CoastWatch Utilities

The CoastWatch Utilities (CWUtils) are software tools designed to help users work with NOAA/NESDIS CoastWatch satellite data—especially because these scientific data files aren’t meant to be opened in standard image viewers.

What CoastWatch Utilities includes

CWUtils provides both: - Graphical tools for interactive exploration - Command-line tools for scripting and repeatable processing workflows

The tools commonly support workflows like: - Information and statistics (inspect file contents, compute summary stats) - Data processing (format conversions, compositing, variable math, sampling) - Graphics and visualization (interactive visualization + batch rendering) - Registration and navigation (resampling between projections; navigation correction)

Getting CoastWatch Utilities

CWUtils is available for Windows, macOS, and Linux. The User’s Guide notes (minimum recommendations): ~400 MB disk (1 GB recommended total workspace) and 4 GB RAM.

To download, the guide directs users to the CoastWatch site and to look for CoastWatch Utilities under Data Tools (or search “utilities”).

CoastWatch Utilities Online Course

The CoastWatch Utilities Online Course is about using the CoastWatch Utilities software package to help with processing satellite imagery and derived data products. The course covers working with data files (i) visually using a graphical user interface, and (ii) by typing commands at the Unix or Windows command prompts. No programming experience is needed, though it can be helpful when automating data processing.