Re: version of NetCDF for NDFD? (fwd)

[Russ Rew <russ@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

>To: lmiller@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>From:Tom Whittaker <tomw@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> 
>Subject: Re: 20040401: version of NetCDF for NDFD?
>Organization: SSEC
>Keywords: 

Hi Tom,

> Would you please let me know what version of NetCDF to recommend to
> NWS to use for the NDFD grids? I plan to tell him that the versions
> are all compatible with respect to file format (which perhaps
> implies it doesn't matter to the end users), but any other words you
> can provide would be good, too.  Thanks.

The latest released version, 3.5.1, would be the best choice:

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

You're right that all versions support the same file format, so it
doesn't matter to end users what version was used to create a netCDF
file.

It would be good to recommend that whoever is designing the netCDF
representation for NDFD grids look at the short document "Writing
NetCDF Files: Best Practices":

  http://www.unidata.ucar.edu/packages/netcdf/BestPractices.html

since the conventions followed for representing data and metadata are
important if they want the data to be usable in existing applications.

--Russ