$Id: README,v 1.6 1996/01/26 15:25:28 steve Exp $

Greetings,

    This file briefly describes the netCDFPerl package.

INTRODUCTION
------------

    The netCDFPerl package is a perl extension for accessing netCDF
    datasets.  For example, the following netCDF actions:
    
        1.  Open dataset "foo.nc";
        
        2.  Write a 2 x 3 array of double-precision values into
            the starting corner of the first variable; and

        3.  Close the dataset.

    can be accomplished by the following C fragment:

        int     ncid = ncopen("foo.nc", NC_RDWR);
        int     varid = 0;
        long    start[2], count[2];
        double  values[6];

        ncid = ncopen("foo.nc", NC_RDWR);

        start[0] = 0;
        start[1] = 0;
        count[0] = 2;
        count[1] = 3;

        values[0] = 0.0;
        values[1] = 1.0;
        values[2] = 2.0;
        values[3] = 3.0;
        values[4] = 4.0;
        values[5] = 5.0;

        ncvarput(ncid, varid, start, count, values);

        ncclose(ncid);

    or by this equivalent perl fragment:

        use NetCDF;

        $ncid = NetCDF::open("foo.nc", RDWR);
        $varid = 0;
        @start = (0, 0);
        @count = (2, 3);
        @values = (0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5);
        NetCDF::varput($ncid, $varid, \@start, \@count, \@values);
        NetCDF::close($ncid);

    There are perl-callable functions for all appropriate functions of
    the netCDF API.

AVAILABILITY
------------

    netCDFPerl is freely available from either of the following URLs:

        http://www.unidata.ucar.edu/packages/netcdf-perl/
    
    or

        ftp://ftp.unidata.ucar.edu/pub/netcdf-perl/netcdf-perl.tar.Z

INSTALLATION
------------

    See the file INSTALL in the top-level directory of the netCDFPerl
    distribution for instructions on how to incorporate netCDFPerl into
    your perl utility.

    You will need write access to your installed perl(1) libraries in
    order to install netCDFPerl.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
----------------------

    See the installed manual page, netCDFPerl(1), for additional
    information.

    There is a WWW page for netCDFPerl.  It's URL is

        http://www.unidata.ucar.edu/packages/netcdf-perl

MAILING-LIST
------------

    There is a netCDFPerl mailing-list.  To subscribe, send to the
    following address:

        majordomo@unidata.ucar.edu

    a message whose body consists solely of the following:

        subscribe netcdf-perl [opt-addr]

    where [opt-addr] is an optional email address -- if you use it, then
    mailing-list postings will be sent to it; otherwise, they will be
    sent to the return address of the subscription request.


Regards,
Steve Emmerson <support@unidata.ucar.edu>
