Changes for RSL in IDL v1.0 Released August 1, 2007 * rsl_plotrhi.pro: New. Plots an RHI scan. * rsl_plotsweep.pro: Added keyword BGWHITE to set white background for image. * rsl_plotsweep_from_radar.pro: Added code to call rsl_plotrhi if scan mode is RHI. * rsl_loadcolortable.pro: Removed rsl_colorbar and rsl_plot_colorbar. They have been merged into a single routine in rsl_colorbar.pro. v0.16 Released June 27, 2007 * rsl_nsig_to_radar.pro (nsig_get_ray): Corrected a problem with decompressing two-byte data on big endian machines. v0.15 Released June 18, 2007 * rsl_nsig_to_radar.pro: Modified to handle RHI and to handle Sigmet two-byte data types. Added keyword MAXSWEEPS to specify the maximum number of sweeps to be read from file. Added keyword FIELDS to specify which fields are to be read from file. (read_nsig_into_radar): Removed. Sweep-loop moved into rsl_nsig_to_radar. (nsig_read_ray): Changed name to nsig_get_ray. (nsig_get_ray): Corrected a problem with decompressing one-byte data on big endian machines. * rsl_radar_to_uf.pro and rsl_uf_to_radar.pro: Modified to use Local Use Header to store and retrieve WSR-88D VR azimuth. This is necessary because WSR-88D runs separate scans for DZ and VR at lower elevations, which means that they have different azimuths for a given ray. Thanks go to Pat Kennedy of CSU for discovering this problem and for bringing it to our attention. These routines were also modified to handle RHI. Added a check for empty rays, which occurred with RHI. * rsl_uf_to_radar.pro: Added keyword MAXSWEEPS to specify the maximum number of sweeps to be read from UF file. * rsl_radar_to_uf.pro: Modified to allow selection of fields to be written to UF. FIELDS keyword added for passing string array of field names. * rsl_new_radar.pro: Added new member to radar header (radar.h), named SCAN_MODE. It is a string variable to contain the scan type ('PPI', 'RHI'). * rsl_changefield.pro: New. Provides for changing the field type in a volume header and the sweep headers within volume. * rsl_vslice.pro: New. Retrieve an RHI-like vertical slice of volume scan at the given azimuth. * rsl_which_struct.pro: New. Returns the name of the rsl structure given as argument. * rsl_lassen_to_radar.pro: bug fix: PRF in ray header was off by a factor of 10. * rsl_get_ray_from_sweep.pro: Rewritten to simplify code and to correct a problem with azimuths at 0 and 360 degrees. * rsl_uncompress.pro: Modified to handle multiple line error output from SPAWN. v0.14 Released July 20, 2006 * lassen_to_radar.pro (load_lassen_sweeps): Changed field type for differential reflectivity from DR back to ZD for conformity with RSL. v0.13 Released July 12, 2006 * Added rsl_lassen_to_radar.pro and rsl_read_lassen.pro to read Lassen format data into the Radar structure. * Added rsl_add_volume.pro to add a field to existing radar structure. * rsl_get_volume.pro: if field is not found and it is one of the reflectivity field types (DR or ZD), and the alternative name is present, use that field. For example, if field DR is not found, and ZD is present, use ZD. * rsl_plotsweep.pro: Added keyword "LIKE_FIELD" for the case when the user has created a new field type not recognized by the program. rsl_plotsweep will plot the current data using the same colors and scaling used for the field specified in LIKE_FIELD. Made changes in some variable names to make code more self-documenting. Moved routines rsl_mapcolors and rsl_colorbar to rsl_loadcolortable.pro. * rsl_nsig_to_radar.pro (nsig_sweep_to_radar): Added computations for mean azimuth, taken from nsig_to_radar.c (RSL in C). Added ray number check to prevent reading junk after last ray of sweep. Added ability to handle Signal Quality Index (SQ) field. (rsl_nsig_to_radar): Use date and time from first ray of sweep for radar header. * rsl_loadcolortable.pro: (rsl_mapcolors, rsl_colorbar, rsl_loadcolortable): Added fields SW, DR, KD, RH, and PH. (rsl_mapcolors): changed coloray cast from "fix" to "long" to avoid occasional floating point error messages when a no-data value was converted to short integer. This problem never affected results. Corrected index for VR "rangefolded". Fixed bug where all values were set to rangefolded if Nyquist velocity not specified (fields VR and SW). (rsl_colorbar): Modified colorbar plotting for DZ so that it is now handled by rsl_plot_colorbar as it is for the other fields. (rsl_mapcolors, rsl_colorbar): Moved these routines from rsl_plotsweep.pro to rsl_loadcolortable.pro since all three require modification when a new field is added. * rsl_anyformat_to_radar, rsl_hdf_to_radar, rsl_nsig_to_radar, rsl_uf_to_radar, rsl_wsr88d_to_radar and rsl_lassen_to_radar: Added the keyword "ERROR" to return error flag to the caller of these routines. * rsl_get_ray.pro: Use either sweep or volume as input. Previously, volume was required as in C version, but logically, it makes sense to use sweep. * Improved error checks for rsl_open_radar.pro and rsl_uncompress.pro. uncompress.pro changed to rsl_uncompress.pro. v0.12 Released February 24, 2005 * rsl_hdf_to_radar.pro, rsl_get_numvos.pro: Added error check to handle files that cannot be opened. * rsl_plotsweep.pro: Error correction: In the range computation, range to first gate was being subtracted instead of added. Since the range to gate 1 is usually 0, it took awhile for the problem to show up. Vectorized conversion of cartesian coordinates to longitude/latitude. v0.11 Released December 14, 2004 * rsl_nsig_to_radar: Added a check for nvolumes/nfields > 0. If not, return -1 (no radar). * rsl_plotsweep_from_radar.pro: Added error checking: Check that rsl_get_volume and rsl_get_sweep return with valid structure. v0.10 Released December 13, 2004 * rsl_plotsweep.pro (map_colors, rsl_plotsweep): added code to skip bad rays (nbins eq 0) that were turning up in NPOL data. v0.9 Released December 8, 2004 * rsl_anyformat_to_radar: Added optional error handler: It allows functions to return with -1 on IDL errors that would normally stop processing. * Added QUIET keyword to the following: rsl_anyformat_to_radar.pro rsl_hdf_to_radar rsl_nsig_to_radar.pro rsl_uf_to_radar.pro rsl_wsr88d_to_radar.pro * rsl_plotsweep.pro: Added field ZT (same as DZ). * rsl_nsig_to_radar (nsig_sweep_to_radar): Added a check for valid Raw Product structure ID in order to catch occasional bad data in NPOL files. If invalid ID is found, processing stops on current file and radar structure is returned containing the data processed to the point of error. (nsig_read_ray): Separated nsig_ray structure definition from data assignment to improve readability. (rsl_nsig_to_radar): fixed a bug in which value scaling was inadvertently dependent on a conditional for byte swapping. Renamed internal functions with prefix "nsig_". * Renamed open_radar_file to rsl_open_radar_file and did the same in its callers. v0.8 Released November 22, 2004 * uncompress.pro: Replaced call to obsolete "rstrpos" with "strpos/REVERSE_SEARCH". Removed check for "gzip" with spawn/capture because it can falsely claim "gzip not found" with older versions that print to stderr instead of stdout. v0.7 Released November 18, 2004 * rsl_hdf_to_radar.pro (load_data_from_hdf): Fixed a bug that occurred in CZ processing when all data in a ray was masked. * rsl_plotsweep.pro (rsl_mapcolors, rsl_colorbar): Added CZ field (same as DZ). * rsl_loadcolortable.pro: Added CZ field (same as DZ). v0.6 Released November 16, 2004 * rsl_wsr88d_to_radar.pro: Made sweep processing more robust to handle new Volume Coverage Patterns. This involved changing the way sweeps are handled so that it is no longer necessary to know in advance the number of sweeps per elevation of a particular VCP. Added information for new VCPs 12 and 121. * rsl_radar_to_uf.pro: Modified to handle WSR-88D's multiple sweeps per elevation at low elevations. * rsl_plotsweep.pro: Generalized to handle additional fields. Added routines rsl_mapcolors and rsl_colorbar. * rsl_loadcolortable.pro: Added color table for velocity (VR). This function was formerly named loadcolortable.pro. v0.5 Released October 25, 2004 * rsl_get_ray_from_sweep.pro: Fixed a bug which resulted in failure to find requested azimuth if it was near endpoints of sweep, that is, azimuth 0 or 360. v0.4 Released October 5, 2004 * rsl_anyformat_to_radar.pro (rsl_filetype), rsl_wsr88d_to_radar.pro: Modified to handle new NEXRAD Level II Build 5 format. * is_compressed.pro: Check for gzip magic number in addition to file extension. * wsr88d_locations.pro: Simplified array assignment. v0.3 Released August 12, 2004 * rsl_uf_to_radar.pro (read_uf_record): Fixed a bug that caused unnecessary byteswapping of strings on Mac. v0.2 Released July 14, 2004 * Bug fix: Restored keyword SWEEP_INDEX to rsl_get_sweep.pro so that it would again work correctly with rsl_plotsweep_from_radar. v0.1 Released June 17, 2004 * First release.