C interface reference¶

The C interface is define in the chemfiles.h header, which should be included in all the programs using chemfiles. All the functions and enums have a chfl_ prefix indicating the provenance of the functions. The types are defined as opaque pointer types, in all caps. The following types are defined:

• CHFL_TRAJECTORY maps to the Trajectory class;
• CHFL_FRAME maps to the Frame class;
• CHFL_ATOM maps to the Atom class;
• CHFL_CELL maps to the UnitCell class;
• CHFL_TOPOLOGY maps to the Topology class.
• CHFL_SELECTION maps to the Selection class.

The user is reponsible for memory management when using these types. Constructors functions (functions returning pointers to types defined above) return freshly allocated memory, and calling the chfl_*_free functions return the corresponding memory to the operating system.

In addition to the functions below, the same macro as in the C++ interface are defined, and the chfl_version function allow to access the version of the Chemfiles library.

const char * chfl_version(void)

Get the version of the chemfiles library.

Return

A null-terminated string containing the version of Chemfiles.