[netcdfgroup] Allowed characters in variable names?

To: netcdf@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [netcdfgroup] Allowed characters in variable names?
From: Heiko Klein <Heiko.Klein@xxxxxx>
Date: Thu, 12 Aug 2010 13:10:42 +0200

I'm converting some grib data to netcdf. For variable names, I use theshortNames defined in my grib-reader (grib_api), which in some casesstart with numeric characters, e.g. '2t' or '10u'.

This works well with 3.6.2, but when run on another machine (ubuntulucid, netcdf 3.6.3?), I get an error:


NetCDF: Name contains illegal characters

I've seen that some of the variable-name code has been changed in 3.6.3for UTF-8:http://www.unidata.ucar.edu/software/netcdf/docs/faq.html#fv22 but Ihaven't found out if the first character of a variable must bealphabetic (except in a very old user-guide athttp://www.strw.leidenuniv.nl/~sfinx/netcdf9.html)

Are names like '2t' forbidden in netcdf, or is this a bug in 3.6.3, oris this a bug in my program, which just propagates to the netcdf errormessage?




Best regards,

Heiko

Follow-Ups:
- Re: [netcdfgroup] Allowed characters in variable names?
  - From: Russ Rew
- Re: [netcdfgroup] Allowed characters in variable names?
  - From: Dennis Heimbigner
- Re: [netcdfgroup] Allowed characters in variable names?
  - From: Tom Whittaker