Add new guide on netCDF file format (#24)

* New guide on netCDF file format. Additional content needed

* Add hyperlinks

* Minor edits to provide some clarity. Still needs an introduction for each section

* Add guide to read the docs. Incorporate feedback from PR

docs/source/_static/data_management/file_formats/index.rst

@@ -0,0 +1,8 @@
+File Formats
+============
+
+
+.. toctree::
+   :maxdepth: 1
+
+   netcdf.md

docs/source/_static/data_management/file_formats/netcdf.md

@@ -0,0 +1,112 @@
+# NetCDF
+>**Warning**
+> This guide needs additional information
+
+NetCDF (Network Common Data Form), is a file format that stores scientific data in arrays. Array values may be accessed
+directly, without knowing how the data are stored, and metadata information may be stored with the data.
+
+* Binary file format commonly used for scientific data
+* Self-describing, includes metadata
+* Multi-dimensional array data model
+
+The [netCDF data model](https://docs.unidata.ucar.edu/netcdf-c/current/netcdf_data_model.html) consists of the following:
+* variable
+  * Multi-dimensional array
+  * Column-oriented: each variable as a separate entity
+* dimension
+  * Usually temporal, spatial, spectral, ...
+  * Can be unlimited length. One, at most, is recommended for a growing time dimension
+* attribute
+  * Metadata: global and variable level
+* group
+  * Akin to directories
+  * Avoid unless you really need the complex structure
+
+
+## Why use NetCDF
+NetCDF is a file format commonly used at LASP as it is the "highly preferred" format for NASA Earth Observing System
+Data and Information System data products, per their Data Product Development Guide for Data Producers.
+This affects all NASA Earth Science missions.
+
+NetCDF features:
+* Self-describing
+  * structure captures coordinate system (functional relationship)
+  * includes metadata
+* Efficient storage
+  * packing
+  * compression
+* Efficient access
+  * chunking
+  * http byte range
+  * parallel IO
+* Open specification (unlike IDL save files)
+
+## Options available
+There are two netCDF data models:
+* NetCDF-3 classic
+* NetCDF-4 built on HDF5
+  * recommended but prefer classic constructs
+
+## How to use this data format
+
+#### NetCDF Files
+* Binary format with open specification
+* Requires software libraries to read and write C, Fortran, Java, python, IDL, ...
+* Internal compression, don't bother to compress NetCDF files externally
+* HTTP byte range requests
+* Parallel IO
+* nc file extension
+* Don't be afraid of big files
+
+#### Coordinate System
+* Dimensions should be used to define a coordinate system
+  * e.g. temporal, spatial, spectral
+  * Avoid using dimensions to group data
+  * Think "functional relationship". Each independent variable should represent a dimension.
+* coordinate variable
+  * 1D variable with dimension of the same name
+  * strictly monotonic (ordered)
+  * no missing values
+  * Independent variable of functional relationship
+  * Every dimension should have one
+* shared dimensions
+  * Each variable should reuse dimensions to indicate that they share the same coordinates (domain set)
+
+#### Time as Coordinate Variable
+* If the data are a function of a single time dimension then there should be a single time variable
+  * avoid breaking time up by date and time of day
+* Prefer numeric time units
+  * time unit since an epoch
+  * e.g. "seconds since 1970-01-01", "microseconds since 1980-01-06"
+
+#### Metadata
+* Optional but useful to make NetCDF file self-describing
+* attribute
+  * global (dataset level)
+    * title
+    * history (provenance)
+  * variable
+    * long_name
+    * units
+* Conventions
+  * [Climate and Forecast (CF)](https://cfconventions.org/Data/cf-conventions/cf-conventions-1.8/cf-conventions.html)
+  * [Attribute Convention for Data Discovery (ACDD)](https://wiki.esipfed.org/Attribute_Convention_for_Data_Discovery_1-3)
+  * [udunits](https://www.unidata.ucar.edu/software/udunits/): standard units
+
+#### Other useful variable attributes
+* _FillValue
+  * missing_value is considered deprecated and is not recommended by the NetCDF Users Group.
+  * NaN is another option, however, NaNs in files are handled differently in every language and so it may
+  be better to pick a value for official data products that many users will be using
+* valid_range, valid_min, valid_max
+* scale_factor, add_offset (packed values)
+* [cell_methods](https://cfconventions.org/Data/cf-conventions/cf-conventions-1.8/cf-conventions.html#_data_representative_of_cells): standards for representing data cells (bins)
+  * e.g. daily average, wavelength bins
+
+## Useful Links
+* [NetCDF User's Guide](https://docs.unidata.ucar.edu/nug/current/)
+* [NetCDF ToolsUI](https://docs.unidata.ucar.edu/netcdf-java/current/userguide/toolsui_ref.html)
+* [NetCDF Workshop Materials](https://www.unidata.ucar.edu/software/netcdf/workshops/2011/index.html)
+
+
+Credit: Content taken from a Confluence guide written by Doug Lindholm

docs/source/_static/data_management/index.rst

@@ -0,0 +1,8 @@
+Data Management
+===============
+
+
+.. toctree::
+   :maxdepth: 1
+
+   file_formats/index

docs/source/index.rst

@@ -7,3 +7,4 @@ Welcome to the LASP Developer's Guide!
    :maxdepth: 1
 
    licensing
+   data_management/index