src_dir: ./src output_dir: ./docs project: Object-oriented Fortran HDF5 interface project_github: https://github.com/geospace-code/h5fortran project_website: https://geospace-code.github.io/h5fortran summary: Object-oriented Fortran HDF5 interface author: Michael Hirsch, Ph.D. github: https://github.com/geospace-code license: by exclude: CMakeFortranCompilerId.F reader_lt_template.in.f90 writer_lt_template.in.f90 writer_template.in.f90 writer_template_i32.in.f90 writer_template_r64.in.f90 writer_template_r32.in.f90 writer_template_i64.in.f90 display: public protected private source: false graph: true search: true
Simple, robust, thin HDF5 polymorphic Fortran read/write interface. Reading or writing {real64,real32,int32,int64} from scalar to 7d is as simple as
use h5fortran
call h5write('my.h5', '/x', x)
call h5read('my.h5', '/y', y)
For NetCDF4 see nc4fortran. h5fortran is designed for "serial" HDF5 read/write. We don't yet implement the interface for "parallel" HDF5.
h5fortran is designed for easy use using static or shared linking from your project via:
cmake --install
- CMake ExternalProject
- CMake FetchContent
- CMake + Git submodule
- Meson subproject
Uses Fortran submodule
for clean template structure.
This easy-to-use, thin object-oriented modern Fortran library abstracts away the messy parts of HDF5 so that you can read / write various types/ranks of data with a single command.
In distinction from other high-level HDF5 interfaces, h5fortran works to deduplicate code, using polymorphism wherever feasible and extensive test suite.
Polymorphic API with read/write types int32, int64, real32, real64, character with rank scalar (0-D) through 7-D. If you need int64, we have a working example for that: src/concepts/int64.f90 that can easily be put into the h5fortran API--just make a GitHub Issue.
- HDF5 attributes are also supported for read/write types int32, int64, real32, real64, character with rank scalar (0-D) through 7-D.
- Array slicing on read and write is supported, that is, reading or writing part of a disk HDF5 array into a variable matching the slice shape.
- Mismatched datatypes are coerced as per standard Fortran rules. For example, reading a float HDF5 variable into an integer Fortran variable: 42.3 => 42
- Zlib (deflate) compression / decompression -- h5fortran will work without Zlib, but will save/load uncompressed data only.
- create HDF5 soft link variables--arbitrarily many soft-linked variable names can point to an actual variable, which need not yet exist.
Tested on systems with HDF5 1.8, 1.10 and 1.12 including:
- MacOS (homebrew)
- Linux (Ubuntu, CentOS)
- Windows Subsystem for Linux
- Windows MSYS2
- IBM Power with Gfortran
Compilers known to work include:
- GCC (gfortran) ≥ 7
- Intel oneAPI HPC compiler ≥ 2021
We welcome contributions. In general we hold to the geospace-code code of conduct.
Using CMake:
git clone https://github.com/geospace-code/h5fortran.git
cd h5fortran
cmake -B build
cmake --build build
for more details see Install.md.
For general use with non-CMake build systems, "h5fortran.pc" pkg-config file is also generated / installed.
h5fortran will automatically build the HDF5 and ZLIB libraries if needed. This is useful as many HPC have broken or ABI-incompatible HDF5 libraries installed. Building HDF5 and ZLIB takes about a minute on a typical laptop. To disable this autobuild behavior, use option:
cmake -B build -Dautobuild=off
To force building the HDF5 and ZLIB libraries, to gain better performance via optimizing for your system's CPU:
cmake -Dhdf5_external=on
cmake --build build
NOTE: If using Intel oneAPI on Windows, ensure that environment variable CC=icl as set manually in the command prompt:
set CC=icl
set FC=ifort
This is necessary to workaround techniques used by HDF5 CMake files that don't pickup the CMake set(ENV{CC})
.
Otherwise, HDF5 build failures may result due to defaulting to icl-clang.
By default we use Zlib 2.x a.k.a. zlib-ng. If you have a problem with Zlib-ng on your system, try the unmaintained Zlib 1.x by:
cmake -B build -Dzlib_legacy=on
The simplest example h5fortran usage is like:
use h5fortran
call h5write('golt.h5','/x', [1,2,3,4,5,6])
or
use h5fortran
real :: x2
if(.not. is_hdf5('golt.h5')) error stop 'golt.h5 is not an HDF5 file'
call h5read('golt.h5', '/x', x2)
For detailed examples see Examples.md.
- The first character of the filename should be a character, NOT whitespace to avoid file open/creation errors.
- Polymorphic array rank is implemented.
Instead of auto-building HDF5 via H5Fortran, one may build and install the HDF5 library by:
python3 scripts/build_hdf5.py
- arrays of rank > 7: prototyped in reader_nd.f90, writer_nd.f90. Fortran 2008 arrays are up to rank 15, but only recent compilers support.
- complex64 / complex128: not natively handled in HDF5. There are performance impacts for compound datatypes. Many choose to write two datasets, one each for real and imaginary like
A_real
andA_imag
- non-default character kind
- logical / boolean: not supported natively by HDF5. h5py implements as enum.