[McIDAS #XBZ-396007]: new to unidata - General questions

["Unidata McIDAS Support" <support-mcidas@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi Carlos,

re:
> I write to this address because, after going through lots of
> documentation about your tools and data, I still can't answer a couple
> of things.

OK.

> I hope you will be able to answer to me or, at least, point me to the
> apropriate topic-specific email address.
> 
> For the moment I haven't downloaded nor used none of your tools. I've
> being learning about them and about the data formats in use.
> 
> What I need is: to produce different products, based on GOES-10 data.
> The products I need are:
> - Sea surface temperature,
> - relative humidity at highest troposphere,
> - cloud cover (amount of clouds),
> - clouds mask,
> - pressure at high cloud top level,
> - temperature at high cloud top level,
> - cloud type,
> - volcanic ash products.
> 
> The case is:
> I have access to the raw GOES data (thanks to a local ground station)
> which I have to format according to my needs. I still have to decide
> the format: netCDF, AREA, etc.
> 
> What I can't still figure out is: Is there a tool with which I can
> create the products mentioned above? If so, what tool is it? (GEMPAK
> or McIDAS, maybe?)

McIDAS may be the best of McIDAS/GEMPAK since its forte is the manipulation
of satellite imagery.  Also, the package typically used to generate products
like the ones you mention is McIDAS. One thing to consider, however, is that our
license to distribute McIDAS is restricted to educational institutions.  It is
unclear to me what your institutional affiliation is; can you explain?

GEMPAK has some capabilities for manipulating satellite imagery, but its true capabilities
are geared more towards model output analysis/display.

The other package you may want to consider using is the Unidata Integrated Data
Viewer (IDV).  The IDV, like GEMPAK, is freely available outside of the educational
community.

> If you can help me answer that, then I will finally decide the format
> for my data. The plans are, afterwards, to inject the new data into
> the IDD...

OK.  It certainly sounds like you are either working at an educational institution
(und.edu.ar?) or are affiliated with one.  If you are associated with an
educational institution, I would recommend you use McIDAS (so we can provide
it to you at no cost).  This would mean that you would want to format your
data into AREA files.


> But for the moment, I need to know if the tools that Unidata provides
> will be helpfull.

Yes, I think the tools we offer will be of use in your project.

> Thank you very much for your time,

No worries.

Cheers,

Tom
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Ticket Details
===================
Ticket ID: XBZ-396007
Department: Support McIDAS
Priority: Normal
Status: Closed