H5FROMH4(1)

💖 H5FROMH4 💖

okay bestie, welcome to h5fromh4 from the h5utils collection ✨ she converts your HDF4 scientific datasets into an HDF5 file, and honestly? she ate.

---

🌸 SYNOPSIS 🌸

h5fromh4 [OPTION]... [HDF4FILE]...

---

✨ DESCRIPTION ✨

so basically, h5fromh4 takes one or more files in HDF4 format and outputs files in HDF5 format containing the datasets from the HDF4 files. periodt. but heads up bestie — currently, only a single dataset per HDF4 file is converted. that's the vibe for now 🙈

HDF4 and HDF5 are free, portable binary formats and supporting libraries developed by the National Center for Supercomputing Applications at the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign. iconic lineage fr fr 👑

a single h5 file can contain multiple data sets, no cap. by default, h5fromh4 creates a dataset called "data", but you can change that with the -d option, or by using the syntax HDF5FILE:DATASET with the -o option. and the -a option? that's the glow-up that lets you append new datasets to an existing HDF5 file. 💅

if you use the -o option and specify multiple HDF4 files, all the HDF4 datasets get output into that one HDF5 file, with the input filenames (minus the .hdf suffix) used as the dataset names. so organized. so demure. 🎀

the most basic usage is something like this:

h5fromh4 foo.hdf

which will output a file foo.h5 containing the scientific dataset from foo.hdf. literally the easiest thing you'll do all day 🦋

---

👑 OPTIONS 👑

• -h — displays help on the command-line options and usage. your little safety net, bestie 🫶
• -V — prints the version number and copyright info for h5fromh4. slay, receipts included 💖
• -v — verbose output. she'll tell you everything that's happening, main character energy ✨
• -a — if the HDF5 output file already exists, appends the data as a new dataset rather than overwriting the file (which is the default behavior). however, an existing dataset of the same name within the file is overwritten. so watch out for that one 🙈
• -o file — sends HDF5 output to file rather than to the input filename with .hdf replaced with .h5 (the default). if multiple input files were specified, this causes all input datasets to be stored in file (rather than in separate files), with the input filenames (minus the .hdf suffix) as the dataset names. one file to hold them all 🔥
• -d name — writes to dataset name in the output; otherwise, the output dataset is called "data" by default. alternatively, use the syntax HDF5FILE:DATASET with the -o option. pick your fave method, both valid 💅

---

💀 BUGS 💀

send bug reports to S. G. Johnson, stevenj@alum.mit.edu. not me asking you to email a real human, but like, do it if something's broken 🍓

---

🎀 AUTHORS 🎀

written by Steven G. Johnson. copyright (c) 2005 by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. legends only 🌈

---

ok that's the whole page, you're officially certified in h5fromh4 now, iykyk 💜

this was h5utils, dated March 9, 2002 — thanks for coming to my ted talk bestie, mwah 💖✨