loc_id may be a file identifier, or a group identifier within that file. name may be either an absolute path in the file or a relative path from loc_id naming the dataset.

If dtype_id is either a fixed-length or variable-length string, it is important to set the string length when defining the datatype. String datatypes are derived from H5T_C_S1 (or H5T_FORTRAN_S1 for Fortran codes), which defaults to 1 character in size. See H5Tset_size and “Creating variable-length string datatypes.”

If dtype_id is a committed datatype, and if the file location associated with the committed datatype is different from the file location where the dataset will be created, the datatype is copied and converted to a transient type.

The link creation property list, lcpl_id, governs creation of the link(s) by which the new dataset is accessed and the creation of any intermediate groups that may be missing.

The datatype and dataspace properties and the dataset creation and access property lists are attached to the dataset, so the caller may derive new datatypes, dataspaces, and creation and access properties from the old ones and reuse them in calls to create additional datasets.

Once created, the dataset is ready to receive raw data. Immediately attempting to read raw data from the dataset will probably return the fill value.

To conserve and release resources, the dataset should be closed when access is no longer required.