[Nexus-developers] Feedback on recent committed files

[Ray Osborn]

Since I asked Freddie to roll back the CVS server, I should explain that I
was delighted to see that Jens had been working on adding autoconf support
to the NeXus library.  I think it is essential that we provide the most
modern installation tools for the library.  However, the new branch
prevented me from updating the F90 modules because I couldn't check out the
new src directory for some reason.  I am probably not adept enough with CVS.
Once we have version 2.0.0 released, then, as Freddie suggests, we should
add the autotools as the main trunk, if the experts can agree on how.

Apart from some finger trouble when the remaining files were committed in
one go, I think the updates are now complete and correct.  I have tested
them on Mac OS X (now just another version of unix with HDF4 and 5 ported by
the Fink package manager) and Linux.  VMS is impossible because there is no
HDF5 library, but I would be grateful if someone checked the Windows
version.

As I discussed with Mark, I have simplified the test routines to napi4_test,
which creates an HDF4 file, napi5_test, which creates an HDF5 file,
napif_test (HDF4), and NXtest (HDF5).  They can all be read by NXbrowse.
Are there any objections to me removing the remaining unnecessary files
(napi45.c, napi45.h, napi45_4test.c, napi45_5test.c, napi_test.c,
napi_test_read.c)? 

Mark has done an amazing job in combining HDF4 and HDF5 files in a common
interface.  I am sorry it took so long to get the F90 version out, because I
know that a number of people are itching to try it out.

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