metadata consistency

[Jim Edwards]

I like your milder solution.

On Thu, Jul 11, 2013 at 1:18 PM, Wei-keng Liao
<wkliao at ece.northwestern.edu>wrote:

> In netCDF, the put_att_<type> is allowed in data mode only when
> it is used to change an existing attribute. I consider
> this case rare, and thus am asking the community if this is
> a common practice.
>
> The solution of "rank 0 wins" does not solve the read case.
> For example, one process change a time stamp (as a global attribute)
> in data mode. This change will not be made aware to other processes.
> So, when other processes call get_att(), they will get the old value.
> Will this be OK?
>
> One milder solution is to make the APIs collective, if they are
> called in data mode.
>
> Wei-keng
>
> On Jul 11, 2013, at 1:21 PM, Rob Latham wrote:
>
> > On Thu, Jul 11, 2013 at 12:09:54PM -0500, Wei-keng Liao wrote:
> >> One minor correction. The last API in the list I intent to say
> >> is the family of ncmpi_put_att_<type> APIs. The <type> can be one
> >> of text, uchar, schar, short, int, ...
> >>
> >
> > I'm a little wary of changing our semantics in such a mature piece of
> > software.  I think you are right that most people are already doing
> > this, but it makes me a bit nervous.
> >
> > the put_att_<type> change has me the most nervous.
> >
> > It's not as nice as your proposal, but could we just say "rank 0 wins
> > if there is ever inconsistent metadata" ?
> >
> > ==rob
> >
> >> Wei-keng
> >>
> >> On Jul 11, 2013, at 12:03 PM, Wei-keng Liao wrote:
> >>
> >>> Dear PnetCDF users,
> >>>
> >>> I am working on strengthening the PnetCDF's metadata consistency and
> >>> would like to change/limit the usage of APIs that modified the
> >>> metadata (file header) of a netCDF file. These APIs are:
> >>>   ncmpi_rename_dim(),
> >>>   ncmpi_rename_var(),
> >>>   ncmpi_copy_att(),
> >>>   ncmpi_rename_att(), and
> >>>   ncmpii_put_att().              <------- correction !
> >>>
> >>> (The consistency here is referring to the consistency of file header
> >>> data stored in memory across all MPI processes.)
> >>>
> >>> In netCDF, the above APIs are allowed in data mode if the space
> >>> required to store the new metadata (attributes, names, etc.) is
> >>> less than the old one. Otherwise, they must be called in the define
> >>> mode.
> >>>
> >>> In PnetCDF, I would like to change that to allow these APIs only
> >>> in define mode. If your applications require the above APIs to
> >>> be called in data mode, please do let me know.
> >>>
> >>> Here is my reason for the above change. In data mode, if metadata
> >>> is changed on one process's memory (or even the change is written
> >>> to the file by that process because NC_SHARE is set), there is no
> >>> way to propagate the change from this process to other processes,
> >>> until ncmpi_close() or ncmpi_sync() is called. If allowing these
> >>> APIs in define mode only, we can rely on ncmpi_endef() to
> >>> ensure/check the consistency.
> >>>
> >>> Please let me know if your applications will have a problem with
> >>> such change.
> >>>
> >>> (My plan is to make NC_SHARE the default mode for PnetCDF as
> >>> PnetCDF IS developed to handle parallel access to shared files.
> >>> The above suggested API changes is the first step of my plan.)
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> Wei-keng
> >>>
> >>
> >
> > --
> > Rob Latham
> > Mathematics and Computer Science Division
> > Argonne National Lab, IL USA
>
>


-- 

Jim Edwards
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