Open Source IDL Formats and Protocols

EBF, which stands for Efficient Binary Format, is a binary file format for reading and writing binary data easily. Reading writing routines are currently available in C,C++,Fortran,Java, Python, IDL, MATLAB. A program called ebftkpy which has a set of utility functions to work with the .ebf files , e.g., viewing the contents and getting a summary, is also provided. The EBF specification is designed to be concise and easy to understand to make it easier for others to write their own code if needed. It is also designed to simplify the programming of input output routines in different programming languages. In a nutshell an EBF file is a collection of data objects. Each data object is specified by a unique name and a single file can have multiple data objects. Each data object is preceded by a meta-data or header which describes the binary data associated with it. Among other things, this header allows the files to be portable across systems with different endianess.

Mole is a project started in 2008, designed for allowing users to easily share all kinds of ressources. It is planned to be used as a Mozilla Firefox extension.

APEX Tools is a collection of utilities used in conjunction with the processing of airborne hyperspectral data developed for the ESA-Prodex supported Airborne Prism EXperiment (APEX).

IDL specified API for manipulating and processing CellML 1.0 and 1.1. Includes C++ implementation. Accessible from a C++ program, or from any language for which a CORBA language mapping is available Also, a Java wrapper of the API is available.

A library of tools and API (C++ and Python) for the storage and processing of large 3D laser scanning (LiDAR, ALS, TLS) datasets using a pulse based spatially indexed file format (SPD) which support for both discrete return and full waveform datasets. Code has moved to https://bitbucket.org/petebunting/spdlib

Provides an API, which enables the Interactive Data Language (IDL) user (and developer) to incorporate Space Weather data and metadata resources from the Space Physics Interactive Data Resource (SPIDR) directly into an IDL application. Examples included.

ESML is an interchange technology that utilizes external metadata to allow applications to plug and play seamlessly with Earth Science specific datasets in heterogeneous formats.