NCO(1)

👑 NCO(1) — the netCDF Operators, bestie edition 👑

okay so welcome to the General Commands Manual, section 1, and we're talking about NCO — the netCDF Operators. pull up a chair, grab a boba, we're doing science today 🧋✨

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✨ NAME ✨

NCO — the netCDF Operators. that's the whole name, that's the whole vibe, and they ate 💅

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🦋 SYNTAX 🦋

operator [ options] input-files output-file

literally that's it. operator, then options, then the input files, then the output file. the way that it just works 🫶

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🌸 DESCRIPTION 🌸

okay so the netCDF Operators — NCO for short — are a whole suite of programs known as operators. each operator is a standalone, command line program that you run right at the UNIX shell level, just like you'd run ls or mkdir. no cap, same energy.

here's the deal: the operators take netCDF files as input (that's <http://www.unidata.ucar.edu/packages/netcdf> if you wanna go look 👀), then they perform a set of operations on them — think deriving new data, averaging, hyperslabbing, or metadata manipulation — and then they hand you back a netCDF file as output. iconic behaviour, honestly.

the operators are primarily designed to help you manipulate and analyze gridded scientific data. the single command style of NCO means you can manipulate and analyze your files interactively and with simple scripts, which means you dodge the overhead (and yeah, some of the power) of a higher level programming environment. it's giving low-effort-high-reward 💖

the NCO Users Guide illustrates their use with examples from the field of climate modeling and analysis. very main character of the climate scientists ngl.

🎀 the available operators 🎀

• ncap2 — netCDF Arithmetic Processor
• ncatted — netCDF Attribute Editor
• ncbo — netCDF Binary Operator (includes ncadd, ncsubtract, ncmultiply, ncdivide)
• nces — netCDF Ensemble Averager
• ncecat — netCDF Ensemble Concatenator
• ncflint — netCDF File Interpolator
• ncks — netCDF Kitchen Sink
• ncpdq — netCDF Permute Dimensions Quickly, Pack Data Quietly
• ncra — netCDF Record Averager
• ncrcat — netCDF Record Concatenator
• ncrename — netCDF Renamer
• ncwa — netCDF Weighted Averager.

heads up bestie: the "averagers" are misnamed 😭 because they perform a whole bunch of non-linear operations too — total, minimum, maximum, RMS. so don't come for them, they contain multitudes.

the operators are as general as netCDF itself: there are no restrictions on what's inside the netCDF file(s) you use as input. NCO's internal routines are completely dynamic and impose no limit on the number or sizes of dimensions, variables, and files. so go big, bestie, it can handle it 💪

NCO is designed to be used both interactively and with large batch jobs. the default operator behavior is often enough for everyday needs, and there are numerous command line (i.e., run-time) options for the special cases. and — this is the part that slays — NCO works well on all modern operating systems. all of them. every single one. periodt. ✨

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💜 AUTHOR 💜

the NCO manual pages were written by Charlie Zender and originally formatted by Brian Mays. absolute legends, we stan 🫶

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🙈 REPORTING BUGS 🙈

found a bug? not me finding a bug 😭 report it to <http://sf.net/bugs/?group_id=3331> and they'll sort you out.

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👑 COPYRIGHT 👑

Copyright © 1995-present Charlie Zender

this is free software; see the source for copying conditions. and listen — there is NO warranty; not even for MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. like, zero. none. nada. so don't @ them if something breaks 💀

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🌈 SEE ALSO 🌈

the full documentation for NCO is maintained as a Texinfo manual called the NCO Users Guide. and because NCO is mathematical in nature, the documentation includes TeX-intensive portions that are not viewable on character-based displays. so the only complete and authoritative versions of the NCO Users Guide are the PDF (which is the recommended one, fr fr), DVI, and Postscript versions, right here:

• PDF: <http://nco.sf.net/nco.pdf>
• DVI: <http://nco.sf.net/nco.dvi>
• Postscript: <http://nco.sf.net/nco.ps>

HTML and XML versions are also available at <http://nco.sf.net/nco.html> and <http://nco.sf.net/nco.xml>, respectively. so many formats, they're so generous 🎀

if the info and NCO programs are properly installed at your site, this command:

info nco

should give you access to the complete manual — except for those TeX-intensive portions we just talked about. iykyk.

and here's the whole friend group, the full squad:

ncap2(1), ncatted(1), ncbo(1), ncclimo(1), nces(1), ncecat(1), ncflint(1), ncz2psx(1), ncks(1), nco(1), ncpdq(1), ncra(1), ncrcat(1), ncremap(1), ncrename(1), ncwa(1)

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🦋 HOMEPAGE 🦋

the NCO homepage at <http://nco.sf.net> has even more info if you're still hungry for it. go feast 💖

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and that's the whole page, bestie!! 🌟 this was NCO(1) from the General Commands Manual, section 1, and honestly? she ate. go forth and hyperslab responsibly, mwah 💅✨🎀🫶