Available observation converter programs

The DART/observations/obs_converters directory contains a variety of converter programs to read various external formats and convert the observations into the format required by DART.

Each directory has at least one converter:

• AIRS: AIRS and AMSU

• ARVOR: ARVOR (Profiling Floats)

• AURA: See DART/observations/obs_converters/AURA

• Aviso+/CMEMS: Aviso+/CMEMS Observations

• Ameriflux:

  • PROGRAM fluxnetfull_to_obs

  • PROGRAM level4_to_obs

• BATS: BATS

• CHAMP: CHAMP

• cice: PROGRAM cice_to_obs

• CNOFS: See DART/observations/obs_converters/CNOFS

• CONAGUA: CONAGUA

• COSMOS: PROGRAM COSMOS_to_obs

• CrocoLake: CrocoLake

• DWL: PROGRAM dwl_to_obs

• GMI: GMI Brightness Temperatures

• GOES: NOAA GOES-R Series Advanced Baseline Imager (ABI) Level 1b Radiances

• GPSPW: GPSPW

• GRACE: See DART/observations/obs_converters/GRACE

• GSI2DART: GSI2DART

• GTSPP: GTSPP Observations

• HFradar: HF Radar

• IODA: ioda2obsq

• MADIS: MADIS Data Ingest System

• MIDAS: PROGRAM MIDAS_to_obs

• MODIS: PROGRAM MOD15A2_to_obs

• MODIS: PROGRAM MOD29E1D_to_obs

• MPD: See DART/observations/obs_converters/MPD

• NASA_Earthdata: PROGRAMS LPRM_L3_to_obs.f90 AMSR_E_L2_to_obs.f90

• NCEP:

  • (prepbufr -> ascii) PROGRAM prepbufr

  • (ascii -> obs_seq) PROGRAM create_real_obs

• NSIDC: PROGRAM SMAP_L2_to_obs

• ocean color: VIIRS/AQUA Satellite Ocean Color

• ROMS: ROMS observations to DART observation sequences

• SIF: PROGRAM SIF_to_obs_netcdf

• SSEC: SSEC Data Center

• SST: PROGRAM sst_to_obs, oi_sst_to_obs

• SSUSI: SSUSI F16 EDR-DSK format to observation sequence converters

• WOD: WOD Observations

• gnd_gps_vtec: GND GPS VTEC

• GPS: GPS Observations

• ok_mesonet: Oklahoma Mesonet MDF Data

• QuikSCAT: QuikSCAT SeaWinds Data

• Radar: Radar observations

• snow: PROGRAM snow_to_obs

• SVP: SVP

• Text: PROGRAM text_to_obs

• text_GITM: See DART/observations/obs_converters/text_GITM

• tpw: Total Precipitable Water Observations

• Tropical Cyclones: PROGRAM tc_to_obs

• Var (3D/4D): 3DVAR/4DVAR Observation Converters

  • Var (little-r): PROGRAM littler_tf_dart

  • Var (radar): PROGRAM rad_3dvar_to_dart

In addition the following external program produces DART observation sequence files:

• Observation Processing And Wind Synthesis (OPAWS): OPAWS can process NSF NCAR Dorade (sweep) and NSF NCAR EOL Foray (netCDF) radar data. It analyzes (grids) data in either two-dimensions (on the conical surface of each sweep) or three-dimensions (Cartesian). Analyses are output in netCDF, Vis5d, and/or DART (Data Assimilation Research Testbed) formats.

Contact the DART development group if you have observations in a different format that you want to convert. We can give you advice and pointers on how to approach writing the code.

Synthetic observations

For generating synthetic observations, see the documentation for the program create_obs_sequence. You can also generate observation files based on text input. See the documentation for the PROGRAM text_to_obs. Or for simulating a large complex observing system, you can use the DART library routines in a Fortran program to compute the observation information and have the DART routines write the output file.

There are also a couple utilities of note:

• Even Sphere - a utility for generating evenly-spaced observation locations that can then be used in a perfect model experiment.

• Obs Error - modules that specify observation errors based on what is used by ECMWF and NCEP

To learn how to run a model with a set of observations that have only locations, types, and times, and have the forward operators compute the observation values, see the documentation for the program perfect_model_obs.