Whats new in the netCDF 4.0 release?
Version 4.0 provides compatibility with existing netCDF programs and data, additional data modeling abstractions, and features for use in high performance computing, such as parallel I/O. Support for an enhanced data model is made possible by including the capability to use HDF5 as the data storage layer for the netCDF API. Features of the netCDF-4 data model include: • Multiple unlimited dimensions • String type • Additional numeric types • Groups for nested scopes • User-defined compound types (portable structs) • User-defined variable-length types for ragged arrays • User-defined enumeration types for compact self-description • Unicode in names Performance benefits of the HDF5-based netCDF-4 format include: • Per-variable compression • Per-variable multidimensional tiling (chunking) • Ample variable sizes • Efficient dynamic schema changes • Parallel I/O • Reader-Makes-Right conversion For more information about netCDF-4, see • an overview in NetCDF-4: Software Implementing an Enhan
