[h5md-user] Varying particle number

[Konrad Hinsen]

Hi Peter,

 > For the case of varying particle number, I propose a data element
 > “particles/<subgroup>/particle_number” that contains the number
 > of particles at a given step. An “id” data element may or may not
 > be present. When “particle_number” is present and “id” is absent,
 > the particle data shall be contiguous, i.e., without holes.

How would this number be interpreted in the most general case:
(1) multiple subgroups in a trajectory, all of which could have
a varying number of particles, (2) different kinds of particles,
possible mixed in a subgroup, (3) partially overlapping subgroups?
I actually suspect that some combination of 1-3 must be
forbidden in order to make variable particle numbers possible.

Konrad
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Konrad Hinsen
Centre de Biophysique Moléculaire, CNRS Orléans
Synchrotron Soleil - Division Expériences
Saint Aubin - BP 48
91192 Gif sur Yvette Cedex, France
Tel. +33-1 69 35 97 15
E-Mail: research AT khinsen DOT fastmail DOT net
http://dirac.cnrs-orleans.fr/~hinsen/
ORCID: http://orcid.org/0000-0003-0330-9428
Twitter: @khinsen
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