Project 73: API for Discrete Fourier Transforms

Purdue 1999:
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Tang presented an overview of a proposed Application Program Interface
(API) for FFTs. He distributed a working document discussing this
interface and asked for feedback from members and any other interested
parties.

Tang also reported on plans to organise a workshop to consider a
`standard' API. He advocated developing such a standard for Fortran 95
first and other languages later.

Ottawa 2000:
============

Tang reported on recent developments. He suggested that the name of
this project be changed to `API for Discrete Fourier Transforms' as it
would better reflect the overall scope of the project. They are now
considering testing a Fortran 95 and a C binding of the interface.
Tang's presentation at WoCo 8 can be considered as a summary of some
recent related efforts in this area.

Portland 2002:
==============

Tang summarized recent work on this ongoing effort to provide a
friendly and practical interface for a generic DFT software package.
Agreement has been reached on the options to be provided and the
defaults specified. Implementations are available in FORTRAN and C
with a uniform and consistent interface. Intel and the University of
Houston's FFT package will now adopt the API in future versions of
their respective software.

Washington 2004:
================

Hanson presented at the meeting an overview of API activities and
identified where some progress is expected in the near future.

Hong Kong 2005:
===============

Peter Tang has submitted an article to ACM TOMS, where he presents his
proposal for an API. The Intel Math Kernel Library already supports a
subset of this API, and introduction into other libraries are
underway.

The working group has been reviewing specifications and providing
feedback on a proposed standard API for Fourier transform
procedures. Ping Tak Peter Tang of WG 2.5 wrote a technical paper on
the topic, which appeared in December 2005.

Tang, P. T. 2005. DFTI - a new interface for Fast Fourier Transform libraries. 
ACM Transactions on Mathematical Software. 31, 4 (Dec. 2005), 475-507. 
http://doi.acm.org/10.1145/1114268.1114271

Prescott 2006:
==============

Reid reported that this is still an active project. He has had some
discussion with Tang on future developments and activities.

Uppsala 2007:
=============
  
Reid reported that this is still an active project. He has had some
discussion with Tang on future developments and activities. In
particular attention seems to be focused now on reaching agreement on
a consistent interface that can be adopted by current packages.

Toronto 2008:
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There was no formal report on this project as the members that are
most involved were not able to attend this meeting. It was suggested
that we consider reclassifying this project as inactive or that we
consider the possibility of combining it with technical project
No. 75. It was agreed that Enright would contact Tang, Reid and Gropp
and determine their reactions to such changes.

Raleigh 2009:
=============

This project has been dormant for some time and members felt it
should be terminated (reclassified as inactive). If, in the future, it
becomes active, we could consider combining it with Project No. 75.