Perl Data Language Files

Release Notes for PDL 2.007 --------------------------

 +---------------------------------------------------------------+
 | BE WARNED:  This release includes an update to the internal,  |
 | C-level PDL API for PDL versions 2.006 and earlier.  This     |
 | will require that you re-build any PP or XS modules.  Do not  |
 | upgrade or install over an existing PDL installation unless   |
 | you are prepared to do so!!!                                  |
 +---------------------------------------------------------------+

General Notes:

 * PDL computations now use 64bit indexing/addressing if
   your platform supports it (i.e., your perl configuration
   has $Config{ivsize} == 8).
   
   - You can process with pdls with more then 2**32 elements.

   - Memory mapped file IO supports up to 8TB files which
     allows much simpler processing of large data files.
     (See mapflex in PDL::IO::FlexRaw for details)

 * PDL-2.007 has a new, unified slicing engine and syntax
   that consolidates the multiple slicing variants into
   a backward compatible but now 64bit aware slice.  See
   the PDL::Slices for the new syntax that is enabled.

 * PDL::FFTW has moved to its own distribution on CPAN
   and is no longer in the PDL core distribution.  Look
   for PDL::FFTW3 coming to CPAN soon.

 * Some required dependencies have been update to more
   recent versions:

   - ExtUtils::MakeMaker now requires version 6.56 or
     higher, the minimum version with CONFIGURE_REQUIRES
     support.

   - Perl OpenGL 0.6702 is now required for PDL::Graphics::TriD
     to build.  This fixes a number of critical bugs and should
     be a seamless upgrade.

   - File::Map version 0.57 is required.  This fixes map_anonymous
     support for the >2**32 sizes needed for 64bit support.
     Legacy mmap support for unix platforms is no longer
     supported.  The distribution requires File::Map so you
     should not notice the change.

 * Incompatible Changes:

   - PDL::FFT now uses the same sign convention as FFTW and
     the rest of the world, -1/+1 for forward and reverse
     FFT respectively.

   - C/XS API of PDL-2.007 is incompatible with previous
     PDL releases.  If you upgrade to PDL-2.007, you *will*
     need to re-install or upgrade *all* dependent XS or PP
     based modules.

   - PDL now auto-promotes array refs in many places that
     previously required a piddle (so you can say, e.g.,
     "$a->index([2,3])" instead of "$a->index(pdl(2,3))").

   - String syntax for slice() specifications now ignore
     white space.

 * The clean up of the PDL core distribution continues and
   PDL-2.007 is no exception.  Many bug fixes, documentation
   updates, code and implementation improvements make this
   the best testing PDL release to date.


Highlights:

 * FITS IO improvements and fixes:

   - Added 'afh" option to rfits to allow explicit use of
     legacy hash parser for performance reasons.  

   - New multiple extension writing support for wfits.

 * Added pp_deprecate_module() to PDL::PP

 * New mode/modeover functions in PDL::Ufunc

 * Made exception handling in slices more robust.

 * PDL::CLONE_SKIP added for improved ithread support.

 * Updated graticule() in PDL::Transform::Cartography to
   support NaN-delimited output.

 * Bugs fixes:

   - Fix %hash randomization bugs in PDL tests

   - Fix OpenBSD pthread build problem for non-threaded perls

   - Fix PDL::shape to return vector for 1-D piddles

   - Fix badvalue-on-truncate support for map and for interpND

   - Fix for MSVC++ 6.0 to build on 32bit systems.
     MSVC++ 6.0 cannot be used to build 64bit index support.

   - Fix polyfit() handling of BAD values and various edge cases.

   - Fix rare "Bizarre copy of HASH in scalar assignment"

   - Fix rcols with colsep and $PDL::undefval

   - Fix sf.net bug #331 "uniq does not always return proper object"

   - Fix sf.net bug #338 PDL::FFT uses backwards sign convention from FFTW

   - Make PDL::NiceSlice preserve line numbering (sf.net feature #75)

   - PDL::IO::GD->new() is now less picky about it args, and no longer crashes

   - Two bug fixes to transform.pd, and an augmentation