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IDV plot of NAM model grids in GEMPAK format showing jetstream over United States in 3-D.
Click image for larger view
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IDV Enhanced to Read GEMPAK Grid Files |
By Don Murray, IDV Developer
The IDV can now read in GEMPAK grid files from local disks and (soon) from THREDDS Data Servers (TDS). This will come as welcome news to the GEMPAK users in the Unidata community. To give you an idea of the scope, 1871 unique users downloaded GEMPAK through Unidata's web portal between October 2005 and September 2007.
At the recent Fall Users Committee meeting, two items were discussed that brought the need for this capability to the forefront. First, many Unidata sites have been archiving case studies in GEMPAK format. As new member Bill Gallus from Iowa State stated, accessing these data in the IDV would be a boon to IDV use in the community. There is the belief that some scientists are not using IDV because of the lack of support for the GEMPAK file format in which they store their data. The second pressing issue is the impending transition of NAWIPS/GEMPAK to AWIPS2 in the next 3-5 years. At this point, it is unknown how that will impact Unidata's GEMPAK users, but the committee thought that having IDV support GEMPAK data files would be a way for GEMPAK users to transition to the IDV if they wanted. 
And so IDV developers got to work on resolving the obstacle, working with the netCDF-Java developers to implement a reader for these grid files using the framework already in place for reading GRIB files. The IDV version (2.4) released shortly before the holidays includes the capability to read GEMPAK files from local disk. The ability to read from remote THREDDS servers will be available in the next TDS release later this month. Response to the announcement was immediate and positive.
At this time only GEMPAK grid files with GRIB 1, GRIB 2, or no packing are supported. IDV users can now view their GEMPAK data in 3D and interactively slice and probe these datasets. Along with the recent addition of many GEMPAK grid diagnostics, GEMPAK users should find the IDV a more attractive and long lasting option. As IDV development continues and the need arises, other types of GEMPAK files (e.g., observations) will be supported as well.
As noted above, we released v. 2.4 shortly before the holidays. For additional information on this, and other new features, see the release notes.
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Unidata Travels to New Orleans for the Annual Meeting |
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You'll find a number of Unidata staff members at the American Meteorological Society annual meeting in New Orleans where they will participate in about 15 different events that include presentations and posters. Here's the schedule of Unidata-related posters and presentations.
 You will also find Unidata staff in the UCAR/UOP Booth, # 710.
We call your attention to the CONDUIT meeting (find the agenda here) scheduled for Wednesday the 23rd of January from 2:00-4:00 PM in the Bridge Room, RM A-408, Hilton New Orleans Riverside Hotel.
On Wednesday, January 24, David Fulker, Unidata's first director (there've only been two, actually) will receive the AMS's Cleveland Abbe Award, for distinguished service to atmospheric sciences by an individual. The award honors individuals for "...visionary foresight, creative leadership in community building, and pioneering information technology contributions to advance meteorological data use in education and research.” And, Rich Clark, longtime Unidata activist will receive the Teaching Excellence Award for "...his enthusiasm and dedication to outstanding teaching and mentoring, and exceptional contribution to the professional development of students in the atmospheric sciences.” Rich is a member of Unidata's Policy Committee and was the 2006 recipient of Unidata's Russell L. DeSouza Award.
The awards will be presented at the banquet on Wednesday evening.We hope you will join us in congratulating these two outstanding individuals whose exceptional service to the UPC and the broader community has been instrumental in building the strong viable community that Unidata is. |
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News Briefs |
Introducing Dennis Heimbigner
 NetCDF developers, and indeed, the entire Unidata staff, welcome Dennis to the program center. He will be developing software to integrate OPeNDAP protocols into Unidata's netCDF library, bringing to C-based software capabilities that are also available in Unidata's netCDF Java library. With this addition, applications written in C, Fortran, and other programming languages that make use of the Unidata netCDF C library will be able to efficiently access data in various formats from remote DAP-compatible data servers.
Dennis comes to Unidata from the University of Colorado, where he was involved in research on security, distributed systems, and databases.
In his time away from work Dennis does sculpture and drawing and keeps attempting to learn to play the guitar.
12th Annual National Weather Association Severe Storms and Doppler Radar Conference
The 12th Annual National Weather Association Severe Storms and Doppler Radar Conference will be held in West Des Moines, Iowa March 27-29. Invited speakers this year will include Paul Markowski with an update on VORTEX-2, Pam Heinselman on Dual-Pol and Phased Array radar, and presentations on the Greensburg Kansas and Enterprise Alabama tornadoes. Abstracts for volunteered talks or posters will be accepted through February 20. A $1,000 scholarship is awarded to a sophomore or junior meteorology student at the conference, and details are contained in the attachment. More details about the conference including registration information are available at this link.
Regional Workshop at Plymouth State
 Here's a heads up: Plymouth State University will host a Unidata Regional Workshop on May 18-20, 2008. The workshop will allow for hands on instruction with Integrated Data Viewer (IDV) software. Participants will be a mixture of university faculty and students, research scientists, K-12 teachers, and other interested individuals from across the New England region. Representatives from Unidata will be onsite to provide tutorials on IDV and to discuss other Unidata projects and initiatives. Registration and other additional information can be found here. |
Please send comments to support-eletter@unidata.ucar.edu
The CommuniteE-letter is produced by editor, Jo Hansen, and production manager, Tina Campbell |
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