Version numbers

[Ray Osborn]

>Ray, there is a function
>
>   NXstatus NXUenterdata (NXhandle fileid, char* label, int datatype,
>                          int rank, int dim[], char *pUnits);
>
>included as a "NeXus utility function" with the NXdict API which
>does the equivalent of the NXwritedata() above; however no equivalent to 
>NXreaddata is currently defined, so the questions are:
>
>(1) Do we define an "NXUretrievedata" to complement "NXUenterdata", or
should we
>    use the names NXUwritedata and NXUreaddata instead?
>(2) The NXU* routines are currently part of Mark's NXdict - is that ready
to ship now,
>    or should we move the NXU routines into the general NeXus API instead
(which
>    may be more logical as the NXU* do not rely on any of the dictionary
concepts)
>

I must admit that I didn't know that NXUenterdata existed because the NXdict
routines aren't included in the TAR file from the CVS archive.  I think that
it makes sense for the NXU routines to be included in NAPI.C if their
functionality is only equivalent to what I wrote in NXwritedata.  I believe
that they should be kept separate from the NXdict routines, because that
involves an entirely different philosophy for how to write NeXus files.  I
would rather that NeXus users didn't have to absorb too many different
concepts all at once before writing NeXus files.  Simple read/write
utilities seem to be the best first stage before progessing onto NXdict
which will help with writing much larger files.
Could someone list what is included in the NXU routines so that we can judge
this better.  

>
>Freddie
>
>P.S. I assume we should write a global attribute "NeXus_version" containing
the 
>     API version when we create a new file - i don't believe we do at the
moment
>

Yes please, that would be very useful.

Regards,
Ray
-- 
Dr Ray Osborn                Tel: +1 (630) 252-9011
Materials Science Division   Fax: +1 (630) 252-7777
Argonne National Laboratory  E-mail: ROsborn at anl.gov
Argonne, IL 60439-4845