats going to happen to HDF ?\"\n") ""] nil) Newsgroups: sci.data.formats Path: saips.cv.nrao.edu!hearst.acc.Virginia.EDU!darwin.sura.net!howland.reston.ans.net!news.intercon.com!panix!MathWorks.Com!europa.eng.gtefsd.com!gatech!swrinde!pipex!doc.ic.ac.uk!cc.ic.ac.uk!atae Message-ID: <1994May24.155539.17679@cc.ic.ac.uk> Nntp-Posting-Host: icmag1.sp.ph Reply-To: atae@spva.ph.ic.ac.uk Organization: Imperial College of Science, Technology, and Medicine, London, England References: <1994May18.142537.20161@cc.ic.ac.uk> Lines: 44 From: atae@spva.ph.ic.ac.uk (Ata Etemadi) Subject: Re: Whats going to happen to HDF ? Date: Tue, 24 May 94 15:55:39 BST In article , mfolk@ncsa.uiuc.edu (Mike Folk) writes: Chris visited us here at Imperial and was a great deal of help. Discussions with him certainly improved our knowledge and understanding of HDF and hopefully helped him to understand some of the problems we face as scientists. It would be great to have some kind of yearly forum for HDF developers in Europe and US. I know the CDF folks set up such meetings on a yearly basis. I am certainly willing to host the European version for HDF. |> But what about HDF 4.0? The defining characteristic of HDF 4.0 is |> that it support multi-file and multi-object access to all major |> HDF objects, just as it now supports such access for SDS objects. |> The full list of features we have planned for HDF 4.0 includes the |> following: |> |> 1. Interfaces that support multi-file/multi-object access |> for raster images and annotations, similar to the current |> SDS interface. |> 2. Support for n-bit integer data within the SDS interface. |> 3. Support for parallel I/O on the Thinking Machines' CM-5. |> 4. Limited support for reading CDF files. |> 5. Support for compression for SDSs. |> 6. Support for chunked storage of SDSs. |> 7. Source code support for FORTRAN and ANSI C only. 4. will certainly be very very very welcome since the International Solar Terrestial Physics (ISTP) committee, responsible for hundreds of space missions, have decided on CDF as their primary format. We use HDF-netCDF so I have had to write an HDF-netCDF to CDF converter. Your CDF interface couldn't have come at a better time. Hopefully we will see you add a C++ interface in future. Thanks very much for your detailed response. best regards Ata <(|)>. -- Dr Ata Etemadi, Blackett Laboratory, Space and Atmospheric Physics Group, Imperial College of Science, Technology, and Medicine, Prince Consort Road, London SW7 2BZ, ENGLAND Internet/Arpanet/Earn/Bitnet: atae@spva.ph.ic.ac.uk Span : SPVA::atae UUCP/Usenet : atae%spva.ph.ic@nsfnet-relay.ac.uk From sxu@ncsa.uiuc.edu Mon May 30 09:09:36 1994 Status: RO X-VM-v5-Data: ([nil nil nil nil nil nil nil nil nil] ["6344" "" "27" "May" "1994" "23:01:25" "GMT" "Shiming Xu" "sxu@ncsa.uiuc.edu" "<2s5u45$75s@vixen.cso.uiuc.edu>" "171" "HDF Newsletter #14" "^From:" nil nil "5" "1994052723:01:25" "HDF Newsletter #14" (number " " mark " Shiming Xu May 27 171/6344 " thread-indent "\"HDF Newsletter #14\"\n") nil] nil) Path: saips.cv.nrao.edu!hearst.acc.Virginia.EDU!darwin.sura.net!gatech!howland.reston.ans.net!vixen.cso.uiuc.edu!sxu Newsgroups: sci.data.formats Organization: Nat'l Ctr for Supercomp App (NCSA) @ University of Illinois Lines: 171 Distribution: world Message-ID: <2s5u45$75s@vixen.cso.uiuc.edu> NNTP-Posting-Host: xongmao.ncsa.uiuc.edu Originator: sxu@xongmao.ncsa.uiuc.edu From: sxu@ncsa.uiuc.edu (Shiming Xu) Subject: HDF Newsletter #14 Date: 27 May 1994 23:01:25 GMT HDF Newsletter #14 May 26, 1994 Contents ======== 1. HDF 4.0: Status and Plans 2. HDF4.0 Alpha release 3. Important change in the names of the FORTRAN include files 4. New URL for the HDF information server 5. New contributions 6. Update on NCSA tools 7. NCSA ftp server clogged 8. Thanks and good luck, Chris! HDF 4.0: Status and Plans ========================= The HDF group has been working for some time on a next version of HDF, which we are calling HDF 4.0. The defining characteristic of HDF 4.0 will be that it supports multi-file and multi-object access to all major HDF objects. The full list of features we have planned for HDF 4.0 includes the following: o Interfaces that support multi-file/multi-object access for raster images and annotations, similar to the current SDS interface. o Support for n-bit integer data within the SDS interface. o Support for parallel I/O on the Thinking Machines' CM-5. o Limited support for reading CDF files. o Support for compression for SDSs. o Support for chunked storage of SDSs. As the next article indicates, we now have an alpha version of HDF 4.0, which includes some of the items on the list. Our original plans were to have a full beta version of HDF 4.0 ready by mid-summer. However, with the loss of Chris Houck (see final article), the release will almost certainly be delayed. We are considering postponing one or more of the above features (probably the chunked storage, maybe the annotations) in order to speed up the release, but have not decided yet for sure. We welcome your thoughts about these features. HDF4.0 Alpha release ==================== HDF Version 4.0 is ready for enthusiastic HDF users to run an alpha test now. The new version supports n-bit number types, a parallel I/O HDF interface for CM5, and reads CDF files. Please read ABOUT_4.0.alpha for more details. o In order to increase the clarity and maintainability of HDF code, we are moving towards the use of ANSI C conforming compilers. HDF 4.0 Alpha is the first trial release. o Users of Scientific data sets have been asking for ways to store datasets which are composed of integer number types that don't fall into any of our current pre-defined number types. For example, users would like to be able to read and write 10-bit integers using an HDF SDS interface. HDF 4.0 includes several new routines to let users define, write and read n-bit Scientific data sets. o HDF 4.0 is able to read CDF files. o HDF 4.0 also added a CM5 parallel I/O interface. Important change in the names of the FORTRAN include files ========================================================== HDF FORTRAN users, please notice that the constant.i has been renamed as hdf.inc and dffunct.i as dffunct.inc. If your existing programs include those *.i files , you need to change them correspondently before you compile them with HDF4.0. The ABOUT_4.0.alpha explains why the names were changed. New URL for the HDF information server ====================================== An HDF information server is set up. Its URL is: http://hdf.ncsa.uiuc.edu:8001/. The server has the Online Hypertext Version of the HDF Reference Manual. There is a fill-out form in the home page for users to submit questions to the HDF team. New contributions ================= HDF and XDS extensions to support blocked SDS. Hugo Patterson, graduate research fellow of Carnegie Mellon University contributed the extensions made to HDF3.2r3 and XDS2.2 to support read/ write/display of blocked scientific data sets. The contribution is in HDF/contrib/HDF3.2r3.Blocked_SDS/ on the NCSA ftp server. Read the README file in that directory for more information. Update on NCSA tools ==================== Collage release 1.3 for X Window System. New features in 1.3: o Full support of int16 (short) HDF type. o Support of int8 HDF type. o Backspace works when doodling text in image or whiteboard. o Contour works for all data type. o Animation of a 3d data along an arbitrary axis can be generated from the 3d panel. o A bug was fixed that occurs when the default number of colorcells is less than 256. o Options were added for naming of SDSs (use of annotation or not...). o Screen capture on SGI works better. o Delete buttons were added so that you can recover some memory. o A private copy button was added on the spreadsheet. Distribution: The software is available through anonymous ftp for both binaries and source code. ftp ftp.ncsa.uiuc.edu (141.142.20.50) and answer anonymous to the Name question. Than cd /UNIX/XCollage/Collage1.3, get DOCS, quit ftp, read DOCS and download the binaries that you need. NCSA ftp server clogged ======================= If you have tried recently to get anything from the NCSA ftp server (ftp.ncsa.uiuc.edu), you have probably noticed that it is very hard to connect. This is caused by an overwhelming increase in the number of accesses over the past couple of months, most likely a side effect of the popularity of NCSA Mosaic and the NCSA World Wide Web server. This is just to let you know that we are aware of the problem, we regret the inconvenience it is causing many of you, and we are taking measures to fix it. We hope to have it solved within a month. Thanks and good luck, Chris Houck! ================================== Chris Houck is leaving NCSA and the HDF group to pursue opportunities in the commercial world. Chris has been a joy to work with and a tremendous asset to the HDF project during the two and a half years that he has been with us. He was responsible for the enormous task of merging the netCDF interface into HDF, for rewriting the SDS interface to make it completely compatible with the netCDF and CDF data models, and for making a countless improvements and fixes to practically all parts of the HDF code. Chris has continuously contributed important insights and opinions about how to approach HDF-related problems and issues. In addition to all this, Chris has consistently and cheerfully provided support to the growing population of HDF users. Chris, obviously we will really miss you, we are enormously grateful for your contributions to HDF, and we wish you all the best.