NetCDF (network Common Data Form) is an interface for
array-oriented data access and a library that provides an
implementation of the interface. The netCDF library also defines a
machine-independent format for representing scientific data. Together,
the interface, library, and format support the creation, access, and
sharing of scientific data.
One of the best things with netCDF-files is the
possibility to graphically display them with the help of "ncview". This
nice and free software is easily installed and provides are really fast
way of "having a look" at GOTM results, for example time series and
vertical profiles of variables.
A nice and, at least for non-commercial use, free
Fortran 90 compiler is "ifort" from Intel. It produces the fasted
executing code among all other Fortran compilers we have checked.
"Make" is a tool which controls the generation of
executables and other non-source files of a program from the program's
source files. Make gets its knowledge of how to build your program from
a file called the "makefile", which lists each of the non-source files
and how to compute it from other files. GOTM relies on these makefiles.
Unfortunately, the platform-specific implementations of "make" can be
quite different. Therefore, we require that users implement the freely
available "GNU make" that can be compiled for almost all platforms and
thus provides a certain standard.
