Am Tue, 14 Jul 2009 12:47:28 +0100
schrieb Magnus Hagdorn <Magnus.Hagdorn@xxxxxxxx>:
> Fortran libraries are a bit of a mess, especially f90 libraries since
> as you observed the module files are compiler vendor and version
> specific.
I now realize that this seems to be a common problem between Fortran and C++.
Both can somehow use C libraries since, at least for one OS (calling
convention), those are compatible between compilers.
But, you better think twice before writing a C++ library because every compiler
is incompatible with itself and others...
Java got a defined binary format, but somehow it did not encounter to C++ and
Fortran 90 designers to care about interoperability of code.
> them into /usr/lib/modules or so. if you want to use the intel
> compilers than you will need to compile netcdf yourself
Basically this means I need to include the NetCDF library into my model source.
When there is no reliable external source to use, this dependency needs to be
contained in my sources. To be sensible, only the part wrapping over the C
library should be needed -- since you usually _can_ rely on the C library to
work. And it would somehow be against the whole purpose of the NetCDF format
and library to have a different copy of the whole thing in each software
package that is using it.
Now, perhaps that mess with Fortran libraries could be cleaned up when there is
a nice package of the Fortran wrapper part (for use with NetCDF C API from some
version up) that easily can be integrated in custom build systems (in an
automated way).
One should not rely on autoconf/make for that sub-package -- it should be
enough to name the C API version to support, since all the platform specific
details are handled in the C library (or not?).
Would such an "educated header" package be feasible? I really think that this
would be the correct approach, faced with the inconsistency of fortran runtime
systems. Perhaps it would also work as an include file like the F77 interface,
so that you'd have such a file in your source:
module my_fortran_interface
public ! Possibility to limit exported symbols.
include "netcdf.f90"
end module
...and all other codes would simply use my_fortran_interface (possibly with
ONLY: statement, even).
I would like to get a hint on the difficulties involved with that before I try
to hack that myself...
> BTW, I am
> assuming you are using Linux or some other Unix like OS.
Heck, what else? ;-)
Alrighty then,
Thomas.
--
Dipl. Phys. Thomas Orgis
Atmospheric Modelling
Alfred-Wegener-Institute for Polar and Marine Research
