plotting lon-lat-val lists

["S.P. Jewson" <atmspj@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

The da Silva COADS data is stored as netcdf lon-lat-val lists.
In ferret it looks like:

yes? show data
     currently SET data sets:
    1> ./sst.nc  (default)
 name     title                             I         J         K         L
 LAT      latitude of nth point            1:42164   1:1       1:1       1:1
 LON      longitude of nth point           1:42164   1:1       1:1       1:1
 CLM      1945-89 climatology for each mo  1:42164   1:12      1:1       1:1
                                                                             
Is there a way to shade/contour/fill this in ferret?

Are there any standards for storing data in this format?

steve jewson