Problem writing character arrays using netCDF v3.5.1 compiled using

• To: netcdfgroup@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
• Subject: Problem writing character arrays using netCDF v3.5.1 compiled using
• From: "Paul Vandelst" <Paul.Vandelst@xxxxxxxx>
• Date: Thu, 26 Aug 2004 16:21:19 -0400

Hi There,

I just recently recompiled my netCDF v3.5.1 Fortran API with the latest
PGI v5.2-1 f95 compiler. I'm now having problem with some Fortran90 code
I wrote that has been working up till now. I thought I'd ask this group
in case someone else has had a similar problem and has some sort of work
around.

I have a character array, each element of which is 512 characters in
length, that I want to write to a netCDF file,

INTEGER, PARAMETER :: PDSL = 512
CHARACTER( PDSL ), DIMENSION( : ), ALLOCATABLE :: Description

How I do this, after allocating the array to some length, e.g.

ALLOCATE( Description( n_Profiles ) )

is to first define the dimensions:

  ! -- The number of profiles
  NF90_Status = NF90_DEF_DIM( NC_FileID, &
                              PROFILE_DIMNAME, &
                              n_Profiles, &
                              Profile_DimID )
  ! -- The string length
  NF90_Status = NF90_DEF_DIM( NC_FileID, &
                              DESCRIPTION_DIMNAME, &
                              PDSL, &
                              PD_StrLen_DimID )

Then I would define the variable itself,

  NF90_Status = NF90_DEF_VAR( NC_FileID, &
                              DESCRIPTION_VARNAME, &
                              NF90_CHAR, &
                              DimIDs = (/ PD_StrLen_DimID, Profile_DimID /), &
                              VarID  = VarID )

In my old files, the description variable appears like so from ncdump:

netcdf UMBC.AtmProfile {
dimensions:
        n_profiles = 48 ;
        pdsl = 512 ;
variables:
        char profile_description(n_profiles, pdsl) ;
                profile_description:long_name = "Description of profile" ;
...etc...

where I've taken into account the difference in dimension ordering
between Fortran and C.

Now, when I run this code linking to the PGI v5.2-1 compiler library,
the NF90_DEF_VAR() function call fails with the error:
  "NC_UNLIMITED in the wrong index"

When I run the code linking to the Lahey lf95 v6.2 compiled library, the
code generates no such error.

I run on linux systems running under Red Hat Enterprise WSE3.0

Does anyone there have any ideas about what could be causing this error
so I can try a work around with the PGI compiler?

cheers,

paulv




--
Paul van Delst
CIMSS @ NOAA/NCEP/EMC