This icon is a plotting specification for cross-section plots. It specifies the coordinates of the transect line and the axis details as well as the plot positioning in the plot frame of the display window / paper sheet and the overlay of different data units in the same plot. This icon allows to create a cross-section plot directly from a suitable (multi-level) data unit without resorting to the use of the Cross Section Data application icon. A few input parameters are common to both icons. It is used for visualisation purpose only since the output values (e.g. the netCDF file) are computed and used internally (not available to the user). To understand how this works please see "The View Concept in Visualisation" on page I- 65. Here and in the chapter "Views and Visualisation" on page I- 86 you can find further details on the role and usage of view icons in the visualisation process. The macro language equivalent is mxsectview().
This icon derives (and returns) a vertical cross section data unit of upper air fields along a specified arbitrary transect line. For each upper air field, point values are interpolated along the transect line, with a spacing consistent with the resolution of the input GRIB data. The cross section data can be plotted or saved as a NetCDF data file. A related icon, Cross Section View is used to provide cross section plotting specifications. You can use it to visualise a cross-section without explicitly deriving the cross-section data - see Views. The macro language equivalent is mcross_sect(). | 