Earthdata Forum

It is said "Aqua MODIS Global Binned Chlorophyll (CHL) Data, version R2022.0" has a netCDF4 (.nc) format. I am using a large amount of your other spatial datasets which have a ".nc". format. I can normally load those data into ArcGIS (ArcMap) by using its "Multidimension Tools". However, I am not able to do the same with the dataset "Aqua MODIS Global Binned Chlorophyll (CHL) Data, version R2022.0". The "Make NetCDF Raster Layer" tool in the tools box "Multidimension Tools" doesn't show anything for "Variable", X Dimension, Y dimension and other fields after I inputed a CHL data file downloaded.
Greatly appreciated if you could spare some clues.
Dr Tingbao Xu, from the Australian National University, Australia

So you are accessing the data via the OPeNDAP server: https://oceandata.sci.gsfc.nasa.gov/opendap/ ?

Tommy

tingbao2015 wrote: ↑Wed May 03, 2023 1:15 am America/New_York It is said "Aqua MODIS Global Binned Chlorophyll (CHL) Data, version R2022.0" has a netCDF4 (.nc) format. I am using a large amount of your other spatial datasets which have a ".nc". format. I can normally load those data into ArcGIS (ArcMap) by using its "Multidimension Tools". However, I am not able to do the same with the dataset "Aqua MODIS Global Binned Chlorophyll (CHL) Data, version R2022.0". The "Make NetCDF Raster Layer" tool in the tools box "Multidimension Tools" doesn't show anything for "Variable", X Dimension, Y dimension and other fields after I inputed a CHL data file downloaded.

ArcGIS is built around 2-D arrays (matrices). The level-3 binned data is not stored as 2-D arrays, and conversion to 2-D arrays is rather delicate. Binned data ameliorate some of the statistical problems created by mapping. For some computations it is better to use binned data and visualize the results after mapping the binned data to georeferenced array form. NASA's OCSSW mapgen program.

Dear Tommy and gnwiii,
Many thanks for your prompt response!
I normally use "EarthData Search" to download your data. One of my student used "https://oceancolor.gsfc.nasa.gov/l3/order/".
I have been using ArcGIS almost since it was born, and hope to have the data with a format that can be opened in ArcGIS. I am sure there should be some tools that can be used to convert the "3-D" binned data into 2-D. If you can recommend one, I will certainly save a lot of browsing time.
Regards,
Tingbao

The binned file format is not a raster format and cannot be read by GIS tools...it's also not a 3D product, rather it is essentially spreadsheet... it's complicated . However, the mapped product that we distribute (which are generate from the binned product) are 2D rasters that can be loaded into GIS programs (I don't have ArcGIS, but I know QGIS can open it so ArcGIS should have no trouble). The filenames have L3m instead of L3b. The current mapped products are one variable per file (the format does not limit it to one, it's just how we currently distribute the data), so the variable name is included in the filename.

Sean