  We provide a systematic quantitative description of the structure of edge
states and magnetosubband evolution in hard wall quantum wires in the integer
quantum Hall regime. Our calculations are based on the self-consistent Green's
function technique where the electron- and spin interactions are included
within the density functional theory in the local spin density approximation.
We analyze the evolution of the magnetosubband structure as magnetic field
varies and show that it exhibits different features as compared to the case of
a smooth confinement. In particularly, in the hard-wall wire a deep and narrow
triangular potential well (of the width of magnetic length $l_B$) is formed in
the vicinity of the wire boundary. The wave functions are strongly localized in
this well which leads to the increase of the electron density near the edges.
Because of the presence of this well, the subbands start to depopulate from the
central region of the wire and remain pinned in the well region until they are
eventually pushed up by increasing magnetic field. We also demonstrate that the
spin polarization of electron density as a function of magnetic field shows a
pronounced double-loop pattern that can be related to the successive
depopulation of the magnetosubbands. In contrast to the case of a smooth
confinement, in hard-wall wires the compressible strips do not form in the
vicinity of wire boundaries and spatial spin separation between spin-up and
spin-down states near edges is absent.
