As described above, MPI defines types (e.g., MPI_Aint) to address locations within memory and other types (e.g., MPI_Offset) to address locations within files. In addition, some MPI procedures use count arguments that represent a number of MPI datatypes on which to operate. At times, one needs a single type that can be used to address locations within either memory or files as well as express count values, and that type is MPI_Count in C and INTEGER (KIND=MPI_COUNT_KIND) in Fortran. These types must have the same width and encode values in the same manner such that count values in one language may be passed directly to another language without conversion. The size of the MPI_Count type is determined by the MPI implementation with the restriction that it must be minimally capable of encoding any value that may be stored in a variable of type int, MPI_Aint, or MPI_Offset in C and of type INTEGER, INTEGER (KIND=MPI_ADDRESS_KIND), or INTEGER (KIND=MPI_OFFSET_KIND) in Fortran.
Rationale.
Count values logically need to be large enough to encode any value
used for expressing element counts, type maps in memory, type
maps in file views, etc. For backward compatibility reasons, many
MPI routines still use int in C and INTEGER in Fortran
as the type of count arguments.
( End of rationale.)