IDL 8.5.1 includes new features/functionality including a New FILE_MODTIME function, HDF4 VGroup attributes read/write, New IDLnetURL encode/decode methods, HASH/ORDEREDHASH/DICTIONARY ::IsFoldCase method, WRITE_PNG to a buffer, Fixed issues with IDL-Python bridge, HDF4 library update, and HDF-EOS library update.

New Features

FILE_MODTIME

You can retrieve the modification time for a file or files using the new FILE_MODTIME function. This is significantly faster than calling FILE_INFO if you only need the modification time.

HASH, ORDEREDHASH, DICTIONARY new ::IsFoldCase method

The new IsFoldCase method can be used to check whether a hash, orderedhash, or dictionary is using case-insensitive keys (i.e. whether FOLD_CASE was specified when the object was created). For more details see HASH, DICTIONARY, or ORDEREDHASH.

HDF4 VGroup Attribute Routines

For HDF4 files, you can now read and write the attributes for VGroups. For more details see HDF_VG_ATTRFIND, HDF_VG_ATTRINFO, HDF_VG_ATTRGET, and HDF_VG_ATTRSET.

IDLnetURL::URLEncode and URLDecode Methods

You can use the new IDLnetURL::URLEncode and URLDecode static methods to convert strings to and from "percent encoding":

IDL> value = IDLnetURL.URLEncode('My JSON string is: {"key":"value"}')

IDL> PRINT, value

My%20JSON%20string%20is%3A%20%7B%22key%22%3A%22value%22%7D

IDL> newvalue = IDLnetURL.URLDecode(value)

IDL> PRINT, newvalue

My JSON string is: {"key":"value"}

See IDLnetURL::URLEncode and IDLnetURL::URLDecode for details.

Write PNG to a Buffer

The WRITE_PNG routine can now write its PNG output to a buffer variable instead of a file. This is useful when you want to convert the image to a Base-64 encoded image and embed it in a web page.

Updates

Library updates

The HDF4 library has been updated to version 4.2.11, while HDF-EOS has been updated to version 2.19.

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