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20040324: IDV and Our Discussion in Seattle

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  • Subject: 20040324: IDV and Our Discussion in Seattle
  • Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2004 10:39:13 -0700
Hi Laurence-

Both Robb and Jeff forwarded your message to me.


I'm addressing both of you as I am not sure which of you I talked to at
the AMS in Seattle.
I enjoyed our conversation at the UNIDATA exhibit and appreciated all of
the suggestions you gave.  I finally have begun to look into IDV a little
and have a couple of questions.

First, I would be running it on a Windows 2000 Professional system.  Is
it best to go with the installer files or just the Web Start
installation.  My inclination from reading your notes on the web is to go
with the former.


I would opt for the InstallAnywhere installer.  Depending on your
graphics card, the DirectX version seems to be better than the OpenGL
version.  You'll need to have Direct-X 8.0 or higher installed.  You
can get that from the Microsoft homepage.


Second, my main use would be with archived satellite and radar files from
NCDC.  However, they don't appear to have netCDF formatted data there.
John Kobar at NCDC said he thought IDV would read those .tar files.
Would it?  Also, what about the NOAA AVHRR (HRPT) files from the
Satellite Active Archive?


It depends on the format.  For satellite data, we support McIDAS
AREA format and some netCDF formats.  For radar, we currently only
support Level II format from local disk, but Level III data only
from a remote McIDAS (ADDE) server.


Third, with IDV can you overlay satellite and radar data?  I didn't see
any examples of such on the your web samples.


Yes, but currently, it depends on the ordering of the data. You can
see an example in the IDV Workshop docs at:

http://my.unidata.ucar.edu/content/software/IDV/docs/workshop/datadisplays/imagery/RadarOnSat.html

The workshop materials are a good starting place for learning about
the IDV as well.


I hope the answers are positive as I really look forward to using IDV.
It looks like some outstanding software!


Thanks for your interest.  I do have to note that as a private consulting
firm, you fall outside our core of supported users for the IDV.  As
such, we can't promise to provide timely support to you for the IDV.
That said, we'll try to help out as time permits.  For the full details
on our support for IDV, see:

http://my.unidata.ucar.edu/content/software/IDV/docs/userguide/Support.html

and

http://my.unidata.ucar.edu/content/legal/participation.html#support


Larry Mendenhall

Mendenhall & Associates
Meteorological Consulting
641 W Palm Dr
Placentia, CA 92870
714 961-1606     address@hidden


Don Murray
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