Extending THREDDS middleware to serve OGC community

The netCDF data model [1] is very popular among scientists in the Earth sciences community. The Open Geospatial Consortium's Web Coverage Service (WCS) [2] can be used to dispatch netCDF datasets via standard protocols to client applications use by a variety of user groups: the scientific digital library community, the GIS community, as well as the broader Earth science research and education community. All these potential user groups benefit by having netCDF as one form of coverage supported by WCS. Among the main reasons for bringing the two together are: o The netCDF is one of the most commonly used forms for accessing the output of weather and climate forecast models. The output of these models is different from many of the other datasets currently supported by in the GIS community. These datasets represent several parameters (e.g., temperature, pressure, wind speed and direction) that vary in three spatial dimensions and involve two distinct time scales (model run time and forecast times). o The netCDF interface is evolving in a direction that supports access to many different file formats via several different client/server protocols (e.g., OPeNDAP, HDF5, and ADDE) that are already established in the atmospheric and ocean sciences data provider community.