[Vis5d-users] Re: Vertical Coordinate

Hi Jeff,

Vis5D doesn't use a vertical grid where z spacing varies
in x and y, except in generic coordinates where topography
is wrong (the vertical levels are still displayed as flat).

The irregular data are for point obs, not grids.

Our VisAD system can handle vertical grids where z spacing
varies with x and y. It doesn't have the same performance
or nice GUI of VisAD, but is getting there via Unidata's
IDV.

Cheers,
Bill
----------------------------------------------------------
Bill Hibbard, SSEC, 1225 W. Dayton St., Madison, WI  53706
hi...@fa...  608-263-4427  fax: 608-263-6738
http://www.ssec.wisc.edu/~billh/vis.html


On Mon, 20 Jan 2003, Jeff Frame wrote:

> Hello,
>
> I plan on using Vis5d to visualize model output from ARPS.  The model
> incorporates a terrain following vertical coordinate, z, which is used
> as the vertical coordinate in Vis5d.  However, this presents a problem
> since the terrain following surface is not flat, but it is plotted as
> such.  Overlaying the terrain on top of the model output fields causes
> data to be plotted below ground is areas where the terrain height > 0
> (because the terrain data file uses heights above MSL, zp, not a terrain
> following grid (z) ).  I plan on fixing this problem by reading in the
> v5d file output by the model, then converting the vertical grid back to
> actual height and creating a new v5d file.  Is this the easiest way to
> do this?  Any suggestions on how to do this?
>
> Also, a related question:  Can Vis5d use a vertical grid such that the
> spacing between vertical levels varies in x and y?  (i.e. delta z =
> f(x,y) )?  The vertical grid section in the readme file implies that I
> can't.  However, the readme document also mentions an irregular data
> type called a "record."  I'm wondering if I could possibly display these
> data that way.
>
> Thank you for any suggestions.
>
> Jeff Frame
> PSU Department of Meteorology
> Graduate Program
>
>