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Vis > visualization > explorer > Explorer Sample Maps

Explorer Sample Maps

Introduction

This document presents some sample Explorer maps which demonstrate how to perform several basic operations. It is assumed that the user has at least some knowledge of how Explorer works, including such concepts as Explorer data types (lattice, geometry, etc.), modules, data flow, and the basic mouse operations needed to operate the GUI. Information about how to operate any particular module is available via the "Help" for the module, or by consulting tkcxhelp. The maps themselves reference files in the local GFDL file systems, so would require modifications for use outside GFDL.

All of the sample maps below use data that is oriented top-down; ie, the vertical coordinate is either pressure (varying from low to high pressure) or sigma (with smaller vaules of sigma first). Hence the frequesnt use of the FlipLat module. FlipLat is one of the more difficult modules to explain, but which is *very* useful when dealing with atmospheric and oceanographic data. Careful reading of the Help file is needed to understand it fully, but all we need mention here is that FlipLat is necessary whenever the vertical coordinate of the data is such that increasing values of the coordinate correspond to lower values of "altitude" (eg, sigma coordinates, pressure, or "depth" given as a positive number). It is also used whenever some coordinates values are listed backwards even though larger positive values *do* point toward larger positive distances along that axis (ie, largest values occur first). An example is some NMC data, where the latitudes are correctly labeled, but ordered N-to-S.

Datasets used by the sample maps are all in netCDF format: