Due to the current gap in continued funding from the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF), the NSF Unidata Program Center has temporarily paused most operations. See NSF Unidata Pause in Most Operations for details.

NetCDF News Archive

NetCDF is under active development. This page contains "What's New" announcements that no longer fit on the netCDF home page. For more information about what is going on with netCDF, join the netcdfgroup mailing list.

NetCDF News

NetCDF News Archive: Listed By Year

2010   2009   2008   2007   2006   2005   2004   2003   2002   2001   2000   1999   1998   1997   1996   1995   1994

2010 NetCDF Newsreturn to top

2010-10-31 NetCDF Workshop Materials Available
The materials from the 2010 NetCDF User Workshop are now available on line: 2010 NetCDF Workshop.
2010-07-12 NetCDF 4.1.2-beta1 Release
NetCDF 4.1.2-beta1 Release: Please try version 4.1.2-beta1 of the netCDF C/Fortran/C++ libraries. The 4.1.2 release includes mostly bugfixes and performance enhancements. See the release notes for more information. Please send any feedback to support-netcdf@unidata.ucar.edu.
2010-04-08 NetCDF 4.1.1 Release
NetCDF 4.1.1 Release: We're pleased to announce the release of version 4.1.1 of the netCDF C/Fortran/C++ libraries. See the release notes for more information. Please send feedback to support-netcdf@unidata.ucar.edu.
2010-04-01 NetCDF 4.1.1 Release Candidate:
Please try the 4.1.1 release candidate of the netCDF C/Fortran/C++ libraries.

2009 NetCDF Newsreturn to top

2009-03-30 Presentation on NetCDF-4/HDF5 Chunking Available
Presentation on NetCDF-4/HDF5 Chunking Available: Elena of the HDF5 team suggests this presentation on advanced use of HDF5 chunking for netCDF-4 users who want to maximize performance.
2009-03-30 NetCDF Workshop Materials Available
NetCDF Workshop Materials Available: The materials from the 2009 NetCDF User Workshop are now available on line: 2009 NetCDF Workshop.
2009-03-30 NetCDF 4.0.1 Release:
We are pleased to announce the release of version 4.0.1 of the netCDF C/Fortran/C++ libraries. This release includes bug fixes and portability and performance enhancements. See the release notes for more information. Please send any feedback to support-netcdf@unidata.ucar.edu.
2009-02-03 NetCDF Beta Release
We are pleased to announce the release of version 4.0.1-beta3. This beta release includes bug fixes and portability and performance enhancements. Please send any feedback to support-netcdf@unidata.ucar.edu.

2008 NetCDF Newsreturn to top

2008-12-01 NetCDF Workshop On-line
The web pages from the Unidata 2008 workshop NetCDF for Data Providers and Developers are now available.
2008-12-26 NetCDF User Survey:
We would like to learn how you use netCDF and what features you would like to see in the future. Please take the netCDF user survey.
2008-12-26 NetCDF Beta Release
We are pleased to announce the release of version 4.0.1-beta2. This beta release includes bug fixes and portability and performance enhancements. Please send any feedback to support-netcdf@unidata.ucar.edu.
2008-10-16 NetCDF Beta Release
We are pleased to announce the release of version 4.0.1-beta1. This beta release includes bug fixes and portability and performance enhancements. Please send any feedback to support-netcdf@unidata.ucar.edu.
2008-06-12 NetCDF 3.6.3 and 4.0 Releases Now Available
We are pleased to announce the release of versions 4.0 and 3.6.3 of the NetCDF C/Fortran/C++ libraries and associated utilities. The netcdf-4.0 release offers an expanded data model and the ability to use HDF5 as a storage layer for netCDF files, while remaining fully backward compatible with previous versions of netCDF.

Users who are not interested in the enhanced data model at this time should get the netcdf-3.6.3 release, which does not read or write the new netCDF-4/HDF5 format. For more information see the 4.0 release notes or the 3.6.3 release notes.

NOTE: NetCDF-4.0 is a drop in replacement, with complete backward compatibility; it requires the installation of zlib and HDF5-1.8.1 to take advantage of new netCDF-4 features.
2008-05-07 NetCDF 3.6.3 and 4.0 Beta Releases Now Available
Users interested in netCDF-4 features, please try the netcdf-4.0-beta2 release. Those interested in netCDF Classic only, try the netcdf-3.6.3-beta1 release. Both are intended to be the final beta releases. For more information see the 4.0-beta2 release notes or the 3.6.2-beta1 release notes.

NOTE: NetCDF-4.0 is a drop in replacement, with complete backward compatibility; it requires the installation of zlib and HDF5-1.8.0-snap5 to take advantage of new netCDF-4 features.
2008-01-28 NetCDF Paper and Presentation at AMS Annual Meeting
See the netCDF paper, Experience with an enhanced netCDF data model and interface for scientific data access from the AMS 2008 meeting, and view the exciting presentation.

2007 NetCDF Newsreturn to top

2007-07-23 NetCDF for Developers Workshop On-line
The web pages from the Unidata workshop NetCDF for Developers is now available.
2007-05-03 NetCDF Sessions in Unidata Workshops
Attend the Unidata workshop sessions "NetCDF for Developers" (July 20) and "NetCDF Java - Writing an I/O Service Provider" (August 6), as well as sessions about other Unidata tools: GEMPAK, LDM, THREDDS, IDV, and McIDAS. See the Unidata workshop page to sign up.
2007-04-23 NetCDF 4.0-beta1 Released
NetCDF version 4.0-beta1 has been released. This requires HDF5 1.8.0 beta1, and zlib-1.2.3. See the netCDF-4 build instructions to build netCDF-4.0. See the release notes for more information.
2007-03-05 NetCDF 3.6.2 Released
NetCDF version 3.6.2 has been released. See the release notes for more information.
2007-01-25 Resources for learning about netCDF
Some new netCDF learning resources are now available:
2007-03-29 NetCDF Development Snaphots Available
NetCDF development snapshots are available from the netCDF-3 snapshot page and the netCDF-4 snapshot page.
2007-01-20 NetCDF-3.6.2 beta6 release available
This will be the final beta release of NetCDF-3.6.2. It is available as a gzipped tar file (See also the beta release of the documentation). This release fixes some minor bugs, and supports shared libraries.

2006 NetCDF Newsreturn to top

2006-10-13 A set of complete example programs are now available that demonstrate use of netCDF from C, Fortran 77, Fortran 90, and C++. Equivalent Java examples will soon be added to this collection.
2006-06-06 A new stable release of netcdf-java 2.2.16 is now available. This release adds, among other features, BUFR reading and pluggable coordinate transforms, as well as various bug fixes.
2006-03-31 NetCDF-3.6.2 is now available in beta as a gzipped tar file or compressed tar file. (See also the beta release of the documentation). This release fixes some minor bugs, and supports shared libraries.
2006-02-27 A new release, netCDF-3.6.1 (netcdf.tar.gz or netcdf.tar.Z) is now available, which improves ease of installation. Links to documentation, including installation instructions, are available in the version 3.6.1 documentation. For more information, see the release announcement and the FAQ.

2005 NetCDF Newsreturn to top

2005-03-03 Joe Sirott of NOAA's Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory has developed and made available cdfsync, a program that allows users to rapidly synchronize a set of netCDF files over a network by only transmitting the differences between files.
2005-02-18 A new release, netCDF-3.6.0-p1 (netcdf.tar.gz or netcdf.tar.Z) is now available, improving large file support and fixing a potentially serious bug in version 3.6.0. Links to documentation, including installation instructions, are available in the version 3.6 documentation. For more information, see the release announcement and the FAQ.
2005-02-17 A potentially serious bug has been discovered in large file support in netCDF-3.6.0. Before rewriting any netCDF files in the new 64-bit offset format, please upgrade the 3.6.0 library with this patch, or install the current beta release (netcdf-beta.tar.Z or netcdf-beta.tar.gz). Also the patch has been incorporated into the current 3.6.0-p1 release, available from netcdf.tar.gz or netcdf.tar.Z.

2004 NetCDF Newsreturn to top

2004-12-21 CDO (Climate Data Operators), an extensive new collection of more than 200 command-line operators to manipulate and analyze climate data files, is now available. Supported file formats are netCDF and GRIB. The software was developed by Uwe Schulzweida at the Max Planck Institute for Meteorology, and includes many commonly used operations for data manipulation and analysis.
2004-12-17 A new release, netCDF-3.6.0 (netcdf.tar.gz or netcdf.tar.Z) is now available. NetCDF version 3.6 improves large file support, Windows compatibility, ease of installation, and performance using the Fortran-90 interface. Links to documentation, including installation instructions, are available in the version 3.6 documentation. For more information, see the release announcement and the FAQ.
2004-10-30 The Logistical Computing and Internetworking (LoCI) Laboratory has developed and released NetCDF/L, which can store and access data on the "global logistical network", by using a LoRS URL (i.e. lors://). The NetCDF/L library can also store and access data on a local disk, so offers a new networking option for netCDF users. The NetCDF/L system will be demoed at SC2004 at the Internet2 booth (#2241) in Pittsburgh, November 6-12. For more information and download links, see the LoCI news article.
2004-10-14 A new beta release of netCDF-3.6.0 is available for external testing, with new simplified installation instructions. NetCDF version 3.6 improves large file support, Windows compatibility, ease of installation, and performance using the Fortran-90 interface. In addition, it fixes a few bugs. For more information, see the release announcement and a new list of questions and answers for netCDF large file support.
2004-09-03 A new project proposed by Charlie Zender (UC Irvine, PI) and Phil Papadopoulos (UC San Diego, Co-PI), "SEI(GEO): Scientific Data Operators Optimized for Distributed Interactive and Batch Analysis of Tera-Scale Geophysical Data" <http://nco.sf.net#prp_sei> was funded by NSF's highly competitive Science and Engineering Informatics program. The goal is to develop a suite of Scientific Data Operators (SDO) for interactive and scripted manipulation of (locally and) widely distributed repositories of netCDF- and HDF5-formatted geophysical data. The "grid-enabled" SDO will accelerate distributed, network-transparent, analysis of ensemble tera-scale datasets stored at local and remote locations.
2004-08-19 Developers with the ARM Program (Connor J. Flynn, Jason E. Christy, and Sherman J. Beus) have contributed several new utilities for examination, extraction, visualization, and manipulation of netCDF data. These include ANDX (ARM NetCDF Data eXtract), ANAX (ARM NetCDF Ascii eXtract), ANTS (ARM NetCDF Tool Suite), and an OCTAVE interface.
2004-06-30 Remik Ziemlinski of the NOAA Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory has developed a new tool to compare two netCDF files, nccmp, available from http://nccmp.sourceforge.net/. It can use MPI, include/exclude specific variables or metadata and operates quickly. Highly recommended for regression testing with large datasets. Setup is also easy for those who are familiar with "configure" scripts.
2004-06-12 A description of tentative plans and current work on netCDF-4 is available on the netCDF-4 web site.
2004-02-09 A new minor release, version 3.5.1, is available from ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/netcdf.tar.Z. NetCDF version 3.5.1 includes minor bug fixes and portability and performance enhancements to version 3.5.0. The netCDF file format is unchanged, so files written with previous versions can be read or written with version 3.5.1. For more information on the changes between 3.5.0 and 3.5.1, see the release notes. Please report problems to support@unidata.ucar.edu.

2003 NetCDF Newsreturn to top

2003-10-27 Alan Imerito has made available binaries for Win32 platforms for Fortran90 netCDF bindings, using Compaq Visual Fortran Standard Edition 6.6.0 on Windows NT 4.0.
2003-09-19 LeoNetCDF is a new commercial Windows application (Windows96/NT and higher) for editing netCDF files. It can display content of netCDF files in tree style control and permits editing its parameters in a standard Windows interface environment.
2003-08-15 A new beta release, version 3.5.1-beta13, fixes a memory leak several users noticed in the C++ interface. It is available from ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/netcdf-beta.tar.Z. As usual, please report problems to support@unidata.ucar.edu.
2003-08-08 The latest release, version 3.5.1-beta12, fixes what may have been a significant performance problem. The problem was first noticed on NEC SX6 platforms, but it is not platform-specific. It causes extra I/O as if unnecessary nc_sync() calls were being made. Data would be read and written correctly, but buffers would be flushed unnecessarily. The problem was first introduced in version 3.5.0, but it became significantly worse in 3.5.1-beta10 as the result of another change.

If you have installed version 3.5.1-beta10, or if netCDF I/O seems to be a bottleneck in your application, you might want to try the new beta release: ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/netcdf-beta.tar.Z. As usual, please report problems to support@unidata.ucar.edu.
2003-07-22 A group of researchers at Northwestern University and Argonne National Laboratory (Jianwei Li, Wei-keng Liao, Alok Choudhary, Robert Ross, Rajeev Thakur, William Gropp, and Rob Latham) have designed and implemented a new parallel interface for writing and reading netCDF data, tailored for use on high performance platforms with parallel I/O. The implementation builds on the MPI-IO interface, providing portability to most platforms in use and allowing users to leverage the many optimizations built into MPI-IO implementations. Testing so far has been on Linux platforms with ROMIO and IBM SP machines using IBM's MPI.

Documentation and code for Parallel-NetCDF (pnetcdf) is now available for testing. Although a few interfaces are not implemented yet, the current implementation is complete enough to provide significant I/O performance improvements on parallel platforms, as described in a technical report. Users are invited to test Parallel-NetCDF in their applications.
2003-07-01 A new beta release (3.5.1-beta11) of netCDF 3.5.1 fixes a performance problem discovered by Gottfried Necker that had been inadvertently introduced in the previous 3.5.1-beta10 release. The symptom was that too much system time was used on some platforms (the Fujitsu VPP, for example), from many extraneous calls to the internal px_pgin() and px_pgout() library functions during I/O. The new beta release is available from ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/netcdf-beta.tar.Z
2003-06-06 A new release (1.0 beta) of the NcML Coordinate Systems XML schema and reference implementation in the netCDF Java library 2.1 is ready for community input and review.
2003-03-13 A joint Unidata/NCSA project Merging the NetCDF and HDF5 Libraries to Achieve Gains in Performance and Interoperability has been awarded funding under NASA's Advanced Information Systems Technology (AIST) Program. Unidata will collaborate closely with Robert E. McGrath, Mike Folk, and other researchers and developers at NCSA to perform the work described in the proposal during the next two years.
2003-01-07 Robert Schmunk, NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies, has developed and contributed a new Java application, Panoply, for plotting global latitude-longitude gridded data.

2002 NetCDF Newsreturn to top

2002-11-01 Alexandru Corlan has developed an Ada-95 interface to netCDF and made it available from http://dan.corlan.net/software/netcdf.ada
2002-08-29 Some guidelines for netCDF data design are included in a new web document "Writing NetCDF Files: Best Practices". This is an evolving document, so if you have additional suggestions for best practices, please send them to us.
2002-08-12 A draft of NcML, a new XML representation for netCDF data, is available at http://www.scd.ucar.edu/vets/luca/netcdf. Like CDL, NcML provides a human-readable and machine-parsable specification for the structure of netCDF data, but eventually it may also be used for:
  • cataloging data holdings resulting from metadata harvesting
  • aggregation of data from multiple local or remote datasets
  • changing or augmenting metadata in existing netCDF datasets
  • support for alternate views of data (renaming components, subsetting data, changing structure)
  • declaring derived data
Please send comments and suggestions about NcML to, ncml@unidata.ucar.edu.
2002-03-23 Masato Shiotani (Kyoto University/GFD-DENNOU Club) and colleagues have prepared Japanese versions of the C and Fortran NetCDF Users Guides. The Users Guides are available in both HTML and PDF form.
2002-01-04 Patrick Jöckel of the Max Planck Institute for Chemistry has developed and made available two new tools, ncregrid and ncdx.

ncregrid is a tool (written in FORTRAN-90) for data transfer of gridded 2- and 3-dimensional (spatial) geophysical/geochemical scalar fields between grids of different resolutions. The algorithm handles data on rectangular latitude/longitude grids (not necessarily evenly spaced) and vertical pressure hybrid grids of arbitrary resolution. The input/output data format is netCDF. ncregrid is freely available without any warranty under the GNU public license (GPL). ncregrid can be used as a "stand-alone" program, and/or linked as an interface to a model, in order to re-grid automatically the input from an arbitrary grid space onto the required grid resolution. ncdx is a tool (also written in FORTRAN-90) that scans a netCDF file and makes it OpenDX compliant. ncdx is also freely available without any warranty under the GPL.

2001 NetCDF Newsreturn to top

2001-12-26 Ruby is an interpreted, object-oriented scripting language. Takeshi Horinouchi and colleagues at the Radio Science Center for Space and Atmosphere (RASC) of Kyoto University have developed a netCDF interface for Ruby. This interface is intended to cover all the functionality of the C library for netCDF. Also available are combination functions such as iterators (which offer abstract ways to scan files and variables). Numeric arrays are handled by the "NArray" multi-dimensional array class, which is becoming the de facto standard multi-dimensional array for Ruby.
2001-06-15 The R Project for Statistical Computing has developed R, a freely-available language and environment for statistical computing and graphics. It provides a wide variety of statistical and graphical techniques, including linear and nonlinear modelling, statistical tests, time series analysis, classification, and clustering. Thomas Lumley has contributed a package for reading netCDF data into R.
2001-03-23 NetCDF 3.5.0 is now available in compressed tar form or in ZIP form. No major changes to the source code have occurred since the netCDF 3.5 beta8 release, but there have been numerous changes to the build scripts and to the INSTALL documentation to simplify and correct the documentation for installation on various platforms. This release fully integrates the new Fortran 90 interface into the installation, fixes bugs, and adds some minor enhancements. The format of netCDF files remains the same as in previous versions, so backward compatibility is guaranteed. For more information on the changes, see the RELEASE_NOTES.
2001-02-06 A beta release of netCDF Java (version 2) is now available. The netCDF Java Library (Version 2) is a Java interface to netCDF files. It is built on the MultiArray (version 2) package, which is a stand-alone Java package for multidimensional arrays of primitive types. Also included in this library is an experimental netCDF interface to files that are accessed through a DODS server. The new interface is simpler to use than version 1, and also provides some efficiencies and functionality not available in the version 1 interface. The version 1 interface will still be supported for existing programs that use it, but the version 2 interface is recommended for new developments.
2001-01-31 Netcdf 3.5 beta8, which we hope to replace soon with the final netCDF 3.5 release, is now available in ZIP or compressed tar form. This beta release makes the C++ interface conform more closely to the standard, fixes a bug in the installation of the Fortran 90 interface on some platforms, and includes a new version of the INSTALL instructions in HTML form.

2000 NetCDF Newsreturn to top

2000-11-27 Instructions for building netCDF with the Lahey Fortran 95 compiler Linux and Windows NT are now available, thanks to Dirk Slawinski.
2000-10-20 Netcdf 3.5 beta6, which we hope to replace soon with the final netCDF 3.5 release, is now available in ZIP or compressed tar form. This beta release adds support for building and installing netCDF 3.5 on MacOS X.
2000-10-16 A candidate test version for netCDF 3.5, which we hope to replace within two weeks with the final netCDF 3.5 release, is now available in ZIP or compressed tar form. This release integrates the Fortran 90 interface into the installation, in addition to fixing a number of bugs, adding support for multiprocessing on the Cray T3E, and updating support for additional Fortran compilers. For Win32 systems, corresponding binaries and makefiles are also available. For more information on the changes, see the RELEASE_NOTES.
2000-08-04 Dominik Brunner has developed HIPHOP, a widget based IDL application that facilitates the visualization and analysis of 2D, 3D, and 4D atmospheric science data, in particular atmospheric tracer distributions and meteorological fields. For more information, see the HIPHOP entry in Software for Manipulating or Displaying NetCDF Data.
2000-06-13 Lorenzo Bigagli and Stefano Nativi, University of Florence, have contributed the PDF document ncML: Proposal of an XML Interface for NetCDF Data providing a new DTD for an XML representation of netCDF data and a Java converter that generates a conforming representation from a netCDF file.
2000-06-01 What may be the final beta test version of netCDF 3.5 is now available in ZIP or compressed tar form. The new release integrates the Fortran 90 interface into the installation, in addition to fixing a number of bugs, adding support for multiprocessing on the Cray T3E, and updating support for additional Fortran compilers. For more information on the changes, see the RELEASE_NOTES.
2000-05-08 Thanks to Robert Pincus at the University of Wisconsin - Madison, there is now an HTML version of the NetCDF User's Guide for Fortran 90.
2000-05-05 The Fortran 90 interface is now integrated into the netCDF 3.5 beta release, which is available as a compressed tar file or a ZIP file.
2000-03-29 ncBrowse, a new graphical netCDF file browser developed at NOAA PMEL, is now available. ncBrowse is a Java application (jdk1.2) that provides flexible, interactive graphical displays of data and attributes from a wide range of netCDF data file conventions. More information is available from the announcement or from the ncBrowse page at PMEL.
2000-03-25 Thanks to Sergey Malyshev of the Climate Research Group, Dept Atmospheric Sciences, UIUC, a new port of the netCDF library for Macintosh is now available at http://crga.atmos.uiuc.edu/~sergey/soft/index.html.
2000-02-25 An experimental Fortran 90 interface for netCDF is now available, thanks to Robert Pincus of the University of Wisconsin Space Science and Engineering Center. This will soon be integrated into the netCDF 3.5 beta release.

1999 NetCDF Newsreturn to top

1999-09-17 OpenDX is the open source software version of the IBM Visualization Data Explorer (DX). The import tool of OpenDX allows access to netCDF data. In addition to source, binary distributions are also available for AIX, IRIX, Linux, Solaris, and Windows platforms.
1999-09-07 A beta test version of netCDF 3.5 is now available in ZIP or compressed tar form. The new release fixes a number of bugs, adds support for multiprocessing on the Cray T3E, and updates support for additional Fortran compilers. For more information on the changes, see the draft RELEASE_NOTES.
1999-05-03 On this date, Unidata lost its leading software architect. GlennDavis and two of his friends lost their lives in a plane crash near Cedar City, Utah, during a thunderstorm. Glenn was instrumental in creating Unidata's netCDF software. His other interests included yoga, aerial dance, and piloting. His passions for soaring, physically and intellectually, pulled those who worked with him into his wake.
1999-03-19 WebWinds is a free Java-based science visualization and analysis package. In addition to several new analysis tools, the current fourth beta version does automatic scripting. More information is available in the new WebWinds entry of Software for Manipulating or Displaying NetCDF Data or from the JPL WebWinds site.
1999-02-17 A new minor release of netCDF for Java is available. This release:
  • Fixes bugs when invoking some methods with null shapes
  • Fixes javadoc documentation bugs and adds some clarifications
  • Includes improved Makefiles
The new release requires at least JDK 1.1.7 or better to build it from the sources, but compiled classes are included that should work on earlier VMs as long as you don't try to use the RMI (remote method invocation) classes. We welcome feedback. As usual, questions or bug reports may be submitted to support@unidata.ucar.edu.

1998 NetCDF Newsreturn to top

1998-10-06 NetCDF for Java is now available. Written entirely in the Java programming language, the new software supports reading and writing netCDF files and remote access to netCDF data via Java Remote Method Invocation (RMI). An object-oriented approach to multidimensional array access is also included that provides an independently useful abstraction of mutlidimensional arrays as well as an implementation of some commonly used array operations.
1998-09-29 Dan Schmitt has made cdftcl, a Tcl/Tk interface for netCDF, available. It allows the use of "wildcards" (*) or ranges (1-4) in the subscript notation, and use of name references instead of variable IDs. For more information or to download the software, see the cdftcl web page.
1998-04-09 Bill Noon has written and made available a set of modifications to the netCDF 3.3.1 library source that allows transparent access to both compressed and uncompressed netCDF files. You just have to relink against the znetcdf library. Creating compressed netCDF files requires only one additional flag in invoking the nccreate routine. A more complete explanation, the source changes, instructions on how to patch the netcdf-3.3.1 source, and some perfomance numbers are available from

http://snow.cit.cornell.edu/noon/z_netcdf.html

This has been used on the following platforms with no problems: dUNIX, MacOS, linux, IRIX, Solaris, AIX, openstep, Rhapsody.

1998-03-23 A patch is now available that makes the new tuning functions in netCDF version 3.4 available from C++. See the Known Problems with the netCDF 3.4 Distribution web page for more information and for access to the patch.
1998-03-20 Windows NT makefiles (using Visual C++ 5.0 and Digital Fortran 5.0) for Version 3.4 are now available via anonymous FTP from

ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/contrib/win32/netcdf-3.4.makvc5.zip

Win32 netdf library binaries (both static and DLL) available at

ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/contrib/win32/netcdf-3.4.win32bin.zip
1998-03-09 Version 3.4 of Unidata's netCDF software is now available via anonymous FTP from

ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/netcdf.tar.Z

More details are available in the announcement.

1998-03-06 A NetCDF to HDF converter (Power Macintosh or Windows 95/NT) is available free from Fortner Software. This utility converts netCDF files to the HDF format so that datasets, their dimension scales and any attributes can be viewed with Fortner's HDF Browser. Links to download the converter are available from the HDF Browser page.
1998-01-23 Update of Java netcdf implementation is available. Most changes in package ucar.multiarray. Includes implementation of some methods which were previously just stubs and improved documentation.
1998-01-10 A preliminary release of a Java netcdf implementation is available for friendly users. The implementation is composed of two packages. Package documentation may be viewed directly from our server.

1997 NetCDF Newsreturn to top

1997-11-21 The list of Software for Manipulating or Displaying NetCDF Data has recently been updated to include three more commercial packages that support netCDF access: InterFormat, Noesys, and Slicer Dicer.
1997-10-30 The Center for Clouds Chemistry and Climate (C4) Integrated Data Systems (CIDS) group has developed several useful netCDF utilities:
  • cdf2idl: Writes an IDL script to read a NetCDF file.
  • cdf2c: Writes C code to read a NetCDF file.
  • cdf2fortran: Writes FORTRAN source code to read a NetCDF file.
  • cdf2asc: Dumps NetCDF data to an ASCII file.
The source for these utilities can be downloaded from CIDS NetCDF Visualization Tools site.
1997-08-20 Harry Edmon announced the release of IVE (Interactive Visualization Environment), a software package designed to interactively display and analyze gridded data. IVE is capable of displaying data on arbitrary curvilinear grids. It can display scalar fields and vector fields, overlay plots, loop plots, perform algebraic computations on the gridded data, and calculate derivatives.

IVE uses NetCDF for the data input format, and uses the NCAR Graphics Library to produce graphical output (a license for NCAR Graphics is required to run IVE and can be obtained from the National Center for Atmospheric Research, NCAR). The source code for IVE is freely available, and the documentation is available on-line. For more information, see the IVE description in the Software for Manipulating or Displaying NetCDF Data web page.

1997-08-01 A problem using the gcc compiler when building netCDF on SunOS 4.1.x platforms has been reported. A description of the problem and a workaround are described in the Known Problems with the netCDF 3.3.1 Distribution web page.
1997-07-21 There is now an implementation of the netcdf-3 internal "ncio" which is built on the mmap() call available on many UNIX systems. This may speed up netCDF data access significantly in some cases. It is available as ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/contrib/mmapio.c. This is a "drop in" replacement for libsrc/ncio.c. To use it, move ncio.c out of way, put this file in it's place, and recompile. This has been tested on IRIX 6.2, SunOS 5.3, and HPUX 9.
1997-07-18 The ongoing discussion about netCDF coordinate system conventions is available as a hypermail document. Most of the discussion that pertains to specific proposals is also available organized by proposal.
1997-06-16 Version 3.3.1 of Unidata's netCDF software is now available via anonymous FTP from

ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/netcdf.tar.Z

More details are available in the announcement.

1997-06-06 Charlie Zender announced the release of version 1.0 of NCO (netCDF operators). NCO consists of nine command line operators that work on generic netCDF files and perform tasks like renaming, concatentation, hyperslabbing, averaging, interpolation, and differencing. The source code is freely available, and the documentation is available on-line.

In other news, text-only versions of the NetCDF User's Guides for C and Fortran are now available. These can be handy for searching. See the NetCDF Documentation page for access.

1997-06-03 New versions of the NetCDF User's Guides for C and Fortran are now available. The index in the updated versions includes a large number of function names inadvertantly left out of the original version. There is now a table of contents as well. The updated User's Guides are available as compressed PostScript from the NetCDF Documentation page.
1997-05-28 Konrad Hinsen (hinsen@starship.skyport.net) has contributed a new netCDF interface for Python that uses the new multi-dimensional array objects in the Numeric Extensions to Python. More information and download instructions are available from http://starship.skyport.net/crew/hinsen/netcdf.html. In other news, David N. Bresch and Mark A. Liniger at the Institute for Atmospheric Science at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, ETH, Z\FCrich, have developed ARGOS (interActive thRee-dimensional Graphics ObServatory), a new IDL-based interactive 3D visualization tool that prefers netCDF data. More information on ARGOS is available on the "Software for Manipulating or Displaying NetCDF Data" Web page.
1997-05-20 Steve Simpson (ssimpson@ziplink.net) contributed a build of netcdf-3.3 for 32 bit Windows. Here is what he had to say:

I've built 3.3 using Visual C++ 5.0 into a Win32 DLL. Enclosed are two zip files you can post in your ftp area. The first zip file contains the DLL and LIB files along with a readme and a modified netcdf.h file. The second zip file contains all the source with the modified netcdf.h file, the readme, and the .mak and .dsp files needed by the compiler. Both files are in WinZip format for use by PC users.

We intend to change the netcdf.h so that modifications aren't needed in the future.

1997-05-15 Version 3.3 of Unidata's netCDF software is now available via anonymous FTP from

ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/netcdf.tar.Z

More details are available in the announcement.

1997-05-08 A beta test version of the full netCDF-3.3 release, including the new Fortran interface, is now available. We expect to announce and make a general release available next week that will have a few additional portability fixes. The previous C-language-only pre-releases (version 3.1a and 3.3a) have been withdrawn. New user guides for netCDF-3 are also available: NetCDF User's Guide for C ( HTML for viewing, HTML compressed tar for downloading, compressed PostScript) and NetCDF User's Guide for Fortran ( HTML for viewing HTML compressed tar for downloading, compressed PostScript).
1997-01-27 A Win32 DLL for the pre-beta version 3.3a of netCDF is available from ftp://ftp.jasco.co.jp/pub/NetCDF/Win32DLL/netcdf-3.3a-win32dll.tar.gz. Thanks to T. Hondo for making this available.
1997-01-17 An update to the C-language-only part of netCDF-3, currently up to rev netcdf-3.3a, is available for downloading. A description of the prerelease is available in the NetCDF-3 Prerelease document and man-page reference documentation is also available with the release. Unlike the previous netcdf-3 pre-releases, this release includes the netcdf-2 fortran interface, ncgen, and ncdump. Early access users may drop use this in place of netcdf-2 and have all the features of netcdf-2 available. This release includes an optimized, vectorizable module, ncx_cray.c, which drops into place instead of ncx.c. This module provides high performance on CRAY machines. We will appreciate feedback, especially on bug reports, porting problems, and performance comparisons. Please send to support@unidata.ucar.edu, identifying the prerelease version in your message.

1996 NetCDF Newsreturn to top

1996-12-18 A note about a documentation inaccuracy in the NetCDF 2.4 User's Guide has been added to the list of Known Problems with the NetCDF Distribution. Thanks to William C. Mattison for pointing out the problem.
1996-11-12 Plot Plus (PPLUS), a general-purpose scientific graphics package that can read netCDF files as well as ASCII and binary files, is now available at no charge. It does require licensing on a per computer basis, but the license is at no cost. For more information, see http://www.halcyon.com/www2/dwd.
1996-10-28 Version 2.3.0 of the Unidata decoders package was released, for converting various kinds of meteorological bulletins into netCDF data. In addition to the GRIB decoder (gribtonc) written in C, the package now includes four perl decoders: a synoptic decoder (syn2nc), a buoy decoder (buoy2nc), a METAR decoder (metar2nc), and an upper-air decoder (ua2nc).
1996-10-23 Steve Simpson has made available the source and .mak files necessary to make a Win32 DLL for the alpha (prerelease) version of the C-language-only part of netCDF-3, called netcdf-3.1a. A .zip file is available for downloading.
1996-10-03 A binary release of netcdf-3.1a for 32 bit Windows platforms is available for downloading.
1996-09-19 Phil Miller has contributed "fanmat", a MATLAB interface to the FAN library for extracting and manipulating array data from netCDF files. It includes two MEX functions, nc2mat and mat2nc, that are simple gateway functions to the FAN library and are MEX file equivalents to the FAN utilities nc2text and text2nc. The fanmat package is available via FTP from ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/contrib/, a collection of files of freely available, user-contributed software and documentation related to netCDF.
1996-09-13 The Python netCDF module is now available for testing and use. More information is available from the URL http://snow.cit.cornell.edu/noon/ncmodule.html Python is an interpreted, object-oriented language that is supported on a wide range of hardware and operating systems. More information and sources can be obtained from http://www.python.org/

The netCDF bindings allow easy creation, access and browsing of netCDF files. The bindings also use the udunits library to do unit conversions.
1996-08-30 An alpha (prerelease) version of the C-language-only part of netCDF-3, called netcdf-3.1a, is now available for downloading. A description of the prerelease is available in the NetCDF-3 Prerelease document and man-page reference documentation is also available with the release.

We are releasing this version so C users can have early access to netCDF-3 without waiting for the completion of other components of the software. We will appreciate feedback, especially on bug reports, porting problems, and performance comparisons. Please send to support@unidata.ucar.edu, identifying the prerelease version in your message.
1996-08-12 Version 2.4.3 of Unidata's netCDF software is now available via anonymous FTP from

ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/netcdf.tar.Z

Changes are described in the Release Notes.

1996-07-17 Added a new document Known problems with the netCDF Distribution that describes reported problems and workarounds in the current release. Referenced this document from the netCDF homepage and the netCDF FAQ.

Documented a couple of steps that are needed for building on Windows NT platforms that were inadvertantly left out of the build instructions in the current release.

1996-06-26 Joe Sirott <sirott@atmos.washington.edu> has made available both source and compiled Java code for his Java netCDF interface. You should look at the README file, at ftp://ftp.atmos.washington.edu/freud/java/README before downloading the tar file from ftp://ftp.atmos.washington.edu/freud/java/rmicdf.tar.Z.
1996-06-07 A description of the new EzGet Fortran library for retrieval of modeled and observed climate data stored in popular formats including DRS, netCDF, GrADS, and GRIB has been added to the Web document Software for Manipulating or Displaying NetCDF Data.
1996-05-24 The mailing list searches on the netCDF home page have been modified to use glimpse instead of WAIS, and a new search option has been added for searching all the netCDF-related web documents maintained by Unidata.
1996-05-22 FAN version 2.0.2 (see description below) has been installed in the netcdf contrib ftp area as ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/contrib/fan.tar.Z This fixes a bug causing spurious 'errors' when attribute 'valid_range' defined. Also minor change to document "Introduction to FAN Language and Utilities".
1996-05-20 FAN version 2.0.1 has been installed in the netCDF contributed software FTP area as ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/contrib/fan.tar.Z FAN provides a high-level interface to netCDF.

The most generally useful facility is provided by the following four utilities:

  1. nc2text prints selected data from netCDF files.
  2. ncmeta prints selected metadata from netCDF files.
  3. ncrob reads data from netCDF files, performs some process on it (e.g. calculating mean) and then either prints the result or writes it to a netCDF file.
  4. text2nc reads ASCII data and copies it into netCDF files. It can also create, modify and delete attributes.

The FTP file contains the document "Introduction to FAN Language and Utilities" in both HTML and PostScript forms. The HTML form may be viewed as: http://www.unidata.ucar.edu/software/netcdf/fan_utils.html

What is New in Version 2? The utility ncmeta is new. There are significant enhancements to the utility ncrob. It can now print results as well as write them to netCDF files. A number of bugs have been fixed. Further details in section headed "What is New in Version 2?" in the above document. The utilities have been tested on the following platforms:

  • Cray Y-MP4E/464 running UNICOS 8.0.4.
  • DEC alpha running OSF1 V3.2.
  • DEC risc running ULTRIX V4.5.
  • DEC vax running ULTRIX V4.4.
  • HP 9000/715 running HP-UX A.09.05
  • IBM RS6000 running AIX 4.1.
  • Intel i386 running BSD/OS 2.1.
  • SGI mips IP20 running IRIX 5.3.
  • SGI mips IP26 running IRIX64 Release 6.1.
  • Sun sparc running SunOS 4.1.4.
  • Sun sparc running SunOS 5.5.
1996-05-02 The 2.4.2 release of netCDF, a minor update to netCDF 2.4, is now available via

anonymous FTP from

ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/netcdf.tar.Z

In addition, a patch file containing the differences between release 2.4.1 and 2.4.2 is available from the same directory as

ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/diffs-2.4.1-2.4.2

and the most recent Release Notes, describes the 2.4, 2.4.1, and 2.4.2 releases.

The 2.4.2 release contains a few minor changes:

  • Ported to an Intel 386-based, BSD/OS 2.1 system (but with no FORTRAN support).
  • Ported to DJGPP Version 2 for MS-DOS.
  • For CRAY systems, changed XDRing of scalars to use the same functions as XDRing of vectors. This provides a workaround for a CRAY problem where the same value written as an attribute produced a slightly different external representation than when written as a variable.
  • Added the FORTRAN interfaces macro file `linux.m4' to the distribution.
  • Liberalized conditions on use and distribution of the netCDF software by changing a sentence in the software copyright notice and in netcdf.h from a requirement to a request.
  • Fixed an ncgen bug in generating the proper value for a scalar character variable initialized from a string in a CDL file.
1996-04-30 The netCDF FAQ has been updated with the addition of an answer to the question: What is the best way to handle time using netCDF?
1996-04-15 Although we don't develop or support a Windows 95 version of netCDF, Toshinobu Hondo has contributed a port for Windows 95 compiled by Microsoft Visual C++ 4.0. The diffs and a binary distribution are available from ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/win32/
1996-04-11 The gennet.f program for generating a Fortran program to read an arbitrary netCDF file, contributed by Barry Schwartz of NOAA/FSL, has been updated. It's described in the catalog and included in the directory of user-contributed netCDF software.

The generated program now recognizes when variable IDs have changed, warns the user when gennet should be rerun to regenerate code, permits specification of the input file name, and adds a call to NCCLOS.
1996-04-02 Conditions on use and distribution of the netCDF software were liberalized by changing a sentence in the software copyright notice from

Further, the user agrees to credit UCAR/Unidata in any publications that result from the use of this software or in any product that includes this software.

to

Further, UCAR requests that the user credit UCAR/Unidata in any publications that result from the use of this software or in any product that includes this software.

Thanks to Richard Stallman, founder of the GNU project, for pointing out that the old terms could create unnecessary problems for users and for suggesting the change.

1996-03-19 The 2.4.1 release of netCDF, a minor update to netCDF 2.4, is now available via anonymous FTP from

ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/netcdf.tar.Z

In addition, a patch file containing the differences between release 2.4 and 2.4.1 is available from the same directory as

ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/diffs-2.4-2.4.1

The 2.4.1 release contains fixes for a portability problem in the previous 2.4 release, an ncgen bug, and a few documentation updates:

  • Slightly modified VAX OpenVMS build mechanism: made makevms.com' command procedures VAX-C specific in order to better specify the build environment and avoid incompatibilities.
  • Slightly modified ncdump/ncdump.c: expanded use of isprint() into two statements to avoid problems under Alpha OpenVMS where that function is actually a complicated macro.
  • Fixed ncgen bug in filling one-dimensional string variables when specified with multiple values that should be concatenated, eliminating spurious "too many values for this variable" message.
  • In User's Guide, added links to C++ and netCDFPerl interface documentation.

See the Release Notes for a description of what's new in the 2.4 release.
1996-03-04 The Frequently Asked Questions about netCDF document has just been updated to state that the OpenVMS-6.2 platform on which the latest release of netCDF was tested was a Digital MicroVAX, not a Digital Alpha.

Unidata is looking for a volunteer site in Europe to mirror the netCDF software distribution. [A site volunteered, see mirror sites.]
1996-03-01 Binary versions of the netCDF 2.4 release are now available for a few platforms:

The source release (from which the above binaries were built) is available from ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/netcdf.tar.Z. The NetCDF 2.4 User's Guide is available separately as a PostScript file, a set of info files, or a web document.

1996-02-28 The 2.4 release of netCDF is now available. See the Release Notes for a description of what's new in the release. The freely available source can be obtained by anonymous FTP from: ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/netcdf.tar.Z. This release provides a new version of the netCDF software that incorporates support for new platforms and updated versions of previously-supported platforms, provides new optimizations, improves the documentation, incorporates fixes for reported bugs, and includes other miscellaneous improvements. Version 2.4 is intended to be a stable release incorporating bug fixes and improvements that do not involve significant additions to the netCDF data model or interfaces.
1996-02-16 A new version of the NetCDF User's Guide for the 2.4 release is now available in several forms:
HTML
as a set of HTML documents for viewing with a web browser.
PostScript
as a compressed PostScript file. When uncompressed, this is suitable for printing or viewing with a PostScript viewer. (In the PostScript file, the Table of Contents is printed last, so please reorder before duplicating.)
Info files
as a compressed tar file of Info files, suitable for viewing with an Info documentation browsing system such as GNU info.

Changes to the new User's Guide include the following:

  • a new appendix that formally specifies the netCDF format, independent of its implementation;
  • a new section on limitations of the netCDF data model and implementation;
  • a new section on compiling and linking with the netCDF library;
  • a new section on UNICOS optimization;
  • a new section discussing the correspondence between CDL, netCDF, FORTRAN, and C data types;
  • clarification of, and some changes to, recommended standard attribute conventions;
  • clarification of cross-section access, strided access, and mapped access to arrays;
  • better embedding of URLs, so the derived HTML form of the User's Guide has working links to external documents and references; and
  • a more useful Index.

We expect to release version 2.4 of the netCDF software next week. It is currently available only in a beta test version, from netcdf-beta.tar.Z

1996-01-10 We have added nctopnm, a contributed program from Bear Giles of NOAA/FSL, to the catalog and directory of user-contributed netCDF software. Here's a brief description:

NCTOPNM converts a NetCDF "image" field (a two-dimensional (finite) or three-dimensional (unlimited) field of "char" or "byte" data) into a PNM portable pixmap. It can use a pseudo-color or greyscale colormap in the same file or a different file, add a colorbar to the lower left corner of the image, and "burn in" a map background.
1996-01-08 The version 2.4 beta6 release of netCDF was made available via anonymous FTP from the directory ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/. The compressed tar file is netcdf-beta.tar.Z (a link to the most recent beta release). This release contains fixes for:
  • a bug in not recognizing the new names of variables and dimensions renamed in define mode;
  • a bug in ncdump that caused it to print the explicit fill value instead of "_" for floating-point variables that had a negative "_FillValue" attribute;
  • a bug in using the "-f" option of ncdump for full annotations, in which multidimensional character arrays were missing a comma delimiter;
  • memory leaks in ncdump for some option combinations.

The release notes list operating systems on which the beta release has been tested, describe what's new since release 2.3.2pl2, and describe other problems that have been fixed.

1995 NetCDF Newsreturn to top

1995-12-06 The beta5 release of netCDF 2.4 was made available via anonymous FTP from the directory ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/. The compressed tar file is netcdf-beta.tar.Z (a link to the most recent beta release). This release includes improvements to the ncgen utility program that eliminate limitations on the maximum number of variables, dimensions, or attributes. In addition, the ncgen executable is now significantly smaller. The release notes list operating systems on which the beta release has been tested, describe what's new since release 2.3.2pl2, and list problems that have been fixed.
1995-11-13 The beta3 release of netCDF 2.4 was made available via anonymous FTP from the directory ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/. The compressed tar file is netcdf-beta.tar.Z (a link to the most recent beta release). This release adds some Windows NT-specific files inadvertently left out of the beta2 release (libsrc/winnt_io.h, util/make.com, util/msoft.mk, util/getopt.c, ncgen/msoft32.mak), and includes minor changes necessary for porting to IRIX64-6.1, and changes to configure to use the c89 compiler in preference to cc on AIX platforms.
1995-10-26 We announced the availability of the first release of Harvey Davies' FAN Utilities, a new software package for manipulating netCDF data. FAN (File Array Notation) is an array-oriented notation for identifying data items in files for the purpose of extraction or modification. The three utility programs in the initial release (nc2text, text2nc, and ncrob) can greatly decrease the need for programming with the netCDF library interfaces, since they can be called from the Unix command line and shell scripts. The package is available via anonymous FTP from ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/contrib/fan.tar.Z. Questions and comments may be sent to Harvey Davies, hld@dar.csiro.au.
1995-10-19 The Software for Manipulating or Displaying NetCDF Data document has been revised and reorganized to list packages according to whether they are freely-available or licensed. New entries were added for DODS, EWB, LinkWinds, PolyPaint+, and PPLUS. A few old entries were deleted, and links that don't work were updated or deleted.
1995-10-13 The beta2 release of netCDF 2.4 was made available via anonymous FTP from the directory ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/. The compressed tar file is netcdf-beta.tar.Z (a link to the most recent beta release). This release adds support for Windows NT, including Makefiles and code contributed by Donald W. Denbo of Pacific Northwest Laboratory (thanks Don!). Also a bug in ncattput is fixed and VMS fortran jacket library code was regenerated. The search form on the netCDF home page has been revised. It now uses WAIS directly instead of going through a gopher gateway. Also, help is now available on the syntax of query expressions.
1995-10-12 The Frequently Asked Questions web page has been rewritten, organizing the questions so it's easier to find a specific answer, and revising the document to include mention of the netCDF 2.4 beta release. A few new questions have also been included.
1995-10-11 A beta release of netCDF 2.4 is now available in source form via anonymous FTP from the directory ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/. The compressed tar file is netcdf-beta.tar.Z (a link to the most recent beta release). The release notes list the operating systems on which the beta release has been tested, describe what's new since release 2.3.2, and list problems that have been fixed.
1995-10-9 A beta release of netCDF 2.4 will be available later this week via FTP from the directory ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/. The name of the file will be netcdf-beta.tar.Z. This release has been tested on AIX-4, HPUX-9, IRIX-5, OSF1-3, SunOS-4, SunOS-5, Ultrix-4, and Unicos-8 platforms. It has not yet been tested on VMS, MSDOS, or Windows. The NetCDF User's Guide in the release has not been completely updated to version 2.4 yet, and additions to the C++ interface have yet to be documented. We're very interested in feedback from early testers of this beta release of netCDF 2.4, especially if you notice bugs that have been reported but not fixed or incompatibilities with netCDF 2.3.

The purpose of release 2.4 of netCDF is to:

  • Provide support for new platforms
  • Provide significant Cray optimizations
  • Incorporate fixes for all reported bugs
  • Improve ease of installation
  • Update documentation
1995-07-07 We have added two contributed programs from Charlie Zender, ncks and ncrename, to the catalog and directory of contributed netCDF software. Work on release 2.4 of netCDF continues. We hope to be able to announce a beta release soon.
1995-06-23 The netCDF home page now contains HTML links to netCDFPerl and NCOPERS.
1995-06-07 netCDFPerl, a netCDF interface for the perl utility, is now available.
1995-05-18 The netCDF homepage was changed in some cosmetic ways to adapt to a more uniform look for Unidata WWW pages.
1995-05-11 The netCDF 2.3pl2 release has been built and tested on AIX 4.1.2. It builds and tests cleanly. The compiler problem that exists with AIX 3.2.x is no longer an issue.
1995-05-09 A new draft document includes a draft list of what will be in the upcoming netCDF 2.4 release. The document also lists some possibilities for future enhancements to netCDF.
1995-04-18 The document on Known Problems with the netCDF Distribution has been updated with a few new entries. In particular, how to get an early test version of netCDF for IRIX64 platforms and a workaround for a problem with building the Fortran netCDF interface on some Cray platforms are now included.
1995-02-24 There's a new document explaining netCDF mailing lists. These are now handled by the majordomo list handler. References to the new document have been added to the FAQ and netCDF home page.
1995-02-06 We added some additional comments to the descriptive text for patches 3 and 4 to the netCDF distribution (all available fromftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/) that fix some bugs found in the experimental netCDF C++ interface, pointing out that after applying patch 3 it is necessary to build the netCDF library from scratch, including rerunning the configure' script.
1995-02-03 A new version of Barry Schwartz's program to generate a Fortran program to read a netCDF file is now available in the directory of user-contributed netCDF software maintained at the Unidata Program Center. It opens a specified netCDF file and generates the necessary Fortran code to declare the corresponding Fortran dimensions and variables and read all the data into the Fortran variables.
1995-02-02 A new version of David Pierce's Ncview visual browser for netCDF data is now available in the directory of user-contributed netCDF software maintained at the Unidata Program Center. Ncview is an X11 application that displays a 2-dimensional color representation of single precision floating point data in a netCDF file. You can animate the data in time (making simple movies), flip or enlarge the picture, scan through various axes, change colormaps, etc. The new version has many minor bug fixes, portability enhancements, ability to read non-floating point data, and other improvements.
1995-01-31 A new patch is now available from ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/2.3.2-patch4 that fixes some bugs found in the netCDF C++ interface. It updates the netCDF software to version 2.3.2pl4. Before applying this patch, you should first apply patch 3, available from ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/2.3.2-patch3. The beginning of the patch file includes brief descriptions of the bug fixes contained in patch4.
1995-01-20 We have made available a new Web document listing known problems (and workarounds, where available) with the current netCDF distribution. You can get to the new document from the netCDF homepage or directly using the URL http://www.unidata.ucar.edu/software/netcdf/known_problems.html.

1994 NetCDF Newsreturn to top

1994-12-16 There's a new file, watcom.zip, in the ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/contrib/ directory of user-contributed software. Mike Perryman contributed this collection of makefiles for building netCDF on DOS or OS/2 platforms using the WATCOM compilers. These files could be used to drive other DOS or OS/2 compilers with minimal modification since the compiler, linker and librarian specifications are contained only in the base makefile. This is packaged as a PKZIP file containing makefiles named WATCOM.MK for the base netCDF directory and subdirectories.
1994-11-23 Frank Dzaak (dzaak@fm.bs.dlr.de) contributed his fixes for building netCDF on Linux platforms (with the gcc compiler, f2c, flex, and bison), so we added information about this to the Frequently Asked Questions list for netCDF.
1994-11-17 Fixed searches on netCDF WWW homepage so they would work with the lynx browser and others. Added a link to the netCDF man page reference documentation using our new man-cgi gateway.
1994-11-08 Added a link to the netCDF Conventions/ directory from the netCDF Home Page. Added this document, to make it easier to discover changes and additions to netCDF WWW documents and software. Updated some of the WWW links in the netCDF usage and netCDF software documents.
1994-10-15 Added a PKZIPed version of netCDF for MSDOS, available from ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/msdos/ Added a question and answer to the netCDF Frequently Asked Questions about porting netCDF to OpenVMS platforms.
1994-08-15 Made available a tar file (from ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf/netcdf_html.tar.Z) containing the HTML version of the netCDF User's Guide, ready for local installation for users that want to view the documentation on-line with a WWW browser. Made some new programs available in the netcdf/contrib/ directory of ftp.unidata.ucar.edu.
1994-07-15 Made available a new set of patches for the C++ interface to netCDF. After applying this patch, it's necessary to rebuild from scratch, including the configure' step.
1994-06-15 Incorporated the two sets of existing patches to netCDF version 2.3.2 into the new patched release of the software, version 2.3.2pl2.