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Open-File Report 2014–1159


Coastal Change Processes Project Data Report for Observations Near Fire Island, New York, January to April 2012


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Data-File Identifiers

Data-File Identifiers

A three-digit mooring number is used to identify all files containing time-series data and is the key through which one can identify and (or) locate data records in the USGS Woods Hole Science Center time-series data-management system. Individual data files are labeled by four-digit numbers; the first three digits are the mooring number, and the last digit indicates the location of the instrument on the mooring. For example, 5541 identifies the topmost instrument on mooring 554, 5542 the next instrument down on mooring 554, and so on. As data files are processed, additional identifiers are added to the four-digit identifier to indicate sensors, processing steps, and averaging. A full description of the file naming conventions can be found in Montgomery and others (2008).

Time-Series Oceanographic Observations

The time-series data for the deployment at the basic sampling interval are included as individual files. The data format is the EPIC NetCDF standard defined by the NOAA Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory (PMEL). NetCDF is a very general, self-documenting, machine-transportable data format created and supported by UCAR ( http://www.unidata.ucar.edu/software/netcdf/). EPIC ( http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/epic/) is a set of standards that allow researchers from different organizations to share oceanographic data without having to translate "foreign" data types into the local vernacular.

The naming convention for NetCDF data files is as follows:

Table 2. Nomenclature summary using 9241whp-a.nc as an example, for time series data files. [A description of variable names within files can be found in Montgomery and others (2008). ID, identification number or identifier. ]

Mooring ID Relative position on platform Instrument identifier Sampling scheme (optional) Data type (optional) Version File extension
924 First three digits identify a unique mooring or tripod number.
  1 Relative position, where 1 is the top instrument
    aw Nortek acoustic wave and current profiler water flow data
    awwvs Nortek acoustic wave and current profiler wave data
    adc Teledyne RD Instruments acoustic Doppler current profiler water flow data
    wh Teledyne RD Instruments acoustic Doppler current profiler water flow data (older name)
    whp Teledyne RD Instruments acoustic Doppler current profiler wave data (older name)
    adv Sontek acoustic Doppler velocimeter and associated sensors
    pc Sontek pulse-coherent acoustic Doppler profiler and accessory sensors
    abs Acoustic backscatter sensor
    lisst Laser in Situ Suspended Scattering and Transmissometry
    pencil Imagenex Rotating Sonar pencil beam
    fan Imagenex Rotating Sonar fan beam
    mc Microcat temperature and salinity logger
    sc Seacat temperature and salinity logger
    met meteorological station
    sg Sea-Bird Seagauge
      1 First sampling scheme when multiple schemes are used
      2 Second sampling scheme when multiple schemes are used
        b Burst data (for instruments with burst and statistics files)
        s Statistics of the bursts (for instruments with burst data)
          -a USGS best basic version
          -cal Provisional
            .nc NetCDF file extension
            .cdf NetCDF file extension

Description of variable names within files (Montgomery and others ,2008)

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