hdf images hdf images

This web site is no longer maintained (but will remain online).
Please see The HDF Group's new Support Portal for the latest information.

HOME > NEWS

HDF News

Latest Newsletter - #159 Published on November 30, 2017

Latest Official Releases:
    HDF5-1.10:   1.10.1 - See Newsletter: 153
    HDF5-1.8:     1.8.20 - See Newsletter: 159
    HDF4:          4.2.13 - See Newsletter: 156
    HDFView + Object for HDF5-1.10:   HDFView + Object 3.0.0 Beta - See Newsletter: 154
    HDF Java Products for HDF5-1.8:   HDFView + Object 2.14 and HDF Java 3.3.2 See Newsletter: 157

Previous Newsletters:

158     157     156     155     154     153     152     151     150     149     148     147     146     145     144     143     142     141     140     139     138     137     136     135     134    

For more details and archives, see: Newsletter Archives

HDF Bulletins

December 14, 2016

The Cisco Talos team reported the following security vulnerabilities in HDF5: 

   CVE-2016-4330:  HDF5 bug  HDFFV-9992 (TALOS-2016-176) 
   CVE-2016-4331:  HDF5 bug  HDFFV-9951 (TALOS-2016-177)
   CVE-2016-4332:  HDF5 bug  HDFFV-9950 (TALOS-2016-178)
   CVE-2016-4333:  HDF5 bug  HDFFV-9993 (TALOS-2016-179)

These issues were fixed in HDF5-1.8.18, and will be fixed in HDF5-1.10.1. There are patches available that users can apply to other releases of HDF5. See the HDF5 Known Problems page for details.

August 31,2016

We are pleased to announce that HDF Server has been nominated for two categories in the 2016 HPCwire Reader's Choice Awards:

See the HDF Server project page if you would like to download and try it.

The web page to register to vote on HPCWire awards is: https://www.hpcwire.com/2016-hpcwire-readers-choice-awards/

July 20, 2016:

Release of HL_REGION version 1.1.5

Version 1.1.5 of the HL REGION library is now available. This library is a High Level library for handling HDF5 object and region references. It was developed for the JPSS project.

June 23, 2016:

Release of HDF Compass 0.6.0

The 0.6.0 release of HDF Compass is now available from the HDF Compass project page.

New for the 0.6.0 release is support for the Bathymetry Attributed Grid (BAG) file format, including custom visualization of BAG datasets. See the Bathymetry Attributed Grid (BAG) page for more information on the BAG file format.

Compass is a light-weight desktop visual tool to navigate HDF5 files and other formats and resources (both local and remote). HDF Compass enables users to view datasets, attributes, and groups. Line, image, and contour plots are supported as well.

HDF Compass is intended as a simple, focused application and conforms to the look and feel of the user’s native platform. It has a plug-in architecture that can support other file formats or remote resources. In addition to HDF5, Compass comes with plugins for ASCII Grid, BAG, and OPeNDAP resources. A free and open source software product, HDF Compass is cross-platform and runs on Windows (7 or later), Linux (x86, 64bit), and Mac OS X (Mountain Lion or later).

June 21, 2016:

Release of HL_REGION version 1.1.4

Version 1.1.4 of the HL REGION library is now available. This library is a High Level library for handling HDF5 object and region references. It was developed for the JPSS project.

April 11, 2016:

The HDF Group welcomes new CEO Dave Pearah

Champaign, IL -- The HDF Group today announced that its Board of Directors has appointed David Pearah as its new Chief Executive Officer. The HDF Group is a software company dedicated to creating high performance computing technology to address many of today’s Big Data challenges.

Pearah replaces Mike Folk upon his retirement after ten years as company President and Board Chair. Folk will remain a member of the Board of Directors, and Pearah will become the company’s Chairman of the Board of Directors. Pearah said, "I am honored to have been selected as The HDF Group's next CEO. It is a privilege to be part of an organization with a nearly 30-year history of delivering innovative technology to meet the Big Data demands of commercial industry, scientific research and governmental clients.” ...more

February 1, 2016:

Empowering Earth Science Communities to Share Data Through Guided Metadata Improvement: DataONE Webinar

The HDF Group is collaborating with the University of California, Santa Barbara and Data Observation Network for Earth (DataONE), to help scientific research communities enhance the consistency and quality of their metadata, and to foster discovery, access and understanding of data resources. As part of this collaboration, on February 9, 2016, The HDF Group's Ted Habermann, Director of Earth Science, and Lindsay Powers, Deputy Director of Earth Science will co-lead a webinar, "Sharing Data Through Guided Metadata Improvement" along with Matthew Jones, Director of Informatics Research at the National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis. ...more

November 13, 2015:

PRESS RELEASE: Dr. Michael Folk to Step Down as President and Executive Director of The HDF Group

Champaign, IL -- The HDF Group. After 27 years' stewardship of HDF, the last ten as President and Executive Director of The HDF Group, Mike Folk has announced that he will retire. Mike and The HDF Group are committed to finding a successor who will embrace the mission to advance and support HDF technologies and ensure long term access to HDF data.

HDF software was first developed in 1987 at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA) at the University of Illinois to address challenges in dealing with large, complex data in heterogeneous computing environments. In 2004, Mike and his team spun off from the University of Illinois and founded The HDF Group, a non-profit company dedicated to serving its growing community of users. "It was Mike's vision and leadership that provided the courage to spin off from the University of Illinois and form The HDF Group" says Quincy Koziol, Member of the Board and Director of Core Services and HPC. HDF soon experienced worldwide adoption, and is now used in almost every scientific community, and business sector. "His steady guidance through the explosive growth of HDF technology use has put it on the path to many more years of service to our user community", added Koziol.

The HDF Group has an enormous international client base and an equally diverse user community which they continue to support. "Mike started the company with a commitment to our user community" says Board Member and Director of Technical Services and Operations, Elena Pourmal. "Under Mike's leadership we expanded not only our customer base, which now includes scientific centers and companies in the US and Europe, but our knowledge of what it takes to deliver quality software. Without his personal commitment to software excellence and understanding the needs of the HDF user community, that would not have happened. Our organization is stronger as a result of the support and encouragement Mike has provided to us all these years", Pourmal said.

"I will miss having regular contact with our outstanding staff and the vibrant user community that we have worked with all over the world, but it is time for me to turn over the reins to someone else," Mike said. Mike will continue to provide his leadership to The HDF Group during this transition and is committed to a thorough and smooth process.

The HDF Group Board has selected Lantern Partners of Chicago to conduct an extensive search for Mike's replacement. Lantern Partners is a national leader in Senior Executive Search for the technology industry.

June 11, 2015:

Get your Bearings with HDF Compass

The HDF Group is excited to announce HDF Compass (beta), a light-weight desktop visual tool to navigate HDF5 files and other formats and resources (both local and remote). HDF Compass enables users to view datasets, attributes, and groups. Simple line, image, and contour plots are supported as well.

HDF Compass is intended as a simple, focused application and conforms to the look and feel of the user’s native platform. It has a plug-in architecture that can support other file formats or remote resources. In addition to HDF5, Compass comes with plugins for ASCII Grid and OPeNDAP resources; more format plugins are anticipated. A free and open source software product, HDF Compass is cross-platform and runs on Windows (7 or later), Linux (x86, 64bit), and Mac OS X (Yosemite or later).

HDF Compass is currently in its beta stage. Try it out with a one click installation at your desktop.

We encourage a community development model where interested parties can submit fixes and enhancements via GitHub. If you have some knowledge of Python and interest in improving Compass, please contribute!

Links to more information:

Give Compass a Spin ‐ grab either the one‐click .exe (for Windows), or the .dmg installer (for Mac OS X Yosemite).

See the Examples by API pages for samples HDF5 files to view.

June 11, 2015:

HDF needs you to help build a sustainable future for data - share and learn with the global community

The HDF Group provides free, open-source software that is widely used in government, academia and industry. The goal of The HDF Group is to ensure the sustainable development of HDF (Hierarchical Data Format) technologies and the ongoing accessibility of HDF-stored data because users and organizations have mission-critical systems and archives relying on these technologies. These users and organizations are a critical element of the HDF community and an important source of new and innovative uses of, and sustainability for, the HDF platforms, libraries and tools.

We want to create a sustainability model for the open access platforms and libraries that can serve these diverse communities in the future use and preservation of their data. As a step towards engaging this community, we are seeking partners for a National Science Foundation Research Coordination Network (RCN).

The National Science Foundation supports RCNs in order to foster collaboration and communication among scientists and technologists in the areas of research coordination, education and training, collaborative technologies, and standards development. Our vision     ... More

For previous bulletins, see: Archived Bulletins

Newsletter Archives