MetEd screenshot showing Unidata resources

NSF Unidata and the COMET program are pleased to announce the availability of Unidata's eLearning materials on the COMET's MetEd platform.

Prior to this collaboration with COMET, NSF Unidata's online learning resources were hosted on Unidata's in-house learning management system. Hosting Unidata's courses on MetEd means they will be available to a wider audience, and can take advantage of MetEd's robust learning platform. With the switch to MetEd, learners will be able to provide Unidata with feedback that helps us improve our resources directly within the platform. Learners can also download a certificate of completion after finishing a course.

As of June 2026, five Unidata courses are available on MetEd:

  • Supervised Machine Learning Readiness: a self-paced, beginner-friendly learning program designed for Earth systems scientists to explore the core principles of supervised machine learning.
  • Learn AWIPS CAVE: an in-depth course to help you learn the fundamentals of working with the AWIPS desktop client (CAVE) through demonstrations, tutorials, activities, assessments, and challenges.
  • Learn Python-AWIPS: an introduction to using Unidata's data access framework, using Python to request meteorological and geographic datasets from an AWIPS Environmental Data EXchange (EDEX) server.
  • Getting Started with Siphon and THREDDS: a short module that introduces Unidata's THREDDS Data Server and Siphon data access architecture, showing how to make a request for remote data in Python.
  • Multidimensional Data Structures: a short module exploring the hierarchical nature of multidimensional data structures, focusing on the netCDF data model.

How to Access the MetEd Courses

To use Unidata's online learning resources, you'll need to create an account on the COMET MetEd learning site. You may already have an account on MetEd — if you do, there's no need to create a different account to access the Unidata courses.

Once you've logged in to MetEd, select the Catalog to see the full course catalog. From there:

  • Select the NSF Unidata Category to see all courses created by Unidata staff.
  • Use the Tags drop-down menu to search for courses by topic (e.g. Data Access).
  • Click the Search icon at the top of the MetEd screen and supply a search term. A search for "Unidata" will turn up all courses that mention Unidata, even if they were not created at the Program Center.

If You Have Used the Unidata eLearning System Before

If you have used Unidata's previous online learning system (elearning.unidata.ucar.edu), you should be aware of the following things:

  • As of June 2026, we are no longer allowing new registrations on the old learning system.
  • As of July 2026, you will no longer have access to the old learning system. If you are currently in the middle of a course, please finish before the end of June.
  • If you have completed a course and wish to download a completion badge or other materials, please do so before the end of June.

Looking to the Future

We're excited to be able to present Unidata's selection of learning materials alongside all of the other courses available on MetEd. As resources allow us to create new online learning experiences, we'll be adding them to the NSF Unidata category on MetEd.