McIDAS-X for Win7 Fastrack Version 2017.1
Software and Instructions

This page contains the software and instructions for installing McIDAS-X version 2017.1 on a Windows 7 workstation. If you are installing it on a Linux or Mac OS X workstation, go to the Unix instructions.

McIDAS-X for Win7 version 2017.1 is a fully supported Fastrack release. Significant modifications made since the previous release (version 2016.2) are listed in the bullet list below. The instructions for obtaining and installing McIDAS-X for Win7 2017.1 appear after the bullet list.

• Updated preliminary GOES-R Series ABI server and calibration and navigation modules with bug fixes and enhancements. The enhancements include improved performance, allowing multiband IMGCOPYs of ABI Level 1b imagery, and improved remaps of regions that include the earth limb. See the DSSERVE command documentation in the McIDAS User's Guide or its online help for information about creating GOES-R datasets, and the GOES section in the Bands appendix for information about its spatial and spectral attributes. GOES-16 launched 19 November 2016 and is in extended checkout and validation phase for approximately one year. ABI test data distributed via the GRB service is scheduled to begin 01 March 2017. See the GOES-R Series website for schedule updates and additional information.
• Added preliminary GLM_EVENT.cfg, GLM_FLASH.cfg and GLM_GROUP.cfg data files to use when creating ADDE datasets of GOES-16 Geostationary Lightning Mapper (GLM) netCDF point files for use with the PT* commands. See the "GOES-R Series netCDF Dataset Remarks" section in the DSSERVE command documentation in the McIDAS User's Guide or its online help for information about creating the datasets.
• Updated Himawari servers to support Himawari-9 and to retain correct calibration values of saturated pixels in infrared bands when IMGCOPY is used to create an Area file.
• Set the minimum shared memory segment size to 4 MB for commands run from the Unix prompt or from mcenv. This change fixes a problem where commands run using those methods failed on OS X 10.11 systems. The change ensures that commands will now have a shared memory segment of sufficient size to complete properly on OS X 10.11 and other operating systems.
• Updated the McIDAS-XRD package (which is included in the McIDAS-X installation files) to include two new commands (FRMDIR and PLT_SPC_RPTS) and include a new Python package in the Unix version that can be used to run McIDAS-X commands in a Python environment on Linux and OS X workstations. See the "Python Package" section in the McIDAS-XRD Software page for additional information, including a link to a tutorial with installation instructions, how-to's and an example script. See the Files Included in McIDAS-XRD 2017.1 page for the complete list of software included in McIDAS-XRD.

Before installing Fastrack version 2017.1, make sure you view the complete list of Fastrack 2017.1 Software Changes. Programmers and those who do local code development/modifications need to be especially thorough in reviewing the list of updated modules and descriptions of the changes.

McIDAS-X 2017.1 is a fully supported Fastrack release. This means that the software is fully supported by SSEC, and that each change to the software has been tested on all of the supported workstation configurations. Full system testing will occur at least once on each platform during each calendar year. If you elect to install 2017.1, we ask that you notify the McIDAS Help Desk if you encounter any bugs. Please be sure to mention that you are running version 2017.1.

Also note that if you plan to upgrade to 2017.1 from a version earlier than 2016.2, you must first read and perform any required actions in the release documents for each of the versions you skipped so you know about their major changes and any required actions in the interim. For example, if you are upgrading from version 2015.1 to 2017.1, you must first read and perform any required actions in the release documents for versions 2015.2, 2016.1 and 2016.2. See the past versions page for links to those and other materials from past versions.

 

To obtain and install McIDAS-X and/or McIDAS-XRD 2017.1, complete the following steps.

1. Download (e.g., right-click and select Save option) the following files to the ~mcidas directory on your McIDAS-X for Win7 workstation.
   Note: The installation will fail if the names of the downloaded files do not exactly match those listed below. If your web browser changes the names of the files during download (e.g., mcidas2017.1_win7.tar.gz becomes mcidas2017.1_win7_tar.gz), you must rename the files to those below before installing.

   File name	Size	Description
   mcidas2017.1_win7.sh	20 KB	install/uninstall script
   mcidas2017.1_win7.tar.gz	205 MB	compressed tar file containing binaries, source and data files; compiled version of -X & -XRD is about 745 MB
   mcidas.mcenv	8 KB	environment variables used by McIDAS-X
   mcidas.profile	4 KB	template for creating a .profile file in user accounts that don't have a pre-existing .profile

2. To install McIDAS-X and/or -XRD 2017.1 on your workstation, complete the instructions in the section titled "Installing and Configuring McIDAS-X" in Chapter 1 of the McIDAS User's Guide.