import name conflicts with pysclint pyhdf package

[fhs]

I was hoping to eventually have changes in this repo be merge into pysclint pyhdf, but that seems unlikely since pysclint appears to be unmaintained -- the last commit was in 2008.

I think it's time this package had it's own name. It would be less confusing and allow users to install this package along with pysclint pyhdf in the same python installation. Some import names I'm considering:

• hdf4py
• h4py (similar to h5py)
• hdf4

[djhoese]

@fhs I ran in to a recent issue related to this and started doing some research. It looks like the HDF-EOS group has kept up development a little bit: http://hdfeos.org/software/pyhdf.php.

This is actually the release that conda-forge is using to make their conda package: https://github.com/conda-forge/pyhdf-feedstock/blob/master/recipe/meta.yaml

I'm not sure what changes were made to this package, but maybe they could be merged with the HDF-EOS groups changes and someone could update the PyPI package.

[fhs]

I think they are using a fork of this repo (https://github.com/hdfeos/pyhdf), which has not diverged much. Although I think it's missing a bug fix that I recently pushed out.

It looks like they are sticking to "pyhdf" package name, so maybe we should stay with that name. The only issue I have with that is pip install pyhdf installs the old pysclint pyhdf. You need to run pip install python-hdf4 to install the new one, which is confusing.

[djhoese]

Agreed that it is confusing. You or HDF-EOS should probably contact the maintainers of the PyPI package and ask for permission to take of the project on PyPI (I've done this for other projects that became unmaintained). It would be best if the pyhdf that users got from PyPI was the same as from conda-forge.

In fact, the issue I was having is that my test_requires in my setup.py was checking for python-hdf4 but in a conda environment it is called pyhdf (from conda-forge) so it tried to install the python-hdf4 package even though pyhdf was already installed.

[fhs]

@hdfeos any opinion? I'd like to see hdfeos take over maintenance of this package if possible. I'll of course help out as much as I can.

[djhoese]

@fhs I suppose you could always make a pull request on their fork to make it up to date.

It's too bad that things like this happen without maintainers notifying each other.

[hdfeos]

@fhs, h4py sounds best for community but we are not going to maintain it because we don't have resources.

[djhoese]

@hdfeos Seeing as the HDF-EOS groups package is being used by conda-forge would it be possible to give @fhs maintainer permissions of the repository (that was based on this repository) and then they/we can work on updating the pyhdf PyPI package?

I personally think that making a new package name is not the right solution for this project. "pyhdf" is known by the community and making a new one is going to take time to synchronize across the fields that need it.

[hdfeos]

@djhoese I added @fhs and @djhoese as collaborator on my fork.

[djhoese]

@fhs You can find the email address for the author of pyhdf on the PyPI page if you'd be willing to get PyPI access to the project so you can start releasing the HDF-EOS version as "pyhdf" on PyPI: https://pypi.org/project/pyhdf/

[fhs]

I reached out to the original author (Andre Gosselin) about a week ago but haven't received any response. I think @teoliphant has access to pyhdf on PyPI, but I'm not sure if he's an Owner or a Maintainer.

There are two possible roles for collaborators:

Maintainer
Can upload releases for a package. Cannot add collaborators. Cannot delete files, releases, or the project.
Owner
Can upload releases. Can add other collaborators. Can delete files, releases, or the entire project.

[djhoese]

You could try making an issue on the issue tracker: https://github.com/pypa/warehouse/issues

Or wait for the work discussed here: https://pypi.org/help/#project-name-claim

[djhoese]

@fhs is there any update on this?

[fhs]

@djhoese No update, unfortunately. I guess we should open an issue in pypa/warehouse?

[djhoese]

See pypi/warehouse#5157 for the status of this ownership transfer. I think our wires got crossed @fhs. I thought you were going to make the issue.

[fhs]

Thanks for opening the issue @djhoese