Re: 19981224: NetCDF 4 release schedule?

>To: address@hidden
>From: "Scott R. Wilson" <address@hidden>
>Subject: NetCDF 4 release schedule?
>Organization: Bio-Rad CD Systems, Semiconductor Division
>Keywords: 199812240104.SAA21288 netCDF 4

Hi Scott,

> The company I work for, Bio-Rad Semiconductor, has been using netCDF
> 3.3.1 for a couple of years as the basis for handling metrology data
> for data collected in semiconductor fabs. We are starting to really
> bog down with the size of the data sets (around a gig). We
> understand that netCDF 4 may include some data compression/packing
> functionality, and we are very interested in that.
> 
> Is there a release schedule for netCDF4? If so, is it something that
> you can tell me about? We are aware of the compression mods tp 3.3.1
> and are in the process of evaluating that as a solution, but we
> would definately like to stay with the mainstream, wherever it goes.
> 
> Anything you can tell me is of great interest.

Our plans still call for eventually implementing the next version of a
netCDF format in terms of the HDF 5 format and thus leveraging the
support available for packing in HDF 5.  However, we didn't get all
the resources we requested in our last NSF proposal, and as a result
we have had to put our netCDF development plans on the back burner.
Lately we have been concentrating our limited development resources on
netCDF for Java

   http://www.unidata.ucar.edu/packages/netcdf/java/

I assume the compression mods you're referring to are Bill Noon's zlib
mods

   http://snow.cit.cornell.edu/noon/z_netcdf.html

While we don't have any plans to incorporate zlib into the mainstream
netCDF development, this variant is getting a lot of use at some
Regional Climate Centers, and may be a good solution for your
purposes.

> We really appreciate the work that your team as done on netCDF. Give
> everyone a big "THANK YOU" for us! We are running it on Linux/Intel,
> Linux/Alpha, and W95.

Thanks for the feedback!  I've forwarded your note to Glenn Davis and
Steve Emmerson.

--Russ

_____________________________________________________________________

Russ Rew                                         UCAR Unidata Program
address@hidden                     http://www.unidata.ucar.edu