Release information for the 10/10/97 prototype release:

    This release is intended primarily as a proof of concept and as a method
of familiarizing users with the intended functionality.  A list of the
limitations of the prototype is as follows:
    o - Multiple datasets may be created/read/written in an HDF5 file, but
        access must be as an entire dataset, i.e. no slab/slice/subset code is
        implemented yet.  The datasets must also be homogeneous, orthogonal
        datasets, similar to the datasets which are able to be created in the
        HDF4 "SD" interface.  Reducing these restrictions will be a major
        effort of further development on the library.
    o - Datasets can be located in a hierarchy of groups in the file, however
        user-level features for transitioning through the groups are not
        implemented in this release.  Each dataset must be accessed through
        its full "pathname" in the file, ie. "/foo/bar/dataset1",
        "/foo/bar/dataset2", "/foo/data"

    This release has been tested on UNIX platforms only; specifically: Linux,
FreedBSD, IRIX, Solaris & Dec UNIX.  Machines which do not have IEEE floating-
point representation or non big- or little-endian memory representations aren't
supported in this release, most other machines should work correctly.

    A list of the API functions currently supported follows.  [This list is
short, mainly as a method of providing feedback before significant direction
changes must be made]
    H5 (library) interface
        o - H5version
    H5F (file) interface
        o - H5Fis_hdf5
        o - H5Fcreate
        o - H5Fopen
        o - H5Fclose
    H5M (meta) interface
        o - H5Mcreate (for datatype, dataspace & dataset objects)
        o - H5Mendaccess
    H5P (dataspace) interface
        o - H5Pis_simple
        o - H5Pset_space
        o - H5Pnelem
        o - H5Pget_lrank
        o - H5Pget_ldims
    H5T (datatype) interface
        o - H5Tis_atomic
        o - H5Tset_type
        o - H5Tget_type
        o - H5Tsize
        o - H5Tarch
    H5D (dataset) interface
        o - H5Mfind_name (to attach to a dataset)
        o - H5Dset_info
        o - H5Dget_info
        o - H5Dread
        o - H5Dwrite