[SciPy-user] HDF5 vs FITS (was: Fast saving/loading of huge matrices)

[Anne Archibald]

On 20/04/07, Perry Greenfield <perry at stsci.edu> wrote:

> I think that is a bit too broadly posed to answer in any simple way
> (if you are wondering how HDF and FITS compare). Speed? Flexibility?
> Etc. FITS is generally much less flexible. However, it is archival.
> Something that HDF has a harder time claiming. And it is very well
> entrenched in astronomy.

FITS has certain limitations, which people seem to work their way
around in different ways. For example, RXTE data processing produces
FITS files which generally use a sui generis data description language
to describe the layout of bitfields in its tables. Is there a nice
page summarizing the capabilities of HDF5, for comparison?

Thanks,
Anne