[Dart-users] recent updates to dart repository

[Nancy Collins]

hello dart users,

here's a summary of recent changes to the dart subversion repository.

- copyright:
over the last month tim has had to update almost every file in the
entire repository to make our copyright notice be accurate.   if you
haven't updated from the head of the trunk recently do not freak
out when you do.  you'll see almost every file has changes - but they
are mostly confined to the comment section at the top of the files
where the legal disclaimers live.

- type and kind changes:
anyplace the string _DEW_POINT_TEMPERATURE was found
it has been replaced by the shorter _DEWPOINT to avoid exceeding
the limits for string lengths of fortran 90 parameters.  i've updated all
the places in the repository code that it exists, but if you have your own
versions of anything that uses this type you'll have to update it as well.

- obs_seq to netcdf converter:
the source code is now generic for both oned and threed locations, and
so has moved into the DART/obs_sequence directory.
mkmf and path_names files for POP, cam, and wrf have been added,
so you can build this tool right in the model work directory.

- plot_obs_netcdf:
has moved from DART/observations/utilities/threed_sphere to
DART/diagnostics/matlab, and has additional functionality.

- ncep prepbufr observations:
the location of the bufr converter has moved from DART/ncep_obs to
the more logical DART/observations/NCEP.   i've also moved the location
of the create_real_obs executable to be in a separate subdirectory at
the same level as the prepbufr code.  hopefully this makes it more
clear what is based on the ncep prepbufr code and what's our own
converter code.

- minor log message updates:
several files which write messages to the dart_log.out file have had
additional text added to try to make the information more clear.
there is no new functionality, just more logging information for
choices set by namelist.

- wod converter update:
the world ocean database observation converter should run much
faster now as it converts WOD files to dart's obs_seq format.

- cam model_mod:
minor changes committed, including a fix for possible problems when
processing observations with a vertical component of height.

- wrf radar files:
several new executables have been added to the WRF_DART_utilities
directory and wrf/experiments/Radar to accommodate radar experiments.

- wrf model_mod (upcoming):
sometime in the next couple days a new version of the model_mod will
be committed that includes ryan's new vortex-center-finding code, as
well as a surface-height check.  also, the updated dart_to_wrf converter
that works either on model_advance or restart files will be added.  this
will require a new namelist to be added to your &input.nml file.

- MADIS converters (existing and upcoming):
one set of updates has already been committed, and another is
coming up in the next few days.  the code will detect if incoming
data QC values are there and use them if so; the converters will
read both MADIS surface obs files from METAR sources as well
as general MESONET files.  and finally, there are options for
generating moisture observations as specific or relative humidity
or as dewpoint obs.


nancy