[netCDF #LJW-262807]: netCDF to text

Hi Sarah,

The ncdump utility that is part of the netCDF distribution converts
netCDF files to CDL, a form of text file that preserves the structure
and metadata.

Other similar utilities include the formatted output of the CDO package:

  http://www.mpimet.mpg.de/fileadmin/software/cdo/

documented in the CDO User's Guide, section 2.12 Formatted I/O.  Note
that the CDO package works with either netCDF or GRIB files as well as
some other formats.

You could also look at the ncks utility program that is part of the NCO
package:

  http://nco.sourceforge.net/nco.html#ncks-netCDF-Kitchen-Sink

If that looks like what you need, you should check out how to download
and build the NCO package, or maybe a compiled version is already
available for your platform:

  http://nco.sourceforge.net/

NCAR's NCL also can read and write GRIB and netCDF data.  The "ncl_filedump"
utility converts netCDF or GRIB data to ASCII:

  http://www.ncl.ucar.edu/Applications/d-support.shtml

and the ncl_convert2nc tool converts all or part of a GRIB file to netCDF:

  http://www.ncl.ucar.edu/Document/Tools/ncl_convert2nc.shtml

For GRIB to netCDF, these other packages are also available:

  http://www.unidata.ucar.edu/netcdf/docs/faq.html#grib

For GRIB directly to text, you might also try the NWS program "degrib":

  http://www.nws.noaa.gov/mdl/NDFD_GRIB2Decoder/

Finally, if you happen to be getting your netCDF or GRIB data from a THREDDS
Data Server, the TDS supports getting GRIB data as a netCDF CF-compliant file
that the server creates for you, and also provides the data in a structured
text form as NcML, which is a form of XML.

--Russ

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



Ticket Details
===================
Ticket ID: LJW-262807
Department: Support netCDF
Priority: Normal
Status: Closed