NOPP High Resolution Data Delivery

Data File Formats

ASCII - Least compact, but easy to handle. Can open files in an editor. A simple fortran program to read the ascii files is included with the files after you select "Deliver". You can also find all of the programs here.

NetCDF (4 byte) - Binary file format with grid information included. Requires netcdf library, or software package which is NetCDF capable. Each real floating-point data value takes 4 bytes

NetCDF (2 byte) - Ultra Compact format. Good for slow network connections. Same as NetCDF (4 byte) except the data have been linearly transformed to 2 byte integers. Inverse transformation is in the file header (use 'ncdump -h file.cdf'). Some software packages will apply the inverse transformation upon reading the file. Note that after you apply the inverse transformation, you should round-off the result to the original precision to get an exact match to the original data. The original precision specifications are: Temperatures 0.001 C, Salinity 0.001 PSU, Rain 0.01 mm/hr, SW Radiation 0.01 W/m**2, Winds 0.01 m/s, Wind direction 0.1 deg, Relative Humidity 0.01%. Due to its large dynamic range, the linear transformations of SW Radiation introduce errors of order 0.01 W/m**2, which is below the accuracy of the radiation sensor. If this is an unacceptible problem for you, please use either the ASCII or NetCDF (4 byte) formats for SW Radiation.