N5 is a library to store large chunked n-dimensional tensors, and arbitrary meta-data in a hierarchy of groups similar to HDF5. Other than HDF5, an N5 group is not a single file but simply a directory on the file system. Meta-data is stored as a JSON file per each group/ directory. Tensor datasets can be chunked and chunks are stored as individual files. This enables parallel reading and writing on a cluster. At this time, N5 supports:

• arbitrary group hierarchies
• arbitrary meta-data stored as JSON
• chunked n-dimensional tensor datasets
• value-datatypes: [u]int8, [u]int16, [u]int32, [u]int64, float32, float64
• compression: raw, gzip, bzip2, xz

Chunked datasets can be sparse, i.e. empty chunks do not need to be stored.

1. All directories of the file system are N5 groups.

2. A JSON file attributes.json in a directory contains arbitrary attributes.

3. A dataset is a group with the mandatory attributes:

   • dimensions (e.g. [100, 200, 300]),
   • blockSize (e.g. [64, 64, 64]),
   • dataType (one of {uint8, uint16, uint32, uint64, int8, int16, int32, int64, float32, float64})
   • compressionType (one of {raw, bzip2, gzip, xz}).

4. Chunks are stored in a directory hierarchy that enumerates their positive integer position in the chunk grid (e.g. 0/4/1/7 for chunk grid position p=(0, 4, 1, 7)).

5. Datasets are sparse, i.e. there is no guarantee that all chunks of a dataset exist.

6. All chunks of a chunked dataset have the same size except for end-chunks that may be smaller, therefore

7. Chunks are stored in the following binary format:

   • number of dimensions (uint32 big endian)
   • dimension 1[,...,n] (uint32 big endian)
   • compressed data (big endian)

   Example:

   A 3-dimensional uint16 datablock of 1×2×3 pixels with raw compression storing the values (1,2,3,4,5,6) starts with:

   00000000: 00 00 00 03  ....    # 3 (number of dimensions)
   00000004: 00 00 00 01  ....    # 1 (dimensions)
   00000008: 00 00 00 02  ....    # 2
   0000000c: 00 00 00 03  ....    # 3
   

   followed by data stored as raw or compressed big endian values. For raw:

   00000010: 00 01        ..      # 1
   00000012: 00 02        ..      # 2
   00000014: 00 03        ..      # 3
   00000016: 00 04        ..      # 4
   00000018: 00 05        ..      # 5
   0000001a: 00 06        ..      # 6
   

   for bzip2 compression:

   00000010: 42 5a 68 39  BZh9
   00000014: 31 41 59 26  1AY&
   00000018: 53 59 02 3e  SY.>
   0000001c: 0d d2 00 00  ....
   00000020: 00 40 00 7f  .@..
   00000024: 00 20 00 31  . .1
   00000028: 0c 01 0d 31  ...1
   0000002c: a8 73 94 33  .s.3
   00000030: 7c 5d c9 14  |]..
   00000034: e1 42 40 08  .B@.
   00000038: f8 37 48     .7H
   
   

   for gzip2 compression:

   00000010: 1f 8b 08 00  ....
   00000014: 00 00 00 00  ....
   00000018: 00 00 63 60  ..c`
   0000001c: 64 60 62 60  d`b`
   00000020: 66 60 61 60  f`a`
   00000024: 65 60 03 00  e`..
   00000028: aa ea 6d bf  ..m.
   0000002c: 0c 00 00 00  ....
   

   for xz compression:

   00000010: fd 37 7a 58  .7zX
   00000014: 5a 00 00 04  Z...
   00000018: e6 d6 b4 46  ...F
   0000001c: 02 00 21 01  ..!.
   00000020: 16 00 00 00  ....
   00000024: 74 2f e5 a3  t/..
   00000028: 01 00 0b 00  ....
   0000002c: 01 00 02 00  ....
   00000030: 03 00 04 00  ....
   00000034: 05 00 06 00  ....
   00000038: 0d 03 09 ca  ....
   0000003c: 34 ec 15 a7  4...
   00000040: 00 01 24 0c  ..$.
   00000044: a6 18 d8 d8  ....
   00000048: 1f b6 f3 7d  ...}
   0000004c: 01 00 00 00  ....
   00000050: 00 04 59 5a  ..YZ
   

HDF5 is a great format that provides a wealth of conveniences that I do not want to miss. It's inefficiency for parallel writing, however, limit its applicability for handling of very large n-dimensional data.

N5 uses the native filesystem of the target platform and JSON files to specify basic and custom meta-data as attributes. It aims at preserving the convenience of HDF5 where possible but doesn't try too hard to be a full replacement. Please do not take this project too seriously, we will see where it will get us and report back when more data is available.