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10.9 The Multifile Annotation Interface

The C routine names of the multifile annotation interface are prefaced by the string "AN" and the Fortran-77 routine names are prefaced by "af". The purpose of the AN multifile annotation interface is to permit concurrent operations on a set of annotations that exist in more than one file rather than requiring the program to deal with the annotations on a file-by-file basis. The design of the AN interface is similar to the multifile interfaces for raster image (GR) and scientific data set objects (SD).

10.9.1 AN Library Routines

These functions are divided into the following categories:

The AN function calls are defined in the following table and on their respective pages in the HDF Reference Guide.

TABLE 10J AN Library Routines
Category

Routine Names

Description

C

Fortran-77

Access

ANstart

afstart

Initialize AN interface and open file.

ANselect

afselect

Gets an annotation identifier from a specified index.

ANend

afend

Close file and AN interface.

ANcreate

afcreate

Create a new data annotation.

ANcreatef

affcreate

Create a new file annotation.

ANendaccess

afendaccess

Terminate access to the annotation that corresponds to the given annotation identifier.

Read/write

ANwriteann

afwriteann

Write the annotation the corresponds to the given annotation identifier.

ANreadann

afreadeann

Read the annotation the corresponds to the given annotation identifier.

General Inquiry

ANnumann

afnumann

Get the number of annotations in the file that correspond to a given type and tag/reference number pair.

ANannlist

afannlist

Get a list of annotations in the file that correspond to a given type and tag/reference number pair.

ANannlen

anannlen

Get the length of the annotation corresponding to a given annotation identifier.

ANfileinfo

anfileinfo

Get information concerning the number of annotations of each type in the file.

ANget_tagref

afgettagref

Get a tag/reference number pair from a specified annotation type and index.

ANid2tagref

afidtagref

Get a tag/reference number pair from a specified annotation id.

ANtagref2id

aftagrefid

Get an annotation id from a specified tag/reference number pair.

ANatype2tag

afatypetag

Get an object tag corresponding to a specified annotation type.

ANtag2atype

aftagatype

Get an annotation type corresponding to a specified object tag.

10.9.2 Type Definitions Used in the Multifile Annotation Interface

The multifile annotation interface uses the four general annotation types used in HDF: the data label, the data description, the file label and the file description. These annotation types correspondingly map to the AN_DATA_LABEL, the AN_DATA_DESC, the AN_FILE_LABEL and the AN_FILE_DESC definitions. Several routines in the multifile annotation interface require one of these type definitions to be passed in as an argument to designate the kind of annotation to be created or accessed.



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HDF User's Guide - 06/04/97, NCSA HDF Development Group.