summaryrefslogtreecommitdiffstats
path: root/doxygen/examples/H5.format.1.0.html
diff options
context:
space:
mode:
Diffstat (limited to 'doxygen/examples/H5.format.1.0.html')
-rw-r--r--doxygen/examples/H5.format.1.0.html4050
1 files changed, 4050 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/doxygen/examples/H5.format.1.0.html b/doxygen/examples/H5.format.1.0.html
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..2d3ffbe
--- /dev/null
+++ b/doxygen/examples/H5.format.1.0.html
@@ -0,0 +1,4050 @@
+<html>
+ <head>
+ <title>
+ HDF5 File Format Specification
+ </title>
+ </head>
+ <body bgcolor="#FFFFFF">
+
+ <center>
+ <table border=0 width=90%>
+ <tr>
+ <td valign=top>
+ <ol type=I>
+ <li><a href="#Intro">Introduction</a>
+ <li><a href="#BootBlock">Disk Format Level 0 - File Signature and Super Block</a>
+ <li><a href="#Group">Disk Format Level 1 - File Infrastructure</a>
+ <font size=-2>
+ <ol type=A>
+ <li><a href="#Btrees">Disk Format Level 1A - B-link Trees and B-tree Nodes</a>
+ <li><a href="#SymbolTable">Disk Format Level 1B - Group</a>
+ <li><a href="#SymbolTableEntry">Disk Format Level 1C - Group Entry</a>
+ <li><a href="#LocalHeap">Disk Format Level 1D - Local Heaps</a>
+ <li><a href="#GlobalHeap">Disk Format Level 1E - Global Heap</a>
+ <li><a href="#FreeSpaceIndex">Disk Format Level 1F - Free-space Index</a>
+ </ol>
+ </font>
+ <li><a href="#DataObject">Disk Format Level 2 - Data Objects</a>
+ <font size=-2>
+ <ol type=A>
+ <li><a href="#ObjectHeader">Disk Format Level 2a - Data Object Headers</a>
+ <ol type=1>
+ <li><a href="#NILMessage">Name: NIL</a> <!-- 0x0000 -->
+ <li><a href="#SimpleDataSpace">Name: Simple Dataspace</a> <!-- 0x0001 -->
+<!--
+ <li><a href="#DataSpaceMessage">Name: Complex Dataspace</a> --> <!-- 0x0002 -->
+ <li><a href="#DataTypeMessage">Name: Datatype</a> <!-- 0x0003 -->
+ <li><a href="#FillValueMessage">Name: Data Storage - Fill Value</a> <!-- 0x0004 -->
+ <li><a href="#ReservedMessage_0005">Name: Reserved - not assigned yet</a> <!-- 0x0005 -->
+ </ol>
+ </ol>
+ </font>
+ </ol>
+ </td><td>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td><td valign=top>
+ <ol type=I>
+
+ <li><a href="#DataObject">Disk Format Level 2 - Data Objects</a>
+ <font size=-2><i>(Continued)</i>
+ <ol type=A>
+ <li><a href="#ObjectHeader">Disk Format Level 2a - Data Object Headers</a><i>(Continued)</i>
+ <ol type=1>
+ <li><a href="#CompactDataStorageMessage">Name: Data Storage - Compact</a> <!-- 0x0006 -->
+ <li><a href="#ExternalFileListMessage">Name: Data Storage - External Data Files</a> <!-- 0x0007 -->
+ <li><a href="#LayoutMessage">Name: Data Storage - Layout</a> <!-- 0x0008 -->
+ <li><a href="#ReservedMessage_0009">Name: Reserved - not assigned yet</a> <!-- 0x0009 -->
+ <li><a href="#ReservedMessage_000A">Name: Reserved - not assigned yet</a> <!-- 0x000a -->
+ <li><a href="#FilterMessage">Name: Data Storage - Filter Pipeline</a> <!-- 0x000b -->
+ <li><a href="#AttributeMessage">Name: Attribute</a> <!-- 0x000c -->
+ <li><a href="#NameMessage">Name: Object Name</a> <!-- 0x000d -->
+ <li><a href="#ModifiedMessage">Name: Object Modification Date and Time</a> <!-- 0x000e -->
+ <li><a href="#SharedMessage">Name: Shared Object Message</a> <!-- 0x000f -->
+ <li><a href="#ContinuationMessage">Name: Object Header Continuation</a> <!-- 0x0010 -->
+ <li><a href="#SymbolTableMessage">Name: Group Message</a> <!-- 0x0011 -->
+ </ol>
+ <li><a href="#SharedObjectHeader">Disk Format: Level 2b - Shared Data Object Headers</a>
+ <li><a href="#DataStorage">Disk Format: Level 2c - Data Object Data Storage</a>
+ </ol>
+ </font>
+ </ol>
+</td></tr>
+</table>
+</center>
+
+<br><br>
+
+
+ <h2>Introduction</h2>
+
+ <table align=right width=100>
+ <tr><td>&nbsp;</td><td align=center>
+ <hr>
+ <img src="FF-IH_FileGroup.gif" alt="HDF5 Groups" hspace=15 vspace=15>
+ </td><td>&nbsp;</td></tr>
+ <tr><td>&nbsp;</td><td align=center>
+ <strong>Figure 1:</strong> Relationships among the HDF5 root group, other groups, and objects
+ <hr>
+ </td><td>&nbsp;</td></tr>
+
+ <tr><td>&nbsp;</td><td align=center>
+ <img src="FF-IH_FileObject.gif" alt="HDF5 Objects" hspace=15 vspace=15>
+ </td><td>&nbsp;</td></tr>
+ <tr><td>&nbsp;</td><td align=center>
+ <strong>Figure 2:</strong> HDF5 objects -- datasets, datatypes, or dataspaces
+ <hr>
+ </td><td>&nbsp;</td></tr>
+ </table>
+
+
+ <P>The format of an HDF5 file on disk encompasses several
+ key ideas of the HDF4 and AIO file formats as well as
+ addressing some shortcomings therein. The new format is
+ more self-describing than the HDF4 format and is more
+ uniformly applied to data objects in the file.
+
+ <P>An HDF5 file appears to the user as a directed graph.
+ The nodes of this graph are the higher-level HDF5 objects
+ that are exposed by the HDF5 APIs:
+
+ <ul>
+ <li>Groups
+ <li>Datasets
+ <li>Datatypes
+ <li>Dataspaces
+ </ul>
+
+ <P>At the lowest level, as information is actually written to the disk,
+ an HDF5 file is made up of the following objects:
+ <ul>
+ <li>A super block
+ <li>B-tree nodes (containing either symbol nodes or raw data chunks)
+ <li>Object headers
+
+ <li>Collections
+ <li>Local heaps
+ <li>Free space
+ </ul>
+
+ The HDF5 library uses these lower-level objects to represent the
+ higher-level objects that are then presented to the user or
+ to applications through the APIs.
+ For instance, a group is an object header that contains a message that
+ points to a local heap and to a B-tree which points to symbol nodes.
+ A dataset is an object header that contains messages that describe
+ datatype, space, layout, filters, external files, fill value, etc
+ with the layout message pointing to either a raw data chunk or to a
+ B-tree that points to raw data chunks.
+
+
+ <h3>This Document</h3>
+
+ <p>This document describes the lower-level data objects;
+ the higher-level objects and their properties are described
+ in the <a href="H5.user.html"><cite>HDF5 User's Guide</cite></a>.
+
+
+<!--
+<blockquote>
+<pre>
+
+Elena> NOTE: give reference to the detailed discussion of the B-trees
+Elena> when needed. Right now we do not have specification (only general one)
+Elena> for the Symbol Table B-trees and B-trees used to manage chunked datasets.
+Elena> B-trees
+Elena> General Discussion
+Elena> Object related discussions
+Elena> Symbol Tables
+Elena> Global heap
+Elena> "Free-space object"
+
+
+</pre>
+</blockquote>
+-->
+
+
+
+ <P>Three levels of information comprise the file format.
+ Level 0 contains basic information for identifying and
+ defining information about the file. Level 1 information contains
+ the group information (stored as a B-tree) and is used as the
+ index for all the objects in the file. Level 2 is the rest
+ of the file and contains all of the data objects, with each object
+ partitioned into header information, also known as
+ <em>meta information</em>, and data.
+
+ <p>The sizes of various fields in the following layout tables are
+ determined by looking at the number of columns the field spans
+ in the table. There are three exceptions: (1) The size may be
+ overridden by specifying a size in parentheses, (2) the size of
+ addresses is determined by the <em>Size of Offsets</em> field
+ in the super block, and (3) the size of size fields is determined
+ by the <em>Size of Lengths</em> field in the super block.
+
+
+
+<br><br>
+<br><br>
+
+
+ <h2><a name="BootBlock">
+ Disk Format: Level 0 - File Signature and Super Block</a></h2>
+
+ <P>The super block may begin at certain predefined offsets within
+ the HDF5 file, allowing a block of unspecified content for
+ users to place additional information at the beginning (and
+ end) of the HDF5 file without limiting the HDF5 library's
+ ability to manage the objects within the file itself. This
+ feature was designed to accommodate wrapping an HDF5 file in
+ another file format or adding descriptive information to the
+ file without requiring the modification of the actual file's
+ information. The super block is located by searching for the
+ HDF5 file signature at byte offset 0, byte offset 512 and at
+ successive locations in the file, each a multiple of two of
+ the previous location, i.e. 0, 512, 1024, 2048, etc.
+
+ <P>The super block is composed of a file signature, followed by
+ super block and group version numbers, information
+ about the sizes of offset and length values used to describe
+ items within the file, the size of each group page,
+ and a group entry for the root object in the file.
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border align=center cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <B>HDF5 Super Block Layout</B>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>HDF5 File Signature (8 bytes)<br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td>Version # of Super Block</td>
+ <td>Version # of Global Free-space Storage</td>
+ <td>Version # of Group</td>
+ <td>Reserved</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td>Version # of Shared Header Message Format</td>
+ <td>Size of Offsets</td>
+ <td>Size of Lengths</td>
+ <td>Reserved (zero)</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=2>Group Leaf Node K</td>
+ <td colspan=2>Group Internal Node K</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>File Consistency Flags</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Base Address*</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Address of Global Free-space Heap*</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>End of File Address*</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Driver Information Block Address*</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Root Group Address*</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+
+ <table width="80%" border=0>
+ <tr><td>
+ <div align=right>
+ (Items marked with an asterisk (*) in the above table
+ <br>
+ are of the size specified in "Size of Offsets.")
+ </div>
+ </td></tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table width="80%">
+ <tr>
+ <th width="30%">Field Name</th>
+ <th width="70%">Description</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>File Signature</td>
+ <td>This field contains a constant value and can be used to
+ quickly identify a file as being an HDF5 file. The
+ constant value is designed to allow easy identification of
+ an HDF5 file and to allow certain types of data corruption
+ to be detected. The file signature of an HDF5 file always
+ contains the following values:
+
+ <br><br><center>
+ <table border align=center cellpadding=4 width="100%">
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td>decimal</td>
+ <td width="8%">137</td>
+ <td width="8%">72</td>
+ <td width="8%">68</td>
+ <td width="8%">70</td>
+ <td width="8%">13</td>
+ <td width="8%">10</td>
+ <td width="8%">26</td>
+ <td width="8%">10</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td>hexadecimal</td>
+ <td width="8%">89</td>
+ <td width="8%">48</td>
+ <td width="8%">44</td>
+ <td width="8%">46</td>
+ <td width="8%">0d</td>
+ <td width="8%">0a</td>
+ <td width="8%">1a</td>
+ <td width="8%">0a</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td>ASCII C Notation</td>
+ <td width="8%">\211</td>
+ <td width="8%">H</td>
+ <td width="8%">D</td>
+ <td width="8%">F</td>
+ <td width="8%">\r</td>
+ <td width="8%">\n</td>
+ <td width="8%">\032</td>
+ <td width="8%">\n</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+ <br>
+
+ This signature both identifies the file as an HDF5 file
+ and provides for immediate detection of common
+ file-transfer problems. The first two bytes distinguish
+ HDF5 files on systems that expect the first two bytes to
+ identify the file type uniquely. The first byte is
+ chosen as a non-ASCII value to reduce the probability
+ that a text file may be misrecognized as an HDF5 file;
+ also, it catches bad file transfers that clear bit
+ 7. Bytes two through four name the format. The CR-LF
+ sequence catches bad file transfers that alter newline
+ sequences. The control-Z character stops file display
+ under MS-DOS. The final line feed checks for the inverse
+ of the CR-LF translation problem. (This is a direct
+ descendent of the PNG file signature.)</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Version Number of the Super Block</td>
+ <td>This value is used to determine the format of the
+ information in the super block. When the format of the
+ information in the super block is changed, the version number
+ is incremented to the next integer and can be used to
+ determine how the information in the super block is
+ formatted.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Version Number of the Global Free-space Heap</td>
+ <td>This value is used to determine the format of the
+ information in the Global Free-space Heap.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Version Number of the Group</td>
+ <td>This value is used to determine the format of the
+ information in the Group. When the format of
+ the information in the Group is changed, the
+ version number is incremented to the next integer and can be
+ used to determine how the information in the Group
+ is formatted.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Version Number of the Shared Header Message Format</td>
+ <td>This value is used to determine the format of the
+ information in a shared object header message, which is
+ stored in the global small-data heap. Since the format
+ of the shared header messages differs from the private
+ header messages, a version number is used to identify changes
+ in the format.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Size of Offsets</td>
+ <td>This value contains the number of bytes used to store
+ addresses in the file. The values for the addresses of
+ objects in the file are offsets relative to a base address,
+ usually the address of the super block signature. This
+ allows a wrapper to be added after the file is created
+ without invalidating the internal offset locations.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Size of Lengths</td>
+ <td>This value contains the number of bytes used to store
+ the size of an object.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Group Leaf Node K</td>
+ <td>Each leaf node of a group B-tree will have at
+ least this many entries but not more than twice this
+ many. If a group has a single leaf node then it
+ may have fewer entries.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Group Internal Node K</td>
+ <td>Each internal node of a group B-tree will have
+ at least K pointers to other nodes but not more than 2K
+ pointers. If the group has only one internal
+ node then it might have fewer than K pointers.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Bytes per B-tree Page</td>
+ <td>This value contains the number of bytes used for symbol
+ pairs per page of the B-trees used in the file. All
+ B-tree pages will have the same size per page.
+ <br>
+ For 32-bit file offsets, 340 objects is the maximum
+ per 4KB page; for 64-bit file offset, 254 objects will fit
+ per 4KB page. In general, the equation is:
+ <br>
+ <code>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&lt;<i>number of objects</i>&gt; =
+ <br>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;
+ FLOOR((&lt;<i>page size</i>&gt; - &lt;<i>offset size</i>&gt;) /
+ <br>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;
+ (&lt;<i>Symbol size</i>&gt; + &lt;<i>offset size</i>&gt;))
+ - 1 </code></td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>File Consistency Flags</td>
+ <td>This value contains flags to indicate information
+ about the consistency of the information contained
+ within the file. Currently, the following bit flags are
+ defined:
+ <ul>
+ <li>Bit 0 set indicates that the file is opened for
+ write-access.
+ <li>Bit 1 set indicates that the file has
+ been verified for consistency and is guaranteed to be
+ consistent with the format defined in this document.
+ <li>Bits 2-31 are reserved for future use.
+ </ul>
+ Bit 0 should be
+ set as the first action when a file is opened for write
+ access and should be cleared only as the final action
+ when closing a file. Bit 1 should be cleared during
+ normal access to a file and only set after the file's
+ consistency is guaranteed by the library or a
+ consistency utility.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Base Address</td>
+ <td>This is the absolute file address of the first byte of
+ the HDF5 data within the file. The library currently
+ constrains this value to be the absolute file address
+ of the super block itself when creating new files;
+ future versions of the library may provide greater
+ flexibility. Unless otherwise noted,
+ all other file addresses are relative to this base
+ address.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Address of Global Free-space Heap</td>
+ <td>Free-space management is not yet defined in the HDF5
+ file format and is not handled by the library.
+ Currently this field always contains the
+ undefined address <code>0xfff...ff</code>.
+<!--
+ <td>This value contains the relative address of the B-tree
+ used to manage the blocks of data which are unused in the
+ file currently. The free-space heap is used to manage the
+ blocks of bytes at the file-level which become unused when
+ objects are moved within the file.</td>
+-->
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>End of File Address</td>
+ <td>This is the relative file address of the first byte past
+ the end of all HDF5 data. It is used to determine whether a
+ file has been accidently truncated and as an address where
+ file data allocation can occur if the free list is not
+ used.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Driver Information Block Address</td>
+ <td>This is the relative file address of the file driver
+ information block which contains driver-specific
+ information needed to reopen the file. If there is no
+ driver information block then this entry should be the
+ undefined address (all bits set).</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Root Group Address</td>
+ <td>This is the address of the root group (described later
+ in this document), which serves as the entry point into
+ the group graph.</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+
+ <p>The <em>file driver information block</em> is an optional region of the
+ file which contains information needed by the file driver in
+ order to reopen a file. The format of the file driver information
+ block is:
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border align=center cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <B>Driver Information Block</B>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td>Version</td>
+ <td colspan=3>Reserved (zero)</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Driver Information Size (4 bytes)</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Driver Identification (8 bytes)<br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br><br>Driver Information<br><br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table align=center width="80%">
+ <tr>
+ <th width="30%">Field Name</th>
+ <th width="70%">Description</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Version</td>
+ <td>The version number of the driver information block. The
+ file format documented here is version zero.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Driver Information Size</td>
+ <td>The size in bytes of the Driver Information part of this
+ structure.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Driver Identification</td>
+ <td>This is an eight-byte ASCII string without null
+ termination which identifies the driver and version number
+ of the Driver Information block. The predefined drivers
+ supplied with the HDF5 library are identified by the
+ letters <code>NCSA</code> followed by the first four characters of
+ the driver name. If the Driver Information block is not
+ the original version then the last letter(s) of the
+ identification will be replaced by a version number in
+ ASCII.
+ For example, the various versions of the <em>family driver</em>
+ will be identified by <code>NCSAfami</code>, <code>NCSAfam0</code>,
+ <code>NCSAfam1</code>, etc.
+ (<code>NCSAfami</code> is simply <code>NCSAfamily</code> truncated
+ to eight characters. Subsequent identifiers will be created by
+ substituting sequential numerical values for the final character,
+ starting with zero.)
+ <p>
+ Identification for user-defined drivers
+ is arbitrary but should be unique.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Driver Information</td>
+ <td>Driver information is stored in a format defined by the
+ file driver and encoded/decoded by the driver callbacks
+ invoked from the <code>H5FD_sb_encode</code> and
+ <code>H5FD_sb_decode</code> functions.</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+
+ <br><br>
+ <br><br>
+
+
+ <h2><a name="Group">
+ Disk Format: Level 1 - File Infrastructure</a></h2>
+ <h3><a name="Btrees">Disk Format: Level 1A - B-link Trees and B-tree Nodes</a></h3>
+
+ <p>B-link trees allow flexible storage for objects which tend to grow
+ in ways that cause the object to be stored discontiguously. B-trees
+ are described in various algorithms books including "Introduction to
+ Algorithms" by Thomas H. Cormen, Charles E. Leiserson, and Ronald
+ L. Rivest. The B-link tree, in which the sibling nodes at a
+ particular level in the tree are stored in a doubly-linked list,
+ is described in the "Efficient Locking for Concurrent Operations
+ on B-trees" paper by Phillip Lehman and S. Bing Yao as published
+ in the <em>ACM Transactions on Database Systems</em>, Vol. 6,
+ No. 4, December 1981.
+
+ <p>The B-link trees implemented by the file format contain one more
+ key than the number of children. In other words, each child
+ pointer out of a B-tree node has a left key and a right key.
+ The pointers out of internal nodes point to sub-trees while
+ the pointers out of leaf nodes point to symbol nodes and
+ raw data chunks.
+ Aside from that difference, internal nodes and leaf nodes
+ are identical.
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <B>B-tree Nodes</B>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Node Signature</td>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td>Node Type</td>
+ <td>Node Level</td>
+ <td colspan=2>Entries Used</td>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Address of Left Sibling</td>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Address of Right Sibling</td>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Key 0 (variable size)</td>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Address of Child 0</td>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Key 1 (variable size)</td>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Address of Child 1</td>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>...</td>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Key 2<em>K</em> (variable size)</td>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Address of Child 2<em>K</em></td>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Key 2<em>K</em>+1 (variable size)</td>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table align=center width="80%">
+ <tr>
+ <th width="30%">Field Name</th>
+ <th width="70%">Description</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Node Signature</td>
+ <td>The ASCII character string <code>TREE</code> is
+ used to indicate the
+ beginning of a B-link tree node. This gives file
+ consistency checking utilities a better chance of
+ reconstructing a damaged file.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Node Type</td>
+ <td>Each B-link tree points to a particular type of data.
+ This field indicates the type of data as well as
+ implying the maximum degree <em>K</em> of the tree and
+ the size of each Key field.
+ <br>
+ <dl compact>
+ <dt>0
+ <dd>This tree points to group nodes.
+ <dt>1
+ <dd>This tree points to a new data chunk.
+ </dl>
+ </td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Node Level</td>
+ <td>The node level indicates the level at which this node
+ appears in the tree (leaf nodes are at level zero). Not
+ only does the level indicate whether child pointers
+ point to sub-trees or to data, but it can also be used
+ to help file consistency checking utilities reconstruct
+ damanged trees.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Entries Used</td>
+ <td>This determines the number of children to which this
+ node points. All nodes of a particular type of tree
+ have the same maximum degree, but most nodes will point
+ to less than that number of children. The valid child
+ pointers and keys appear at the beginning of the node
+ and the unused pointers and keys appear at the end of
+ the node. The unused pointers and keys have undefined
+ values.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Address of Left Sibling</td>
+ <td>This is the file address of the left sibling of the
+ current node relative to the super block. If the current
+ node is the left-most node at this level then this field
+ is the undefined address (all bits set).</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Address of Right Sibling</td>
+ <td>This is the file address of the right sibling of the
+ current node relative to the super block. If the current
+ node is the right-most node at this level then this
+ field is the undefined address (all bits set).</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Keys and Child Pointers</td>
+ <td>Each tree has 2<em>K</em>+1 keys with 2<em>K</em>
+ child pointers interleaved between the keys. The number
+ of keys and child pointers actually containing valid
+ values is determined by the <em>Entries Used</em> field. If
+ that field is <em>N</em> then the B-link tree contains
+ <em>N</em> child pointers and <em>N</em>+1 keys.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Key</td>
+ <td>The format and size of the key values is determined by
+ the type of data to which this tree points. The keys are
+ ordered and are boundaries for the contents of the child
+ pointer; that is, the key values represented by child
+ <em>N</em> fall between Key <em>N</em> and Key
+ <em>N</em>+1. Whether the interval is open or closed on
+ each end is determined by the type of data to which the
+ tree points.
+ <p>
+ The format of the key depends on the node type.
+ For nodes of node type 1, the key is formatted as follows:
+ <center>
+ <table>
+ <tr valign=top align=left>
+ <td width=40%>Bytes 1-4</td>
+ <td>Size of chunk in bytes.</td>
+ <tr valign=top align=left></tr>
+ <td>Bytes 4-8</td>
+ <td>Filter mask, a 32-bit bitfield indicating which
+ filters have been applied to that chunk.</td>
+ </tr><tr valign=top align=left>
+ <td><i>N</i> fields of 8 bytes each</td>
+ <td>A 64-bit index indicating the offset of the
+ chunk within the dataset where <i>N</i> is the number
+ of dimensions of the dataset. For example, if
+ a chunk in a 3-dimensional dataset begins at the
+ position <code>[5,5,5]</code>, there will be three
+ such 8-bit indices, each with the value of
+ <code>5</code>.</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+ <p>
+ For nodes of node type 0, the key is formatted as follows:
+ <center>
+ <table>
+ <tr valign=top align=left>
+ <td width=40%>A single field of <i>Size of Lengths</i>
+ bytes</td>
+ <td>Indicates the byte offset into the local heap
+ for the first object name in the subtree which
+ that key describes.</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+ </td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Child Pointers</td>
+ <td>The tree node contains file addresses of subtrees or
+ data depending on the node level. Nodes at Level 0 point
+ to data addresses, either data chunk or group nodes.
+ Nodes at non-zero levels point to other nodes of the
+ same B-tree.</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+<p>
+ Each B-tree node looks like this:
+
+ <center>
+ <table>
+ <tr valign=top align=center>
+ <td>key[0]</td><td>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+ <td>child[0]</td><td>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+ <td>key[1]</td><td>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+ <td>child[1]</td><td>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+ <td>key[2]</td><td>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+ <td>...</td><td>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+ <td>...</td><td>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+ <td>key[<i>N</i>-1]</td><td>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+ <td>child[<i>N</i>-1]</td><td>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+ <td>key[<i>N</i>]</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ where child[<i>i</i>] is a pointer to a sub-tree (at a level
+ above Level 0) or to data (at Level 0).
+ Each key[<i>i</i>] describes an <i>item</i> stored by the B-tree
+ (a chunk or an object of a group node). The range of values
+ represented by child[<i>i</i>] are indicated by key[<i>i</i>]
+ and key[<i>i</i>+1].
+
+
+ <p>The following question must next be answered:
+ "Is the value described by key[<i>i</i>] contained in
+ child[<i>i</i>-1] or in child[<i>i</i>]?"
+ The answer depends on the type of tree.
+ In trees for groups (node type 0) the object described by
+ key[<i>i</i>] is the greatest object contained in
+ child[<i>i</i>-1] while in chunk trees (node type 1) the
+ chunk described by key[<i>i</i>] is the least chunk in
+ child[<i>i</i>].
+
+ <p>That means that key[0] for group trees is sometimes unused;
+ it points to offset zero in the heap, which is always the
+ empty string and compares as "less-than" any valid object name.
+
+ <p>And key[<i>N</i>] for chunk trees is sometimes unused;
+ it contains a chunk offset which compares as "greater-than"
+ any other chunk offset and has a chunk byte size of zero
+ to indicate that it is not actually allocated.
+
+
+ <h3><a name="SymbolTable">Disk Format: Level 1B - Group and Symbol Nodes</a></h3>
+
+ <p>A group is an object internal to the file that allows
+ arbitrary nesting of objects (including other groups).
+ A group maps a set of names to a set of file
+ address relative to the base address. Certain meta data
+ for an object to which the group points can be duplicated
+ in the group symbol table in addition to the object header.
+
+ <p>An HDF5 object name space can be stored hierarchically by
+ partitioning the name into components and storing each
+ component in a group. The group entry for a
+ non-ultimate component points to the group containing
+ the next component. The group entry for the last
+ component points to the object being named.
+
+ <p>A group is a collection of group nodes pointed
+ to by a B-link tree. Each group node contains entries
+ for one or more symbols. If an attempt is made to add a
+ symbol to an already full group node containing
+ 2<em>K</em> entries, then the node is split and one node
+ contains <em>K</em> symbols and the other contains
+ <em>K</em>+1 symbols.
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <B>Group Node (A Leaf of a B-tree)</B>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Node Signature</td>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td>Version Number</td>
+ <td>Reserved for Future Use</td>
+ <td colspan=2>Number of Symbols</td>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br><br>Group Entries<br><br><br></td>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table align=center width="80%">
+ <tr>
+ <th width="30%">Field Name</th>
+ <th width="70%">Description</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Node Signature</td>
+ <td>The ASCII character string <code>SNOD</code> is
+ used to indicate the
+ beginning of a group node. This gives file
+ consistency checking utilities a better chance of
+ reconstructing a damaged file.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Version Number</td>
+ <td>The version number for the group node. This
+ document describes version 1.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Number of Symbols</td>
+ <td>Although all group nodes have the same length,
+ most contain fewer than the maximum possible number of
+ symbol entries. This field indicates how many entries
+ contain valid data. The valid entries are packed at the
+ beginning of the group node while the remaining
+ entries contain undefined values.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Group Entries</td>
+ <td>Each symbol has an entry in the group node.
+ The format of the entry is described below.</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <h3><a name="SymbolTableEntry">
+ Disk Format: Level 1C - Group Entry </a></h3>
+
+ <p>Each group entry in a group node is designed
+ to allow for very fast browsing of stored objects.
+ Toward that design goal, the group entries
+ include space for caching certain constant meta data from the
+ object header.
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <B>Group Entry</B>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Name Offset (&lt;size&gt; bytes)</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Object Header Address</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Cache Type</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Reserved</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br><br>Scratch-pad Space (16 bytes)<br><br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table align=center width="80%">
+ <tr>
+ <th width="30%">Field Name</th>
+ <th width="70%">Description</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Name Offset</td>
+ <td>This is the byte offset into the group local
+ heap for the name of the object. The name is null
+ terminated.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Object Header Address</td>
+ <td>Every object has an object header which serves as a
+ permanent location for the object's meta data. In addition
+ to appearing in the object header, some meta data can be
+ cached in the scratch-pad space.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Cache Type</td>
+ <td>The cache type is determined from the object header.
+ It also determines the format for the scratch-pad space.
+ <br>
+ <dl compact>
+ <dt>0
+ <dd>No data is cached by the group entry. This
+ is guaranteed to be the case when an object header
+ has a link count greater than one.
+
+ <dt>1
+ <dd>Object header meta data is cached in the group
+ entry. This implies that the group
+ entry refers to another group.
+
+ <dt>2
+ <dd>The entry is a symbolic link. The first four bytes
+ of the scratch-pad space are the offset into the local
+ heap for the link value. The object header address
+ will be undefined.
+
+ <dt><em>N</em>
+ <dd>Other cache values can be defined later and
+ libraries that do not understand the new values will
+ still work properly.
+ </dl>
+ </td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Reserved</td>
+ <td>These four bytes are present so that the scratch-pad
+ space is aligned on an eight-byte boundary. They are
+ always set to zero.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Scratch-pad Space</td>
+ <td>This space is used for different purposes, depending
+ on the value of the Cache Type field. Any meta-data
+ about a dataset object represented in the scratch-pad
+ space is duplicated in the object header for that
+ dataset. This meta data can include the datatype
+ and the size of the dataspace for a dataset whose datatype
+ is atomic and whose dataspace is fixed and less than
+ four dimensions.
+ Furthermore, no data is cached in the group
+ entry scratch-pad space if the object header for
+ the group entry has a link count greater than
+ one.</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <h4>Format of the Scratch-pad Space</h4>
+
+ <p>The group entry scratch-pad space is formatted
+ according to the value in the Cache Type field.
+
+ <p>If the Cache Type field contains the value zero
+ (<code>0</code>) then no information is
+ stored in the scratch-pad space.
+
+ <p>If the Cache Type field contains the value one
+ (<code>1</code>), then the scratch-pad space
+ contains cached meta data for another object header
+ in the following format:
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <B>Object Header Scratch-pad Format</B>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Address of B-tree</td>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Address of Name Heap</td>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table align=center width="80%">
+ <tr>
+ <th width="30%">Field Name</th>
+ <th width="70%">Description</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Address of B-tree</td>
+ <td>This is the file address for the root of the
+ group's B-tree.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Address of Name Heap</td>
+ <td>This is the file address for the group's local
+ heap, in which are stored the symbol names.</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+
+ <p>If the Cache Type field contains the value two
+ (<code>2</code>), then the scratch-pad space
+ contains cached meta data for another symbolic link
+ in the following format:
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <B>Symbolic Link Scratch-pad Format</B>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Offset to Link Value</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table align=center width="80%">
+ <tr>
+ <th width="30%">Field Name</th>
+ <th width="70%">Description</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Offset to Link Value</td>
+ <td>The value of a symbolic link (that is, the name of the
+ thing to which it points) is stored in the local heap.
+ This field is the 4-byte offset into the local heap for
+ the start of the link value, which is null terminated.</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <h3><a name="LocalHeap">Disk Format: Level 1D - Local Heaps</a></h3>
+
+ <p>A heap is a collection of small heap objects. Objects can be
+ inserted and removed from the heap at any time.
+ The address of a heap does not change once the heap is created.
+ References to objects are stored in the group table;
+ the names of those objects are stored in the local heap.
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <b>Local Heaps</b>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Heap Signature</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Reserved (zero)</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Data Segment Size</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Offset to Head of Free-list (&lt;size&gt; bytes)</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Address of Data Segment</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table align=center width="80%">
+ <tr>
+ <th width="30%">Field Name</th>
+ <th width="70%">Description</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Heap Signature</td>
+ <td>The ASCII character string <code>HEAP</code>
+ is used to indicate the
+ beginning of a heap. This gives file consistency
+ checking utilities a better chance of reconstructing a
+ damaged file.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Data Segment Size</td>
+ <td>The total amount of disk memory allocated for the heap
+ data. This may be larger than the amount of space
+ required by the object stored in the heap. The extra
+ unused space holds a linked list of free blocks.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Offset to Head of Free-list</td>
+ <td>This is the offset within the heap data segment of the
+ first free block (or all 0xff bytes if there is no free
+ block). The free block contains &lt;size&gt; bytes that
+ are the offset of the next free chunk (or all 0xff bytes
+ if this is the last free chunk) followed by &lt;size&gt;
+ bytes that store the size of this free chunk.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Address of Data Segment</td>
+ <td>The data segment originally starts immediately after
+ the heap header, but if the data segment must grow as a
+ result of adding more objects, then the data segment may
+ be relocated, in its entirety, to another part of the
+ file.</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>Objects within the heap should be aligned on an 8-byte boundary.
+
+ <h3><a name="GlobalHeap">Disk Format: Level 1E - Global Heap</a></h3>
+
+ <p>Each HDF5 file has a global heap which stores various types of
+ information which is typically shared between datasets. The
+ global heap was designed to satisfy these goals:
+
+ <ol type="A">
+ <li>Repeated access to a heap object must be efficient without
+ resulting in repeated file I/O requests. Since global heap
+ objects will typically be shared among several datasets, it is
+ probable that the object will be accessed repeatedly.
+
+ <br><br>
+ <li>Collections of related global heap objects should result in
+ fewer and larger I/O requests. For instance, a dataset of
+ void pointers will have a global heap object for each
+ pointer. Reading the entire set of void pointer objects
+ should result in a few large I/O requests instead of one small
+ I/O request for each object.
+
+ <br><br>
+ <li>It should be possible to remove objects from the global heap
+ and the resulting file hole should be eligible to be reclaimed
+ for other uses.
+ <br><br>
+ </ol>
+
+ <p>The implementation of the heap makes use of the memory
+ management already available at the file level and combines that
+ with a new top-level object called a <em>collection</em> to
+ achieve Goal B. The global heap is the set of all collections.
+ Each global heap object belongs to exactly one collection and
+ each collection contains one or more global heap objects. For
+ the purposes of disk I/O and caching, a collection is treated as
+ an atomic object.
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <B>A Global Heap Collection</B>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Magic Number</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td>Version</td>
+ <td colspan=3>Reserved</td>
+ </td>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Collection Size</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Global Heap Object 1
+ <i>(described below)</i><br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Global Heap Object 2<br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>...<br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Global Heap Object <em>N</em><br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Global Heap Object 0 (free space)<br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table align=center width="80%">
+ <tr>
+ <th width="30%">Field Name</th>
+ <th width="70%">Description</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Magic Number</td>
+ <td>The magic number for global heap collections are the
+ four bytes <code>G</code>, <code>C</code>, <code>O</code>,
+ and <code>L</code>.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Version</td>
+ <td>Each collection has its own version number so that new
+ collections can be added to old files. This document
+ describes version zero of the collections.
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Collection Data Size</td>
+ <td>This is the size in bytes of the entire collection
+ including this field. The default (and minimum)
+ collection size is 4096 bytes which is a typical file
+ system block size and which allows for 170 16-byte heap
+ objects plus their overhead.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Object 1 through <em>N</em></td>
+ <td>The objects are stored in any order with no
+ intervening unused space.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Object 0</td>
+ <td>Object 0 (zero), when present, represents the free space in
+ the collection. Free space always appears at the end of
+ the collection. If the free space is too small to store
+ the header for Object 0 (described below) then the
+ header is implied and the collection contains no free space.
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <B>Global Heap Object</B>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=2>Object ID</td>
+ <td colspan=2>Reference Count</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Reserved</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Object Data Size</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Object Data<br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table align=center width="80%">
+ <tr>
+ <th width="30%">Field Name</th>
+ <th width="70%">Description</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Object ID</td>
+ <td>Each object has a unique identification number within a
+ collection. The identification numbers are chosen so that
+ new objects have the smallest value possible with the
+ exception that the identifier <code>0</code> always refers to the
+ object which represents all free space within the
+ collection.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Reference Count</td>
+ <td>All heap objects have a reference count field. An
+ object which is referenced from some other part of the
+ file will have a positive reference count. The reference
+ count for Object 0 is always zero.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Reserved</td>
+ <td>Zero padding to align next field on an 8-byte
+ boundary.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Object Size</td> <td>This is the size of the the fields
+ above plus the object data stored for the object. The
+ actual storage size is rounded up to a multiple of
+ eight.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Object Data</td>
+ <td>The object data is treated as a one-dimensional array
+ of bytes to be interpreted by the caller.</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <h3><a name="FreeSpaceIndex">Disk Format: Level 1F - Free-space Heap</a></h3>
+
+ <p>The Free-space Index is a collection of blocks of data,
+ dispersed throughout the file, which are currently not used by
+ any file objects.
+
+ <p>The super block contains a pointer to root of the free-space description;
+ that pointer is currently (i.e., in HDF5 Release 1.2) required
+ to be the undefined address <code>0xfff...ff</code>.
+
+ <p>The free-sapce index is not otherwise publicly defined at this time.
+
+
+ <!--
+ <p>The Free-space Index is a collection of blocks of data,
+ dispersed throughout the file, which are currently not used by
+ any file objects. The blocks of data are indexed by a B-tree of
+ their length within the file.
+
+
+ <p>Each B-tree page is composed of the following entries and
+ B-tree management information, organized as follows:
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=bottom>
+ <B>HDF5 Free-space Heap Page</B>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Free-space Heap Signature</td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>B-tree Left-link Offset</td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Length of Free-block #1<br> <br></td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Offset of Free-block #1<br> <br></td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>.<br>.<br>.<br></td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Length of Free-block #n<br> <br></td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Offset of Free-block #n<br> <br></td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>"High" Offset</td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Right-link Offset</td>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <dl>
+ <dt> The elements of the free-space heap page are described below:
+ <dd>
+ <dl>
+ <dt>Free-space Heap Signature: (4 bytes)
+ <dd>The ASCII character string <code>FREE</code>
+ is used to indicate the
+ beginning of a free-space heap B-tree page. This gives
+ file consistency checking utilities a better chance of
+ reconstructing a damaged file.
+
+ <dt>B-tree Left-link Offset: (&lt;offset&gt; bytes)
+ <dd>This value is used to indicate the offset of all offsets
+ in the B-link-tree which are smaller than the value of the
+ offset in entry #1. This value is also used to indicate a
+ leaf node in the B-link-tree by being set to all ones.
+
+ <dt>Length of Free-block #n: (&lt;length&gt; bytes)
+ <dd>This value indicates the length of an unused block in
+ the file.
+
+ <dt>Offset of Free-block #n: (&lt;offset&gt; bytes)
+ <dd>This value indicates the offset in the file of an
+ unused block in the file.
+
+ <dt>"High" Offset: (4-bytes)
+ <dd>This offset is used as the upper bound on offsets
+ contained within a page when the page has been split.
+
+ <dt>Right-link Offset: (&lt;offset&gt; bytes)
+ <dd>This value is used to indicate the offset of the next
+ child to the right of the parent of this group
+ page. When there is no node to the right, this value is
+ all zeros.
+ </dl>
+ </dl>
+
+ <p>The algorithms for searching and inserting objects in the
+ B-tree pages are described fully in the Lehman and Yao paper,
+ which should be read to provide a full description of the
+ B-tree's usage.
+-->
+
+
+<br><br>
+<br><br>
+
+
+ <h2><a name="DataObject">Disk Format: Level 2 - Data Objects </a></h2>
+
+ <p>Data objects contain the real information in the file. These
+ objects compose the scientific data and other information which
+ are generally thought of as "data" by the end-user. All the
+ other information in the file is provided as a framework for
+ these data objects.
+
+ <p>A data object is composed of header information and data
+ information. The header information contains the information
+ needed to interpret the data information for the data object as
+ well as additional "meta-data" or pointers to additional
+ "meta-data" used to describe or annotate each data object.
+
+ <h3><a name="ObjectHeader">
+ Disk Format: Level 2a - Data Object Headers</a></h3>
+
+ <p>The header information of an object is designed to encompass
+ all the information about an object which would be desired to be
+ known, except for the data itself. This information includes
+ the dimensionality, number-type, information about how the data
+ is stored on disk (in external files, compressed, broken up in
+ blocks, etc.), as well as other information used by the library
+ to speed up access to the data objects or maintain a file's
+ integrity. The header of each object is not necessarily located
+ immediately prior to the object's data in the file and in fact
+ may be located in any position in the file.
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <B>Object Headers</B>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=1 width="25%">Version # of Object Header</td>
+ <td colspan=1 width="25%">Reserved</td>
+ <td colspan=2 width="50%">Number of Header Messages</td>
+ </tr>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Object Reference Count</td>
+ </tr>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Total Object Header Size<br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=2>Header Message Type #1</td>
+ <td colspan=2>Size of Header Message Data #1</td>
+ </tr>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td>Flags</td>
+ <td colspan=3>Reserved</td>
+ </tr>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Header Message Data #1<br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>.<br>.<br>.<br></td>
+ </tr>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=2>Header Message Type #n</td>
+ <td colspan=2>Size of Header Message Data #n</td>
+ </tr>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td>Flags</td>
+ <td colspan=3>Reserved</td>
+ </tr>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Header Message Data #n<br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table align=center width="80%">
+ <tr>
+ <th width="30%">Field Name</th>
+ <th width="70%">Description</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Version number of the object header</td>
+ <td>This value is used to determine the format of the
+ information in the object header. When the format of the
+ information in the object header is changed, the version number
+ is incremented and can be used to determine how the
+ information in the object header is formatted.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Reserved</td>
+ <td>Always set to zero.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Number of header messages</td>
+ <td>This value determines the number of messages listed in
+ this object header. This provides a fast way for software
+ to prepare storage for the messages in the header.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Object Reference Count</td>
+ <td>This value specifies the number of references to this
+ object within the current file. References to the
+ data object from external files are not tracked.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Total Object Header Size</td>
+ <td>This value specifies the total number of bytes of header
+ message data following this length field for the current
+ message as well as any continuation data located elsewhere
+ in the file.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Header Message Type</td>
+ <td>The header message type specifies the type of
+ information included in the header message data following
+ the type along with a small amount of other information.
+ Bit 15 of the message type is set if the message is
+ constant (constant messages cannot be changed since they
+ may be cached in group entries throughout the
+ file). The header message types for the pre-defined
+ header messages will be included in further discussion
+ below.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Size of Header Message Data</td>
+ <td>This value specifies the number of bytes of header
+ message data following the header message type and length
+ information for the current message. The size includes
+ padding bytes to make the message a multiple of eight
+ bytes.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Flags</td>
+ <td>This is a bit field with the following definition:
+ <dl>
+ <dt><code>0</code>
+ <dd>If set, the message data is constant. This is used
+ for messages like the datatype message of a dataset.
+ <dt><code>1</code>
+ <dd>If set, the message is stored in the global heap and
+ the Header Message Data field contains a Shared Object
+ message and the Size of Header Message Data field
+ contains the size of that Shared Object message.
+ <dt><code>2-7</code>
+ <dd>Reserved
+ </dl>
+ </td>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Header Message Data</td>
+ <td>The format and length of this field is determined by the
+ header message type and size respectively. Some header
+ message types do not require any data and this information
+ can be eliminated by setting the length of the message to
+ zero. The data is padded with enough zeros to make the
+ size a multiple of eight.</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>The header message types and the message data associated with
+ them compose the critical "meta-data" about each object. Some
+ header messages are required for each object while others are
+ optional. Some optional header messages may also be repeated
+ several times in the header itself, the requirements and number
+ of times allowed in the header will be noted in each header
+ message description below.
+
+ <P>The following is a list of currently defined header messages:
+
+ <hr>
+ <h4><a name="NILMessage">Name: NIL</a></h4>
+ <b>Type: </b>0x0000<br>
+ <b>Length:</b> varies<br>
+ <b>Status:</b> Optional, may be repeated.<br>
+ <b>Purpose and Description:</b> The NIL message is used to
+ indicate a message
+ which is to be ignored when reading the header messages for a data object.
+ [Probably one which has been deleted for some reason.]<br>
+ <b>Format of Data:</b> Unspecified.<br>
+
+<!-- Delete examples throughout doc
+ <b>Examples:</b> None.
+-->
+
+
+ <hr>
+ <h4><a name="SimpleDataSpace">Name: Simple Dataspace</a></h4>
+
+ <b>Type: </b>0x0001<br>
+ <b>Length:</b> Varies according to the number of dimensions,
+ as described in the following table<br>
+ <b>Status:</b> The <em>Simple Dataspace</em> message is required
+ and may not be repeated. This message is currently used with
+ datasets and named dataspaces.<br>
+
+ <p>The <em>Simple Dataspace</em> message describes the number
+ of dimensions and size of each dimension that the data object
+ has. This message is only used for datasets which have a
+ simple, rectilinear grid layout; datasets requiring a more
+ complex layout (irregularly structured or unstructured grids, etc.)
+ must use the <em>Complex Dataspace</em> message for expressing
+ the space the dataset inhabits.
+ <i>(Note: The <em>Complex Dataspace</em> functionality is
+ not yet implemented (as of HDF5 Release 1.2). It is not described
+ in this document.)</i>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <b>Simple Dataspace Message</b>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td>Version</td>
+ <td>Dimensionality</td>
+ <td>Flags</td>
+ <td>Reserved</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Reserved</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Dimension Size #1 (&lt;size&gt; bytes)</td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>.<br>.<br>.<br></td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Dimension Size #n (&lt;size&gt; bytes)</td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Dimension Maximum #1 (&lt;size&gt; bytes)</td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>.<br>.<br>.<br></td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Dimension Maximum #n (&lt;size&gt; bytes)</td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Permutation Index #1</td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>.<br>.<br>.<br></td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Permutation Index #n</td>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table align=center width="80%">
+ <tr>
+ <th width="30%">Field Name</th>
+ <th width="70%">Description</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Version </td>
+ <td>This value is used to determine the format of the
+ Simple Dataspace Message. When the format of the
+ information in the message is changed, the version number
+ is incremented and can be used to determine how the
+ information in the object header is formatted.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Dimensionality</td>
+ <td>This value is the number of dimensions that the data
+ object has.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Flags</td>
+ <td>This field is used to store flags to indicate the
+ presence of parts of this message. Bit 0 (the least
+ significant bit) is used to indicate that maximum
+ dimensions are present. Bit 1 is used to indicate that
+ permutation indices are present for each dimension.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Dimension Size #n (&lt;size&gt; bytes)</td>
+ <td>This value is the current size of the dimension of the
+ data as stored in the file. The first dimension stored in
+ the list of dimensions is the slowest changing dimension
+ and the last dimension stored is the fastest changing
+ dimension.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Dimension Maximum #n (&lt;size&gt; bytes)</td>
+ <td>This value is the maximum size of the dimension of the
+ data as stored in the file. This value may be the special
+ value &lt;UNLIMITED&gt; (all bits set) which indicates
+ that the data may expand along this dimension
+ indefinitely. If these values are not stored, the maximum
+ value of each dimension is assumed to be the same as the
+ current size value.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Permutation Index #n (4 bytes)</td>
+ <td>This value is the index permutation used to map
+ each dimension from the canonical representation to an
+ alternate axis for each dimension. If these values are
+ not stored, the first dimension stored in the list of
+ dimensions is the slowest changing dimension and the last
+ dimension stored is the fastest changing dimension.</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+<!-- Delete examples throughout doc
+ <h4>Examples</h4>
+ <dl>
+ <dt> Example #1
+ <dd>A sample 640 horizontally by 480 vertically raster image
+ dimension header. The number of dimensions would be set to 2
+ and the first dimension's size and maximum would both be set
+ to 480. The second dimension's size and maximum would both be
+ set to 640
+.
+ <dt>Example #2
+ <dd>A sample 4 dimensional scientific dataset which is composed
+ of 30x24x3 slabs of data being written out in an unlimited
+ series every several minutes as timestep data (currently there
+ are five slabs). The number of dimensions is 4. The first
+ dimension size is 5 and its maximum is &lt;UNLIMITED&gt;. The
+ second through fourth dimension's size and maximum value are
+ set to 3, 24, and 30 respectively.
+
+ <dt>Example #3
+ <dd>A sample unlimited length text string, currently of length
+ 83. The number of dimensions is 1, the size of the first
+ dimension is 83 and the maximum of the first dimension is set
+ to &lt;UNLIMITED&gt;, allowing further text data to be
+ appended to the string or possibly the string to be replaced
+ with another string of a different size. (This could also be
+ stored as a scalar dataset with number-type set to "string")
+ </dl>
+-->
+
+<!-- DELETE ENTIRE DATASPACE SECTION -->
+<!--
+ <hr>
+ <h4><a name="DataSpaceMessage">Name: Complex Dataspace (Fiber Bundle?)</a></h4>
+ <b>Type: </b>0x0002<br>
+ <b>Length:</b> varies<br>
+
+ <b>Status:</b> One of the <em>Simple Dataspace</em> or
+ <em>Complex Dataspace</em> messages is required (but not both) and may
+ not be repeated.<br> <b>Purpose and Description:</b> The
+ <em>Dataspace</em> message describes space that the dataset is
+ mapped onto in a more comprehensive way than the <em>Simple
+ Dimensionality</em> message is capable of handling. The
+ dataspace of a dataset encompasses the type of coordinate system
+ used to locate the dataset's elements as well as the structure and
+ regularity of the coordinate system. The dataspace also
+ describes the number of dimensions which the dataset inhabits as
+ well as a possible higher dimensional space in which the dataset
+ is located within.
+
+ <br>
+ <b>Format of Data:</b>
+
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=bottom>
+ <B>HDF5 Dataspace Message Layout</B>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Mesh Type</td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Logical Dimensionality</td>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <dl>
+ <dt>The elements of the dimensionality message are described below:
+ <dd>
+ <dl>
+ <dt>Mesh Type: (unsigned 32-bit integer)
+ <dd>This value indicates whether the grid is
+ polar/spherical/cartesion,
+ structured/unstructured and regular/irregular. <br>
+ The mesh type value is broken up as follows: <br>
+
+ <P>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=bottom>
+ <B>HDF5 Mesh-type Layout</B>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=1>Mesh Embedding</td>
+ <td colspan=1>Coordinate System</td>
+ <td colspan=1>Structure</td>
+ <td colspan=1>Regularity</td>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+ The following are the definitions of mesh-type bytes:
+ <dl>
+ <dt>Mesh Embedding
+ <dd>This value indicates whether the dataset dataspace
+ is located within
+ another dataspace or not:
+ <dl> <dl>
+ <dt>&lt;STANDALONE&gt;
+ <dd>The dataset mesh is self-contained and is not
+ embedded in another mesh.
+ <dt>&lt;EMBEDDED&gt;
+ <dd>The dataset's dataspace is located within
+ another dataspace, as
+ described in information below.
+ </dl> </dl>
+ <dt>Coordinate System
+ <dd>This value defines the type of coordinate system
+ used for the mesh:
+ <dl> <dl>
+ <dt>&lt;POLAR&gt;
+ <dd>The last two dimensions are in polar
+ coordinates, higher dimensions are
+ cartesian.
+ <dt>&lt;SPHERICAL&gt;
+ <dd>The last three dimensions are in spherical
+ coordinates, higher dimensions
+ are cartesian.
+ <dt>&lt;CARTESIAN&gt;
+ <dd>All dimensions are in cartesian coordinates.
+ </dl> </dl>
+ <dt>Structure
+ <dd>This value defines the locations of the grid-points
+ on the axes:
+ <dl> <dl>
+ <dt>&lt;STRUCTURED&gt;
+ <dd>All grid-points are on integral, sequential
+ locations, starting from 0.
+ <dt>&lt;UNSTRUCTURED&gt;
+ <dd>Grid-points locations in each dimension are
+ explicitly defined and
+ may be of any numeric datatype.
+ </dl> </dl>
+ <dt>Regularity
+ <dd>This value defines the locations of the dataset
+ points on the grid:
+ <dl> <dl>
+ <dt>&lt;REGULAR&gt;
+ <dd>All dataset elements are located at the
+ grid-points defined.
+ <dt>&lt;IRREGULAR&gt;
+ <dd>Each dataset element has a particular
+ grid-location defined.
+ </dl> </dl>
+ </dl>
+ <p>The following grid combinations are currently allowed:
+ <dl> <dl>
+ <dt>&lt;POLAR-STRUCTURED-REGULAR&gt;
+ <dt>&lt;SPHERICAL-STRUCTURED-REGULAR&gt;
+ <dt>&lt;CARTESIAN-STRUCTURED-REGULAR&gt;
+ <dt>&lt;POLAR-UNSTRUCTURED-REGULAR&gt;
+ <dt>&lt;SPHERICAL-UNSTRUCTURED-REGULAR&gt;
+ <dt>&lt;CARTESIAN-UNSTRUCTURED-REGULAR&gt;
+ <dt>&lt;CARTESIAN-UNSTRUCTURED-IRREGULAR&gt;
+ </dl> </dl>
+ All of the above grid types can be embedded within another
+ dataspace.
+ <br> <br>
+ <dt>Logical Dimensionality: (unsigned 32-bit integer)
+ <dd>This value is the number of dimensions that the dataset occupies.
+
+ <P>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=bottom>
+ <B>HDF5 Dataspace Embedded Dimensionality Information</B>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Embedded Dimensionality</td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Embedded Dimension Size #1</td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>.<br>.<br>.<br></td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Embedded Dimension Size #n</td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Embedded Origin Location #1</td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>.<br>.<br>.<br></td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Embedded Origin Location #n</td>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <dt>Embedded Dimensionality: (unsigned 32-bit integer)
+ <dd>This value is the number of dimensions of the space the
+ dataset is located
+ within. i.e. a planar dataset located within a 3-D space,
+ or a 3-D dataset
+ which is a subset of another 3-D space, etc.
+ <dt>Embedded Dimension Size: (unsigned 32-bit integer)
+ <dd>These values are the sizes of the dimensions of the
+ embedded dataspace
+ that the dataset is located within.
+ <dt>Embedded Origin Location: (unsigned 32-bit integer)
+ <dd>These values comprise the location of the dataset's
+ origin within the embedded dataspace.
+ </dl>
+ </dl>
+ [Comment: need some way to handle different orientations of the
+ dataset dataspace
+ within the embedded dataspace]<br>
+
+ <P>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=bottom>
+ <B>HDF5 Dataspace Structured/Regular Grid Information</B>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Logical Dimension Size #1</td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Logical Dimension Maximum #1</td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>.<br>.<br>.<br></td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Logical Dimension Size #n</td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Logical Dimension Maximum #n</td>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <dl>
+ <dt>The elements of the dimensionality message are described below:
+ <dd>
+ <dl>
+ <dt>Logical Dimension Size #n: (unsigned 32-bit integer)
+ <dd>This value is the current size of the dimension of the
+ data as stored in
+ the file. The first dimension stored in the list of
+ dimensions is the slowest
+ changing dimension and the last dimension stored is the
+ fastest changing
+ dimension.
+ <dt>Logical Dimension Maximum #n: (unsigned 32-bit integer)
+ <dd>This value is the maximum size of the dimension of the
+ data as stored in
+ the file. This value may be the special value
+ &lt;UNLIMITED&gt; which
+ indicates that the data may expand along this dimension
+ indefinitely.
+ </dl>
+ </dl>
+ <P>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=bottom>
+ <B>HDF5 Dataspace Structured/Irregular Grid Information</B>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4># of Grid Points in Dimension #1</td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>.<br>.<br>.<br></td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4># of Grid Points in Dimension #n</td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Datatype of Grid Point Locations</td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Location of Grid Points in Dimension #1</td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>.<br>.<br>.<br></td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Location of Grid Points in Dimension #n</td>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <P>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=bottom>
+ <B>HDF5 Dataspace Unstructured Grid Information</B>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4># of Grid Points</td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Datatype of Grid Point Locations</td>
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Grid Point Locations<br>.<br>.<br></td>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <h4><a name="DataSpaceExample">Examples:</a></h4>
+ Need some good examples, this is complex!
+-->
+
+
+ <hr>
+ <h4><a name="DataTypeMessage">Name: Datatype</a></h4>
+
+ <b>Type:</b> 0x0003<br>
+ <b>Length:</b> variable<br>
+ <b>Status:</b> One required per dataset or named datatype<br>
+
+ <p>The datatype message defines the datatype for each data point
+ of a dataset. A datatype can describe an atomic type like a
+ fixed- or floating-point type or a compound type like a C
+ struct. A datatype does not, however, describe how data points
+ are combined to produce a dataset. Datatypes are stored on disk
+ as a datatype message, which is a list of datatype classes and
+ their associated properties.
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <b>Datatype Message</b>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td>Type Class and Version</td>
+ <td colspan=3>Class Bit Field</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Size in Bytes (4 bytes)</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br><br>Properties<br><br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>The Class Bit Field and Properties fields vary depending
+ on the Type Class, which is the low-order four bits of the Type
+ Class and Version field (the high-order four bits are the
+ version, which should be set to the value one). The type class
+ is one of 0 (fixed-point number), 1 (floating-point number),
+ 2 (date and time), 3 (text string), 4 (bit field), 5 (opaque),
+ 6 (compound), 7 (reference), 8 (enumeration), or 9 (variable-length).
+ The Class Bit Field is zero and the size of the
+ Properties field is zero except for the cases noted here.
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <b>Bit Field for Fixed-point Numbers (Class 0)</b>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="10%">Bits</th>
+ <th width="90%">Meaning</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>0</td>
+ <td><b>Byte Order.</b> If zero, byte order is little-endian;
+ otherwise, byte order is big endian.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>1, 2</td>
+ <td><b>Padding type.</b> Bit 1 is the lo_pad type and bit 2
+ is the hi_pad type. If a datum has unused bits at either
+ end, then the lo_pad or hi_pad bit is copied to those
+ locations.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>3</td>
+ <td><b>Signed.</b> If this bit is set then the fixed-point
+ number is in 2's complement form.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>4-23</td>
+ <td>Reserved (zero).</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <b>Properties for Fixed-point Numbers (Class 0)</b>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">Byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">Byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">Byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">Byte</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=2>Bit Offset</td>
+ <td colspan=2>Bit Precision</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <b>Bit Field for Floating-point Numbers (Class 1)</b>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="10%">Bits</th>
+ <th width="90%">Meaning</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>0</td>
+ <td><b>Byte Order.</b> If zero, byte order is little-endian;
+ otherwise, byte order is big endian.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>1, 2, 3</td>
+ <td><b>Padding type.</b> Bit 1 is the low bits pad type, bit 2
+ is the high bits pad type, and bit 3 is the internal bits
+ pad type. If a datum has unused bits at either or between
+ the sign bit, exponent, or mantissa, then the value of bit
+ 1, 2, or 3 is copied to those locations.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>4-5</td>
+ <td><b>Normalization.</b> The value can be 0 if there is no
+ normalization, 1 if the most significant bit of the
+ mantissa is always set (except for 0.0), and 2 if the most
+ signficant bit of the mantissa is not stored but is
+ implied to be set. The value 3 is reserved and will not
+ appear in this field.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>6-7</td>
+ <td>Reserved (zero).</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>8-15</td>
+ <td><b>Sign.</b> This is the bit position of the sign
+ bit.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>16-23</td>
+ <td>Reserved (zero).</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <b>Properties for Floating-point Numbers (Class 1)</b>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">Byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">Byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">Byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">Byte</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=2>Bit Offset</td>
+ <td colspan=2>Bit Precision</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td>Exponent Location</td>
+ <td>Exponent Size in Bits</td>
+ <td>Mantissa Location</td>
+ <td>Mantissa Size in Bits</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Exponent Bias</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <b>Bit Field for Strings (Class 3)</b>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="10%">Bits</th>
+ <th width="90%">Meaning</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>0-3</td>
+ <td><b>Padding type.</b> This four-bit value determines the
+ type of padding to use for the string. The values are:
+
+ <dl>
+ <dt><code>0</code> Null terminate.
+ <dd>A zero byte marks the end of the string and is
+ guaranteed to be present after converting a long
+ string to a short string. When converting a short
+ string to a long string the value is padded with
+ additional null characters as necessary.
+
+ <br><br>
+ <dt><code>1</code> Null pad.
+ <dd>Null characters are added to the end of the value
+ during conversions from short values to long values
+ but conversion in the opposite direction simply
+ truncates the value.
+
+ <br><br>
+ <dt><code>2</code> Space pad.
+ <dd>Space characters are added to the end of the value
+ during conversions from short values to long values
+ but conversion in the opposite direction simply
+ truncates the value. This is the Fortran
+ representation of the string.
+
+ <br><br>
+ <dt><code>3-15</code> Reserved.
+ <dd>These values are reserved for future use.
+ </dl>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>4-7</td>
+ <td><b>Character Set.</b> The character set to use for
+ encoding the string. The only character set supported is
+ the 8-bit ASCII (zero) so no translations have been defined
+ yet.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>8-23</td>
+ <td>Reserved (zero).</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <b>Bit Field for Bitfield Types (Class 4)</b>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="10%">Bits</th>
+ <th width="90%">Meaning</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>0</td>
+ <td><b>Byte Order.</b> If zero, byte order is little-endian;
+ otherwise, byte order is big endian.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>1, 2</td>
+ <td><b>Padding type.</b> Bit 1 is the lo_pad type and bit 2
+ is the hi_pad type. If a datum has unused bits at either
+ end, then the lo_pad or hi_pad bit is copied to those
+ locations.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>3-23</td>
+ <td>Reserved (zero).</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <b>Properties for Bitfield Types (Class 4)</b>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">Byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">Byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">Byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">Byte</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=2>Bit Offset</td>
+ <td colspan=2>Bit Precision</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <b>Bit Field for Opaque Types (Class 5)</b>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="10%">Bits</th>
+ <th width="90%">Meaning</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>0-23</td>
+ <td>Reserved (zero).</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <b>Properties for Opaque Types (Class 5)</b>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">Byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">Byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">Byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">Byte</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Null-terminated ASCII Tag<br>
+ (multiple of 8 bytes)<br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <b>Bit Field for Compound Types (Class 6)</b>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="10%">Bits</th>
+ <th width="90%">Meaning</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>0-15</td>
+ <td><b>Number of Members.</b> This field contains the number
+ of members defined for the compound datatype. The member
+ definitions are listed in the Properties field of the data
+ type message.
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>15-23</td>
+ <td>Reserved (zero).</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>The Properties field of a compound datatype is a list of the
+ member definitions of the compound datatype. The member
+ definitions appear one after another with no intervening bytes.
+ The member types are described with a recursive datatype
+ message.
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <b>Properties for Compound Types (Class 6)</b>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">Byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">Byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">Byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">Byte</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br><br>Name (null terminated, multiple of
+ eight bytes)<br><br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Byte Offset of Member in Compound Instance</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td>Dimensionality</td>
+ <td colspan=3>reserved</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Dimension Permutation</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Reserved</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Size of Dimension 0 (required)</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Size of Dimension 1 (required)</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Size of Dimension 2 (required)</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Size of Dimension 3 (required)</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br><br>Member Type Message<br><br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <b>Bit Field for Enumeration Types (Class 8)</b>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="10%">Bits</th>
+ <th width="90%">Meaning</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>0-15</td>
+ <td><b>Number of Members.</b> The number of name/value
+ pairs defined for the enumeration type.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>16-23</td>
+ <td>Reserved (zero).</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <b>Properties for Enumeration Types (Class 8)</b>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">Byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">Byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">Byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">Byte</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Parent Type<br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Names<br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Values<br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <center>
+ <table border=0 cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <tr align=left valign=top>
+ <td valign=top width=20%>Parent Type:</td>
+ <td valign=top>Each enumeration type is based on some parent type,
+ usually an integer. The information for that parent type is
+ described recursively by this field.</td>
+ </tr><tr align=left valign=top>
+ <td valign=top>Names:</td>
+ <td valign=top>The name for each name/value pair. Each name is
+ stored as a null terminated ASCII string in a multiple of
+ eight bytes. The names are in no particular order.</td>
+ </tr><tr align=left valign=top>
+ <td valign=top>Values:</td>
+ <td valign=top>The list of values in the same order as the names.
+ The values are packed (no inter-value padding) and the
+ size of each value is determined by the parent type.</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <b>Bit Field for Variable-length Types (Class 9)</b>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="10%">Bits</th>
+ <th width="90%">Meaning</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>0-3</td>
+ <td><dl><dt><b>Type</b></dt>
+ <dt>0 Variable-length sequence</dt>
+ <dd>This variable-length datatype can be of any sequence
+ of data. Variable-length sequences do not have padding
+ or character set information.</dd>
+ <dt>1 Variable-length string</dt>
+ <dd>This variable-length datatype is composed of a series of
+ characters. Variable-length strings have padding and
+ character set information.</dd></dl>
+ </td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>4-7</td>
+ <td><dl><dt><b>Padding type</b> (variable-length string only)</dt>
+ <dd>This four-bit value determines the type of padding
+ used for variable-length strings. The values are the same
+ as for the string padding type, as follows:</dd>
+ <dt>0 Null terminate</dt>
+ <dd>A zero byte marks the end of a string and is guaranteed
+ to be present after converting a long string to a short
+ string. When converting a short string to a long string,
+ the value is padded with additional null characters
+ as necessary.
+ <dt>1 Null pad</dt>
+ <dd>Null characters are added to the end of the value
+ during conversion from a short string to a longer string.
+ Conversion from a long string to a shorter string
+ simply truncates the value.</dd>
+ <dt>2 Space pad</dt>
+ <dd>Space characters are added to the end of the value
+ during conversion from a short string to a longer string.
+ Conversion from a long string to a shorter string simply
+ truncates the value.
+ This is the Fortran representation of the string.
+ </dd>
+ <dt>3-15 Reserved</dt>
+ <dd>These values are reserved for future use.</dd></dl>
+ </td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>8-11</td>
+ <td><dl><dt><b>Character set</b> (variable-length string only)</dt>
+ <dd>This four-bit value specifies the character set
+ to be used for encoding the string.</dd>
+ <dt>0 8-bit ASCII</dt>
+ <dd>As of this writing (July 2002, Release 1.4.4),
+ 8-bit ASCII is the only character set supported.
+ Therefore, no translations have been defined.</dd></dl>
+ </td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>12-23</td>
+ <td>Reserved (zero).</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <b>Properties for Variable-length Types (Class 9)</b>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">Byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">Byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">Byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">Byte</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Parent Type<br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <center>
+ <table border=0 cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <tr align=left valign=top>
+ <td valign=top width=20%>Parent Type:</td>
+ <td valign=top>Each variable-length type is based on
+ some parent type. The information for that parent type is
+ described recursively by this field.</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+
+
+ <p>
+
+<!--
+ <p>Datatype examples are <a href="Datatypes.html">here</a>.
+-->
+
+
+ <hr>
+ <h4><a name="FillValueMessage">Name: Data Storage - Fill Value</a></h4>
+ <b>Type:</b> 0x0004<br>
+ <b>Length:</b> varies<br>
+ <b>Status:</b> Optional, may not be repeated.<br>
+
+ <p>The fill value message stores a single data point value which
+ is returned to the application when an uninitialized data point
+ is read from the dataset. The fill value is interpretted with
+ the same datatype as the dataset. If no fill value message is
+ present then a fill value of all zero is assumed.
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <b>Fill Value Message</b>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Size (4 bytes)</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Fill Value<br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table align=center width="80%">
+ <tr>
+ <th width="30%">Field Name</th>
+ <th width="70%">Description</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Size (4 bytes)</td>
+ <td>This is the size of the Fill Value field in bytes.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Fill Value</td>
+ <td>The fill value. The bytes of the fill value are
+ interpreted using the same datatype as for the dataset.</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <hr>
+ <h4><a name="ReservedMessage_0005">Name: Reserved - Not Assigned Yet</a></h4>
+ <b>Type:</b> 0x0005<br>
+ <b>Length:</b> N/A<br>
+ <b>Status:</b> N/A<br>
+
+
+
+ <hr>
+ <h4><a name="CompactDataStorageMessage">Name: Data Storage - Compact</a></h4>
+
+ <b>Type:</b> 0x0006<br>
+ <b>Length:</b> varies<br>
+ <b>Status:</b> Optional, may not be repeated.<br>
+
+ <p>This message indicates that the data for the data object is
+ stored within the current HDF file by including the actual
+ data as the header data for this message. The data is
+ stored internally in
+ the <em>normal format</em>, i.e. in one chunk, uncompressed, etc.
+
+ <P>Note that one and only one of the <em>Data Storage</em> headers can be
+ stored for each data object.
+
+ <P><b>Format of Data:</b> The message data is actually composed
+ of dataset data, so the format will be determined by the dataset
+ format.
+
+<!-- Delete examples throughout doc
+ <h4><a name="CompactDataStorageExample">Examples:</a></h4>
+ [very straightforward]
+-->
+
+ <hr>
+ <h4><a name="ExternalFileListMessage">Name: Data Storage -
+ External Data Files</a></h4>
+ <b>Type:</b> 0x0007<BR>
+ <b>Length:</b> varies<BR>
+ <b>Status:</b> Optional, may not be repeated.<BR>
+
+ <p><b>Purpose and Description:</b> The external object message
+ indicates that the data for an object is stored outside the HDF5
+ file. The filename of the object is stored as a Universal
+ Resource Location (URL) of the actual filename containing the
+ data. An external file list record also contains the byte offset
+ of the start of the data within the file and the amount of space
+ reserved in the file for that data.
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <b>External File List Message</b>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td>Version</td>
+ <td colspan=3>Reserved</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=2>Allocated Slots</td>
+ <td colspan=2>Used Slots</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Heap Address<br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Slot Definitions...<br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table align=center width="80%">
+ <tr>
+ <th width="30%">Field Name</th>
+ <th width="70%">Description</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Version </td>
+ <td>This value is used to determine the format of the
+ External File List Message. When the format of the
+ information in the message is changed, the version number
+ is incremented and can be used to determine how the
+ information in the object header is formatted.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Reserved</td>
+ <td>This field is reserved for future use.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Allocated Slots</td>
+ <td>The total number of slots allocated in the message. Its
+ value must be at least as large as the value contained in
+ the Used Slots field.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Used Slots</td>
+ <td>The number of initial slots which contain valid
+ information. The remaining slots are zero filled.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Heap Address</td>
+ <td>This is the address of a local name heap which contains
+ the names for the external files. The name at offset zero
+ in the heap is always the empty string.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Slot Definitions</td>
+ <td>The slot definitions are stored in order according to
+ the array addresses they represent. If more slots have
+ been allocated than what has been used then the defined
+ slots are all at the beginning of the list.</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <b>External File List Slot</b>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Name Offset (&lt;size&gt; bytes)<br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>File Offset (&lt;size&gt; bytes)<br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Size<br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table align=center width="80%">
+ <tr>
+ <th width="30%">Field Name</th>
+ <th width="70%">Description</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Name Offset (&lt;size&gt; bytes)</td>
+ <td>The byte offset within the local name heap for the name
+ of the file. File names are stored as a URL which has a
+ protocol name, a host name, a port number, and a file
+ name:
+ <code><em>protocol</em>:<em>port</em>//<em>host</em>/<em>file</em></code>.
+ If the protocol is omitted then "file:" is assumed. If
+ the port number is omitted then a default port for that
+ protocol is used. If both the protocol and the port
+ number are omitted then the colon can also be omitted. If
+ the double slash and host name are omitted then
+ "localhost" is assumed. The file name is the only
+ mandatory part, and if the leading slash is missing then
+ it is relative to the application's current working
+ directory (the use of relative names is not
+ recommended).</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>File Offset (&lt;size&gt; bytes)</td>
+ <td>This is the byte offset to the start of the data in the
+ specified file. For files that contain data for a single
+ dataset this will usually be zero.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Size</td>
+ <td>This is the total number of bytes reserved in the
+ specified file for raw data storage. For a file that
+ contains exactly one complete dataset which is not
+ extendable, the size will usually be the exact size of the
+ dataset. However, by making the size larger one allows
+ HDF5 to extend the dataset. The size can be set to a value
+ larger than the entire file since HDF5 will read zeros
+ past the end of the file without failing.</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+
+ <hr>
+ <h4><a name="LayoutMessage">Name: Data Storage - Layout</a></h4>
+
+ <b>Type:</b> 0x0008<BR>
+ <b>Length:</b> varies<BR>
+ <b>Status:</b> Required for datasets, may not be repeated.
+
+ <p><b>Purpose and Description:</b> Data layout describes how the
+ elements of a multi-dimensional array are arranged in the linear
+ address space of the file. Two types of data layout are
+ supported:
+
+ <ol>
+ <li>The array can be stored in one contiguous area of the file.
+ The layout requires that the size of the array be constant and
+ does not permit chunking, compression, checksums, encryption,
+ etc. The message stores the total size of the array and the
+ offset of an element from the beginning of the storage area is
+ computed as in C.
+
+ <li>The array domain can be regularly decomposed into chunks and
+ each chunk is allocated separately. This layout supports
+ arbitrary element traversals, compression, encryption, and
+ checksums, and the chunks can be distributed across external
+ raw data files (these features are described in other
+ messages). The message stores the size of a chunk instead of
+ the size of the entire array; the size of the entire array can
+ be calculated by traversing the B-tree that stores the chunk
+ addresses.
+ </ol>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <B>Data Layout Message</B>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td>Version</td>
+ <td>Dimensionality</td>
+ <td>Layout Class</td>
+ <td>Reserved</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Reserved</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Address<br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Dimension 0 (4-bytes)</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Dimension 1 (4-bytes)</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>...</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table align=center width="80%">
+ <tr>
+ <th width="30%">Field Name</th>
+ <th width="70%">Description</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Version</td>
+ <td>A version number for the layout message. This
+ documentation describes version one.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Dimensionality</td>
+ <td>An array has a fixed dimensionality. This field
+ specifies the number of dimension size fields later in the
+ message.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Layout Class</td>
+ <td>The layout class specifies how the other fields of the
+ layout message are to be interpreted. A value of one
+ indicates contiguous storage while a value of two
+ indicates chunked storage. Other values will be defined
+ in the future.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Address</td>
+ <td>For contiguous storage, this is the address of the first
+ byte of storage. For chunked storage this is the address
+ of the B-tree that is used to look up the addresses of the
+ chunks.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Dimensions</td>
+ <td>For contiguous storage the dimensions define the entire
+ size of the array while for chunked storage they define
+ the size of a single chunk.</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+
+ <hr>
+ <h4><a name="ReservedMessage_0009">Name: Reserved - Not Assigned Yet</a></h4>
+ <b>Type:</b> 0x0009<BR>
+ <b>Length:</b> N/A<BR>
+ <b>Status:</b> N/A<BR>
+ <b>Purpose and Description:</b> N/A<BR>
+ <b>Format of Data:</b> N/A
+
+ <hr>
+ <h4><a name="ReservedMessage_000A">Name: Reserved - Not Assigned Yet</a></h4>
+ <b>Type:</b> 0x000A<BR>
+ <b>Length:</b> N/A<BR>
+ <b>Status:</b> N/A<BR>
+ <b>Purpose and Description:</b> N/A<BR>
+ <b>Format of Data:</b> N/A
+
+ <hr>
+ <h4><a name="FilterMessage">Name: Data Storage - Filter Pipeline</a></h4>
+ <b>Type:</b> 0x000B<BR>
+ <b>Length:</b> varies<BR>
+ <b>Status:</b> Optional, may not be repeated.
+
+ <p><b>Purpose and Description:</b> This message describes the
+ filter pipeline which should be applied to the data stream by
+ providing filter identification numbers, flags, a name, an
+ client data.
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border align=center cellpadding=4 witdh="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <b>Filter Pipeline Message</b>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td>Version</td>
+ <td>Number of Filters</td>
+ <td colspan=2>Reserved</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Reserved</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Filter List<br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table align=center width="80%">
+ <tr>
+ <th width="30%">Field Name</th>
+ <th width="70%">Description</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Version</td>
+ <td>The version number for this message. This document
+ describes version one.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Number of Filters</td>
+ <td>The total number of filters described by this
+ message. The maximum possible number of filters in a
+ message is 32.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Filter List</td>
+ <td>A description of each filter. A filter description
+ appears in the next table.</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border align=center cellpadding=4 witdh="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <b>Filter Pipeline Message</b>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=2>Filter Identification</td>
+ <td colspan=2>Name Length</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=2>Flags</td>
+ <td colspan=2>Client Data Number of Values</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Name<br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Client Data<br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Padding</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table align=center width="80%">
+ <tr>
+ <th width="30%">Field Name</th>
+ <th width="70%">Description</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Filter Identification</td>
+ <td>This is a unique (except in the case of testing)
+ identifier for the filter. Values from zero through 255
+ are reserved for filters defined by the NCSA HDF5
+ library. Values 256 through 511 have been set aside for
+ use when developing/testing new filters. The remaining
+ values are allocated to specific filters by contacting the
+ <a href="mailto:hdf5dev@ncsa.uiuc.edu">HDF5 Development
+ Team</a>.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Name Length</td>
+ <td>Each filter has an optional null-terminated ASCII name
+ and this field holds the length of the name including the
+ null termination padded with nulls to be a multiple of
+ eight. If the filter has no name then a value of zero is
+ stored in this field.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Flags</td>
+ <td>The flags indicate certain properties for a filter. The
+ bit values defined so far are:
+
+ <dl>
+ <dt><code>bit 1</code>
+ <dd>If set then the filter is an optional filter.
+ During output, if an optional filter fails it will be
+ silently removed from the pipeline.
+ </dl>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Client Data Number of Values</td>
+ <td>Each filter can store a few integer values to control
+ how the filter operates. The number of entries in the
+ Client Data array is stored in this field.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Name</td>
+ <td>If the Name Length field is non-zero then it will
+ contain the size of this field, a multiple of eight. This
+ field contains a null-terminated, ASCII character
+ string to serve as a comment/name for the filter.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Client Data</td>
+ <td>This is an array of four-byte integers which will be
+ passed to the filter function. The Client Data Number of
+ Values determines the number of elements in the
+ array.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Padding</td>
+ <td>Four bytes of zeros are added to the message at this
+ point if the Client Data Number of Values field contains
+ an odd number.</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <hr>
+ <h4><a name="AttributeMessage">Name: Attribute</a></h4>
+ <b>Type:</b> 0x000C<BR>
+ <b>Length:</b> varies<BR>
+ <b>Status:</b> Optional, may be repeated.<BR>
+
+ <p><b>Purpose and Description:</b> The <em>Attribute</em>
+ message is used to list objects in the HDF file which are used
+ as attributes, or "meta-data" about the current object. An
+ attribute is a small dataset; it has a name, a datatype, a data
+ space, and raw data. Since attributes are stored in the object
+ header they must be relatively small (<64kb) and can be
+ associated with any type of object which has an object header
+ (groups, datasets, named types and spaces, etc.).
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border align=center cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <b>Attribute Message</b>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td>Version</td>
+ <td>Reserved</td>
+ <td colspan=2>Name Size</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=2>Type Size</td>
+ <td colspan=2>Space Size</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Name<br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Type<br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Space<br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Data<br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table align=center width="80%">
+ <tr>
+ <th width="30%">Field Name</th>
+ <th width="70%">Description</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Version</td>
+ <td>Version number for the message. This document describes
+ version 1 of attribute messages.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Reserved</td>
+ <td>This field is reserved for later use and is set to
+ zero.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Name Size</td>
+ <td>The length of the attribute name in bytes including the
+ null terminator. Note that the Name field below may
+ contain additional padding not represented by this
+ field.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Type Size</td>
+ <td>The length of the datatype description in the Type
+ field below. Note that the Type field may contain
+ additional padding not represented by this field.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Space Size</td>
+ <td>The length of the dataspace description in the Space
+ field below. Note that the Space field may contain
+ additional padding not represented by this field.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Name</td>
+ <td>The null-terminated attribute name. This field is
+ padded with additional null characters to make it a
+ multiple of eight bytes.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Type</td>
+ <td>The datatype description follows the same format as
+ described for the datatype object header message. This
+ field is padded with additional zero bytes to make it a
+ multiple of eight bytes.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Space</td>
+ <td>The dataspace description follows the same format as
+ described for the dataspace object header message. This
+ field is padded with additional zero bytes to make it a
+ multiple of eight bytes.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Data</td>
+ <td>The raw data for the attribute. The size is determined
+ from the datatype and dataspace descriptions. This
+ field is <em>not</em> padded with additional zero
+ bytes.</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <hr>
+ <h4><a name="NameMessage">Name: Object Name</a></h4>
+
+ <p><b>Type:</b> 0x000D<br>
+ <b>Length:</b> varies<br>
+ <b>Status:</b> Optional, may not be repeated.
+
+ <p><b>Purpose and Description:</b> The object name or comment is
+ designed to be a short description of an object. An object name
+ is a sequence of non-zero (<code>\0</code>) ASCII characters with no other
+ formatting included by the library.
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border align=center cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <b>Name Message</b>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Name<br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table align=center width="80%">
+ <tr>
+ <th width="30%">Field Name</th>
+ <th width="70%">Description</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Name</td>
+ <td>A null terminated ASCII character string.</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <hr>
+ <h4><a name="ModifiedMessage">Name: Object Modification Date &amp; Time</a></h4>
+
+ <p><b>Type:</b> 0x000E<br>
+ <b>Length:</b> fixed<br>
+ <b>Status:</b> Optional, may not be repeated.
+
+ <p><b>Purpose and Description:</b> The object modification date
+ and time is a timestamp which indicates (using ISO-8601 date and
+ time format) the last modification of an object. The time is
+ updated when any object header message changes according to the
+ system clock where the change was posted.
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border align=center cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <b>Modification Time Message</b>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ <th width="25%">byte</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Year</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=2>Month</td>
+ <td colspan=2>Day of Month</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=2>Hour</td>
+ <td colspan=2>Minute</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=2>Second</td>
+ <td colspan=2>Reserved</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table align=center width="80%">
+ <tr>
+ <th width="30%">Field Name</th>
+ <th width="70%">Description</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Year</td>
+ <td>The four-digit year as an ASCII string. For example,
+ <code>1998</code>. All fields of this message should be interpreted
+ as coordinated universal time (UTC)</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Month</td>
+ <td>The month number as a two digit ASCII string where
+ January is <code>01</code> and December is <code>12</code>.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Day of Month</td>
+ <td>The day number within the month as a two digit ASCII
+ string. The first day of the month is <code>01</code>.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Hour</td>
+ <td>The hour of the day as a two digit ASCII string where
+ midnight is <code>00</code> and 11:00pm is <code>23</code>.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Minute</td>
+ <td>The minute of the hour as a two digit ASCII string where
+ the first minute of the hour is <code>00</code> and
+ the last is <code>59</code>.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Second</td>
+ <td>The second of the minute as a two digit ASCII string
+ where the first second of the minute is <code>00</code>
+ and the last is <code>59</code>.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Reserved</td>
+ <td>This field is reserved and should always be zero.</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <hr>
+ <h4><a name="SharedMessage">Name: Shared Object Message</a></h4>
+ <b>Type:</b> 0x000F<br>
+ <b>Length:</b> 4 Bytes<br>
+ <b>Status:</b> Optional, may be repeated.
+
+ <p>A constant message can be shared among several object headers
+ by writing that message in the global heap and having the object
+ headers all point to it. The pointing is accomplished with a
+ Shared Object message which is understood directly by the object
+ header layer of the library. It is also possible to have a
+ message of one object header point to a message in some other
+ object header, but care must be exercised to prevent cycles.
+
+ <p>If a message is shared, then the message appears in the global
+ heap and its message ID appears in the Header Message Type
+ field of the object header. Also, the Flags field in the object
+ header for that message will have bit two set (the
+ <code>H5O_FLAG_SHARED</code> bit). The message body in the
+ object header will be that of a Shared Object message defined
+ here and not that of the pointed-to message.
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+ <caption align=top>
+ <b>Shared Message Message</b>
+ </caption>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <th width="25%">byte</td>
+ <th width="25%">byte</td>
+ <th width="25%">byte</td>
+ <th width="25%">byte</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td>Version</td>
+ <td>Flags</td>
+ <td colspan=2>Reserved</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4>Reserved</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr align=center>
+ <td colspan=4><br>Pointer<br><br></td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+ <p>
+ <center>
+ <table align=center width="80%">
+ <tr>
+ <th width="30%">Field Name</th>
+ <th width="70%">Description</th>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Version</td>
+ <td>The version number for the message. This document
+ describes version one of shared messages.</td>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Flags</td>
+ <td>The Shared Message message points to a message which is
+ shared among multiple object headers. The Flags field
+ describes the type of sharing:
+
+ <dl>
+ <dt><code>Bit 0</code>
+ <dd>If this bit is clear then the actual message is the
+ first message in some other object header; otherwise
+ the actual message is stored in the global heap.
+
+ <dt><code>Bits 2-7</code>
+ <dd>Reserved (always zero)
+ </dl>
+ </tr>
+
+ <tr valign=top>
+ <td>Pointer</td>
+ <td>This field points to the actual message. The format of
+ the pointer depends on the value of the Flags field. If
+ the actual message is in the global heap then the pointer
+ is the file address of the global heap collection that
+ holds the message, and a four-byte index into that
+ collection. Otherwise the pointer is a group entry
+ that points to some other object header.</td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </center>
+
+
+<hr>
+<h4><a name="ContinuationMessage">Name: Object Header Continuation</a></h4>
+<b>Type:</b> 0x0010<BR>
+<b>Length:</b> fixed<BR>
+<b>Status:</b> Optional, may be repeated.<BR>
+<b>Purpose and Description:</b> The object header continuation is the location
+in the file of more header messages for the current data object. This can be
+used when header blocks are large, or likely to change over time.<BR>
+<b>Format of Data:</b><p>
+ The object header continuation is formatted as follows (assuming a 4-byte
+length &amp; offset are being used in the current file):
+
+<P>
+<center>
+<table border cellpadding=4 width=60%>
+<caption align=bottom>
+<B>HDF5 Object Header Continuation Message Layout</B>
+</caption>
+
+<tr align=center>
+<th width=25%>byte</th>
+<th width=25%>byte</th>
+<th width=25%>byte</th>
+<th width=25%>byte</th>
+
+<tr align=center>
+<td colspan=4>Header Continuation Offset</td>
+<tr align=center>
+<td colspan=4>Header Continuation Length</td>
+</table>
+</center>
+
+<P>
+<dl>
+<dt>The elements of the Header Continuation Message are described below:
+<dd>
+<dl>
+<dt>Header Continuation Offset: (&lt;offset&gt; bytes)
+<dd>This value is the offset in bytes from the beginning of the file where the
+header continuation information is located.
+<dt>Header Continuation Length: (&lt;length&gt; bytes)
+<dd>This value is the length in bytes of the header continuation information in
+the file.
+</dl>
+</dl>
+
+<!-- Delete examples throughout doc
+<h4><a name="ContinuationExample">Examples:</a></h4>
+ [straightforward]
+-->
+
+<hr>
+<h4><a name="SymbolTableMessage">Name: Group Message</a></h4>
+<b>Type:</b> 0x0011<BR>
+<b>Length:</b> fixed<BR>
+<b>Status:</b> Required for groups, may not be repeated.<BR>
+<b>Purpose and Description:</b> Each group has a B-tree and a
+name heap which are pointed to by this message.<BR>
+<b>Format of data:</b>
+<p>The group message is formatted as follows:
+
+<p>
+<center>
+<table border cellpadding=4 width="80%">
+<caption align=bottom>
+<b>HDF5 Object Header Group Message Layout</b>
+</caption>
+
+<tr align=center>
+<th width="25%">byte</th>
+<th width="25%">byte</th>
+<th width="25%">byte</th>
+<th width="25%">byte</th>
+
+<tr align=center>
+<td colspan=4>B-tree Address</td>
+
+<tr align=center>
+<td colspan=4>Heap Address</td>
+</table>
+</center>
+
+<P>
+<dl>
+<dt>The elements of the Group Message are described below:
+<dd>
+<dl>
+<dt>B-tree Address (&lt;offset&gt; bytes)
+<dd>This value is the offset in bytes from the beginning of the file
+where the B-tree is located.
+<dt>Heap Address (&lt;offset&gt; bytes)
+<dd>This value is the offset in bytes from the beginning of the file
+where the group name heap is located.
+</dl>
+</dl>
+
+<h3><a name="SharedObjectHeader">Disk Format: Level 2b - Shared Data Object Headers</a></h3>
+<P>In order to share header messages between several dataset objects, object
+header messages may be placed into the global heap. Since these
+messages require additional information beyond the basic object header message
+information, the format of the shared message is detailed below.
+
+<BR> <BR>
+<center>
+<table border cellpadding=4 width=60%>
+<caption align=bottom>
+<B>HDF5 Shared Object Header Message</B>
+</caption>
+
+<tr align=center>
+<th width=25%>byte</th>
+<th width=25%>byte</th>
+<th width=25%>byte</th>
+<th width=25%>byte</th>
+
+<tr align=center>
+<td colspan=4>Reference Count of Shared Header Message</td>
+<tr align=center>
+<td colspan=4><br> Shared Object Header Message<br> <br></td>
+</table>
+</center>
+
+<p>
+<dl>
+<dt> The elements of the shared object header message are described below:
+<dd>
+<dl>
+<dt>Reference Count of Shared Header Message: (32-bit unsigned integer)
+<dd>This value is used to keep a count of the number of dataset objects which
+refer to this message from their dataset headers. When this count reaches zero,
+the shared message header may be removed from the global heap.
+<dt>Shared Object Header Message: (various lengths)
+<dd>The data stored for the shared object header message is formatted in the
+same way as the private object header messages described in the object header
+description earlier in this document and begins with the header message Type.
+</dl>
+</dl>
+
+
+<h3><a name="DataStorage">Disk Format: Level 2c - Data Object Data Storage</a></h3>
+<P>The data for an object is stored separately from the header
+information in the file and may not actually be located in the HDF5 file
+itself if the header indicates that the data is stored externally. The
+information for each record in the object is stored according to the
+dimensionality of the object (indicated in the dimensionality header message).
+Multi-dimensional data is stored in C order [same as current scheme], i.e. the
+"last" dimension changes fastest.
+<P>Data whose elements are composed of simple number-types are stored in
+native-endian IEEE format, unless they are specifically defined as being stored
+in a different machine format with the architecture-type information from the
+number-type header message. This means that each architecture will need to
+[potentially] byte-swap data values into the internal representation for that
+particular machine.
+<P> Data with a "variable" sized number-type is stored in a data heap
+internal to the HDF5 file. Global heap identifiers are stored in the
+data object storage.
+<P>Data whose elements are composed of pointer number-types are stored in several
+different ways depending on the particular pointer type involved. Simple
+pointers are just stored as the dataset offset of the object being pointed to with the
+size of the pointer being the same number of bytes as offsets in the file.
+Partial-object pointers are stored as a heap-ID which points to the following
+information within the file-heap: an offset of the object pointed to, number-type
+information (same format as header message), dimensionality information (same
+format as header message), sub-set start and end information (i.e. a coordinate
+location for each), and field start and end names (i.e. a [pointer to the]
+string indicating the first field included and a [pointer to the] string name
+for the last field).
+
+<P>Data of a compound datatype is stored as a contiguous stream of the items
+in the structure, with each item formatted according to its datatype.
+
+</body>
+</html>