What's new in h5py 2.7.1
========================

2.7.1 is the first bug-fix release in the 2.7.x series.

Bug fixes
---------

  - :issue:`903` Fixed critical issue with cyclic gc which resulted in segfaults
  - :issue:`904` Avoid unaligned access fixing h5py on sparc64
  - :issue:`883` Fixed compilation issues for some library locations
  - :issue:`868` Fix deadlock between phil and the import lock in py2
  - :issue:`841` Improve windows handling if filenames
  - :issue:`874` Allow close to be called on file multiple times
  - :issue:`867`, :issue:`872` Warn on loaded vs complied hdf5 version issues
  - :issue:`902` Fix overflow computing size of dataset on windows
  - :issue:`912` Do not mangle capitalization of filenames in error messages
  - :issue:`842` Fix longdouble on ppc64le
  - :issue:`862`, :issue:`916` Fix compounds structs with variable-size members

Fix h5py segfaulting on some Python 3 versions
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Through an intersection of `Python Issue 30484`_ and :issue:`888`, it was
possible for the Python Garbage Collector to activate when closing ``h5py``
objects, which due to how dictionaries were iterated over in Python could
cause a segfault. :issue:`903` fixes the Garbage Collector activating whilst
closing, whilst `Python Issue 30484`_ had been fixed upstream (and backported
to Python 3.3 onwards).

Avoid unaligned memory access in conversion functions
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Some architectures (e.g. SPARC64) do not allow unaligned memory access, which
can come up when copying packed structs. :issue:`904` (by James Clarke) uses
``memcpy`` to avoid said unaligned memory access.

.. _`Python Issue 30484`: https://bugs.python.org/issue30484