--- /dev/null	Thu Jan 01 00:00:00 1970 +0000
+++ b/libinterp/corefcn/oct-hdf5-types.cc	Mon Jun 15 17:42:44 2015 -0400
@@ -0,0 +1,63 @@
+/*
+
+Copyright (C) 2015 John W. Eaton
+
+This file is part of Octave.
+
+Octave is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it
+under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the
+Free Software Foundation; either version 3 of the License, or (at your
+option) any later version.
+
+Octave is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT
+ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or
+FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the GNU General Public License
+for more details.
+
+You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
+along with Octave; see the file COPYING.  If not, see
+<http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.
+
+*/
+
+#ifdef HAVE_CONFIG_H
+#include <config.h>
+#endif
+
+#include "error.h"
+#include "oct-hdf5.h"
+#include "oct-hdf5-types.h"
+
+bool
+check_hdf5_types (bool warn)
+{
+  static bool checked = false;
+  static bool ok = false;
+
+  if (! checked)
+    {
+#if defined (HAVE_HDF5)
+      ok = sizeof (octave_hdf5_id) >= sizeof (hid_t);
+
+      if (warn && ! ok)
+        warning_with_id
+          ("Octave:internal",
+           "the size of octave_hdf5_id is smaller than the size of HDF5 hid_t");
+
+      ok = sizeof (octave_hdf5_err) >= sizeof (herr_t);
+
+      if (warn && ! ok)
+        warning_with_id
+          ("Octave:internal",
+           "the size of octave_hdf5_err is smaller than the size of HDF5 herr_t");
+#else
+      warning_with_id
+        ("Octave:internal",
+         "check_hdf5_id_type called but Octave was not compiled with support for HDF5");
+#endif
+
+      checked = true;
+    }
+
+  return ok;
+}