[ncl-install] Trouble with ctrans sun raster output x86_64

[Mary Haley]

On Fri, 11 Apr 2008, Orion Poplawski wrote:

> Mary Haley wrote:
>> 
>> Orion,
>> 
>> Thanks for the patch.  We may have already applied this from another
>> user that sent us one, but I'll check.
>> 
>> You would have a similar problem with ictrans, and hence idt; this
>> patch should fix both of those. It should also fix potential problems
>> with all the ras* tools, if you use these. However, the ras* tools are
>> rather out-of-date, so I don't encourage people to use these.
>
> We came across this because we use the following to convert a gmeta file to a 
> gif:
>
> med -e "1,\$ split \$ tmp" gmeta
> ctrans -d sun -record 1 tmp1.ncgm | rasttopnm | ppmtogif > gmeta.1.gif
>
> If you know of a better way, that would be great.

Orion,

For the highest quality images, I prefer starting with a PostScript
file, rather than an NCGM. You can generate PS files directly
from NCAR Graphics and/or NCL.

Then, I use tools like "convert" from ImageMagick to convert from PS
to png or gif or another format.  I find that this method gives me the
best looking fonts when I put the images on the web or in PowerPoint.
I can also import the PS images directly into Keynote (for Macs).

With "convert", I use "-density 300" to improve the quality of the
image, and the "-geometry" option to increase the size of the image.
If you need the image to be rather large, like poster size, then
increasing the density value can help.

> I'm also attaching a patch that attempts to clean up some implicit 
> declaration warnings.  There are still lots more, but this is a start.

Thanks, I'll take a look at your changes.

> Any idea when the next ncl release will be?

That's a good question. We are in the midst of an overhaul of our
code to handle > 2Gb variables, but I don't think we'll wait until
this overhaul is done to do a release. We need to do a PyNGL/PyNIO
release first, and then an NCL release, maybe next month.

If you need something before then, let me know offline.

--Mary

> -- 
> Orion Poplawski
> Technical Manager                     303-415-9701 x222
> NWRA/CoRA Division                    FAX: 303-415-9702
> 3380 Mitchell Lane                  orion at cora.nwra.com
> Boulder, CO 80301              http://www.cora.nwra.com
>