[netcdfgroup] scale and offset support for netcdf-4

• To: "netcdfgroup@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx" <netcdfgroup@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
• Subject: [netcdfgroup] scale and offset support for netcdf-4
• From: "dmh@xxxxxxxx" <dmh@xxxxxxxx>
• Date: Sun, 30 Jul 2017 15:22:59 -0600

Periodically, we see requests for support for scale+offset
representation of variables. It belatedly occurs to me
that this is a form of compression. Since netcdf-4 will
support hdf5 dynamically loaded compression filters,
we could use that mechanism to support scale+offset
representations. Is there a description of the proper
way to convert a number (float/double?) to scale+offset
and the inverse? There are CF conventions for this, I believe.
=Dennis Heimbigner
 Unidata