In addition to interactive scripting, Jython scripts can run in batch mode for automatic generation of images without necessarily having to "manually" invoke an IDV client GUI. These scripts can be useful for generating images via a crontab, for example. Note that when developing your Jython IDV batch script, it is useful to first experiment with them in interactive mode. See the previous section about the Jython interactive shell.

1. In your favorite editor, create a file call script.py and add the following code

   setOffScreen(1)
   idv.getStateManager().setViewSize(java.awt.Dimension(800,600))
   ds = makeDataSource("dods://motherlode.ucar.edu:8080/thredds/dodsC/casestudies/idvtest/grids/small_ruc_grid.nc","netcdf.grid")
   temp = getData(ds.getName(),"T")
   dc = createDisplay('planviewcolor',temp)
   pause()
   image = getImage()
   writeImage('/home/idv/isl/image.png')
   

2. Now run that script with the following command

   runIDV -islfile script.py
   

Unidata IDV Workshop for version 6.2u2 > Advanced Topics > Scripting with IDV