Re: scientific plotting applications in VisAD

• To: "Tommy E. Cathey" <cathey.tommy@xxxxxxx>
• Subject: Re: scientific plotting applications in VisAD
• From: Don Murray <dmurray@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
• Date: Tue, 09 Apr 2002 15:26:12 -0600

Tommy-

"Tommy E. Cathey" wrote:
> 
> Bill and/or colleagues,
> 
> As a contractor in EPA's National Environmental Supercomputing
> Center, NESC, I have been tasked to survey the Internet
> for available 2-D/3-D scientific plotting applications for possible
> integration into the EPA's Multimedia Integrated Modeling System,
> MIMS.
> 
> Some of the requirements for this application include the following:
> -run under Win32 and Linux
> -open source
> -extensible with user defined routines
> -license which would allow the EPA to distribute it to all MIMS users
> -GUI interface (batch processing is also highly desired)
> -WYSIWYG
> -basic 2-D plots such as
> ---line, scatter,  histograms, bar, box, log,
> ---contour, vector, mesh, polar, and function plots
> -some 3-D plots such as bar, dot plots (not required at this time)
> -image manipulation (zoom, rotate, translate)
> -edit data in separate window
> -fully configurable layout including symbols, color, labels, axes
> -publication grade output
> -statistics would be nice to have
> 
> Grace, SciGraphica, Java Analysis Studio among other applications
> have been examined.  While Grace has many of the desired features
> the Windows port of Grace is not satisfactory and requires an X-server
> 
> which is not likely to be part of the MIMS distribution. Other
> applications
> have lacked the desired features. Thus the search has broadened to
> include
> Java toolkits such as VisAD and Scientific Graphics Toolkit.
> 
> Does anyone know of an application developed in VisAD which might
> fit EPA's needs? Or is there anyone who has started development on
> such an
> application who would be willing to collaborate with the NESC staff
> in such an endeavor? How difficult would it be in time and effort for
> the average programmer who is not familiar with VisAD to develop such
> an application?
> 
> Thanks in advance for comments and consideration.

As Bill mentioned, Unidata is using VisAD as the underpinnings
of it's MetApps project, which is developing tools for the
atmospheric science community for education and research.
A description of the project is available at:

http://www.unidata.ucar.edu/projects/metapps

Our current development is focused on the Integrated Data Viewer
(IDV) which allows display and analysis of gridded model output
and satellite and radar imagery.  The IDV can be downloaded now
through WebStart from the Software/Download link on the page 
above. 

We are looking for collaborators to provide input and code 
to the effort.  If you are interested in pursuing this further,
please contact me (dmurray@xxxxxxxx).

Don
*************************************************************
Don Murray                               UCAR Unidata Program
dmurray@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx                        P.O. Box 3000
(303) 497-8628                              Boulder, CO 80307
http://www.unidata.ucar.edu/staff/donm
*************************************************************

• References:
  • scientific plotting applications in VisAD
    • From: Tommy E. Cathey