Introduction:
This data on the AB/CPC Data Page are the work of many people at NCEP. It
was named the AB/CPC Data Page because I expect that in the future
a "NCEP Data Page" and a "CPC Data Page" will be maintained by the
web-masters of the NCEP and CPC home pages, respectively. Anyways,
I work at the AB of CPC. [Note: CPC has reorganized and
the Analysis Branch (AB) is gone.]
Warning:
The data that is available from the previous page are primarily
research datasets. People who need "time-critical", "must-have", or
"official forecasts" datasets should not use this site.
These people need to go through official channels (see disclaimers). If this
site crashes of Friday evening, I won't be around to reboot it
until Monday morning. If a power surge fries this computer
while I'm on vacation, there is simply nobody around to recreate
the site. Even if I were not on vacation, it would still take
much time to get a new machine, install the operating system,
read the backup tapes and reconfigure the system.
A similar situation exists if workstation "sgi62" dies.
Control and Index files:
Most of the data files include GrADS control files (.ctl). In addition,
the GRIB files also have an index or map file (often .idx or .map).
However the control and index files will only work for the full dataset.
If you obtain a subset, you will need to remake these files.
Personally I would use
grib2ctl to make the control files but I'm biased. After you make
the control file, you have to run gribmap which is part of the
GrADS distribution.
If you pick up some GrADS control files, you may notice some strange comments (lines that begin with an asterisk). These comments are actually directives to the web plotter on how to create various plots. All the customization of the plots are contained in the control files.
New datasets:
If any NCEP people would like to make your data available on this
page, contact me (WNE).
Bugs:
Send bug reports to Wesley.Ebisuzaki@noaa.gov
Plot package:
The plots are produced by GrADS, written by Brian Doty, doty@cola.iges.org.
New Plot Features (PNG version only):
Future Plot Features:
New FTP2You Features:
contact: Wesley.Ebisuzaki@noaa.gov