14. Brief history of NeXus

Two things to note about the development and history of NeXus:

  • All efforts on NeXus have been voluntary except for one year when we had one full-time worker.

  • The NIAC has already discussed many matters related to the format.

2022-07:

  • release v2022.06 <https://github.com/nexusformat/definitions/wiki/releasenotes__v2022.06> of NeXus Definitions

2020-10:

  • release v2020.10 <https://github.com/nexusformat/definitions/wiki/releasenotes__v2020.10> of NeXus Definitions

2020-01:

  • release v2020.1 <https://github.com/nexusformat/definitions/wiki/releasenotes__v2020.1> of NeXus Definitions

2018-05:

  • release v2018.5 <https://github.com/nexusformat/definitions/wiki/releasenotes__v2018.5> of NeXus Definitions

  • #597

    changed versioning scheme and procedures

2017-07:

release 3.3 <https://github.com/nexusformat/definitions/wiki/releasenotes__v3.3> of NeXus Definitions

2016-10:

release 3.2 <https://github.com/nexusformat/definitions/releases/tag/v3.2> of NeXus Definitions

2014-12:

The NIAC approves a new method to identify the default data to be plotted, applying attributes at the group level to the root of the HDF5 tree, and the NXentry and NXdata groups. See the description in Associating plottable data using attributes applied to the NXdata group and the proposal: https://www.nexusformat.org/2014_How_to_find_default_data.html

2012-05:

first release (3.1.0) of NXDL (NeXus Definition Language)

2010-01:

NXDL presented to ESRF HDF5 workshop on hyperspectral data

2009-09:

NXDL and draft NXsas (base class) presented to canSAS at SAS2009 conference

2009-04:

NeXus API version 4.2.0 is released with additional C++, IDL, and python/numpy interfaces.

2008-10:

NXDL: The NeXus Definition Language is defined. Until now, NeXus used another XML format, meta-DTD, for defining base classes and application definitions. There were several problems with meta-DTD, the biggest one being that it was not easy to validate against it. NXDL was designed to circumvent these problems. All current base classes and application definitions were ported into the NXDL.

2007-10:

NeXus API version 4.1.0 is released with many bug-fixes.

2007-05:

NeXus API version 4.0.0 is released with broader support for scripting languages and the feature to link with external files.

2005-07:

The community asked the NeXus team to provide an ASCII based physical file format which allows them to edit their scientific results in emacs. This lead to the development of a XML NeXus physical format. This was released with NeXus API version 3.0.0.

2003-10:

In 2003, NeXus had arrived at a stage where informal gatherings of a group of people were no longer good enough to oversee the development of NeXus. This lead to the formation of the NeXus International Advisory Committee (NIAC) which strives to include representatives of all major stake holders in NeXus. A first meeting was held at CalTech. Since 2003, the NIAC meets every year to discuss all matters NeXus.

2003-06:

Przemek Klosowski, Ray Osborn, and Richard Riedel received the only known grant explicitly for working on NeXus from the Systems Integration for Manufacturing Applications (SIMA) program of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). The grant funded a person for one year to work on community wide infrastructure in NeXus.

2002-09:

NeXus API version 2.0.0 is released. This version brought support for the new version of HDF, HDF5, released by the HDF group. HDF4 imposed limits on file sizes and the number of objects in a file. These issues were resolved with HDF5. The NeXus API abstracted the difference between the two physical file formats away form the user.

2001-summer:

MLNSC at LANL started writing NeXus files to store raw data

1997-07:

SINQ at PSI started writing NeXus files to store raw data.

1996-10:

At SoftNeSS 1996 (at ANL), after reviewing the different scientific data formats discussed, it was decided to use HDF4 as it provided the best grouping support. The basic structure of a NeXus file was agreed upon. the various data format proposals were combined into a single document by Przemek Klosowski (NIST), Mark Könnecke (then ISIS), Jonathan Tischler (ORNL and APS/ANL), and Ray Osborn (IPNS/ANL) coauthored the first proposal for the NeXus scientific data standard. [1]

1996-08:

The HDF-4 API is quite complex. Thus a NeXus Abstract Programmer Interface NAPI was released which simplified reading and writing NeXus files.

1995-09:

At SoftNeSS 1995 (at NIST), three individual data format proposals by Przemek Klosowski (NIST), Mark Könnecke (then ISIS), and Jonathan Tischler (ORNL and APS/ANL) were joined to form the basis of the current NeXus format. At this workshop, the name NeXus was chosen.

1994-10:

Ray Osborn convened a series of three workshops called SoftNeSS. In the first meeting, Mark Könnecke and Jon Tischler were invited to meet with representatives from all the major U.S. neutron scattering laboratories at Argonne National Laboratory to discuss future software development for the analysis and visualization of neutron data. One of the main recommendations of SoftNeSS’94 was that a common data format should be developed.

1994-08:

Jonathan Tischler (ORNL) proposed an HDF-based format [2] as a standard for data storage at APS

1994-06:

Mark Könnecke (then ISIS, now PSI) made a proposal using netCDF [3] for the European neutron scattering community while working at ISIS