MPLNETThe NASA Micro-Pulse Lidar NetworkNational Aeronautics and
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MPLNET Web Services


The MPLNET project provides the following web services for application programming interfaces (API):

  • Download: download MPLNET data products
  • Plot: plot MPLNET data
  • Metadata: download MPLNET site metadata

    Click on a web service to learn more.


    Download Web Service

    Use of MPLNET data must follow our data policy.

     

    This service provides an API to download MPLNET data files. Please see our Product Information page for more information on our product suite, versions, and levels. To learn more about our file naming conventions click here.

     

    The download web service can be used to download one day of data, or a month. The URL format is:
    https://mplnet.gsfc.nasa.gov/download?version=V&level=L&product=P&site=S&year=YYYY&month=MM&day=DD
    Where V is the version (V2 or V3), L is the level (L1, L15, or L2), P is the product (NRB,CLD,AER,PBL), and S is the site name (ie GSFC).
    To download one day, enter the year, month, and day. To download a month, enter only year and month. Monthly downloads will be provided as zip files.

    The product files can be subsetted to avoid downloading the entire file. Add the following to the URL: var=variable1,variable2,... The available variables for each product can be found on the Product Information page.

    Here is a simple curl example:
    curl 'https://mplnet.gsfc.nasa.gov/download?version=V3&level=L1&product=NRB&site=GSFC&year=2020&month=09&day=01' --remote-name --remote-header-name

    Pay attention to the single quotes and use them as shown to avoid problems from passing special characters. Some characters may require insertion of \ prior the symbol (consult curl docs and your OS/shell).

    Near-Real-Time Download Services:
    We offer NRT download service for special users and modeling/forecasting centers. Please contact MPLNET staff for more information.

     

    Other File Download Options

     

    It is also possible to download data files from our Download Data link on the left side menu. We provide a web-based download tool to download files from one day up to one month, and a link to our Data Portal. The Data Portal is a web interface to our data archive directory and provides manual downloads or automated scripting. The Data Portal URL format is:
    https://mplnet.gsfc.nasa.gov/out/data/V/S/YYYY/MM/DD/filename
    Where V is the version (V2 or V3), and filename is the name of the MPLNET product file desired. Our product filename format is standard:
    filename: MPLNET_V_L_P_YYYYMMDD_I_S.nc4
    Where V is V2 or V3, L is the level (L1, L15, or L2), P is the product (NRB,CLD,AER,PBL), I is the instrument number (MPLXXXXX), and S is the site name (ie GSFC).
    The direct download method requires the user to know if data are available on a given day, else the application used by the user will return an error. In addition, the user must understand our file naming convention and know the instrument number for the site/date. It is possible to design a more complicated curl or wget sequence to obtain our listing for a site/day and then download. This may not be easy for most users, thus we recommend using the download API described above.

    Here is a curl example for the direct downloads:
    curl 'https://mplnet.gsfc.nasa.gov/out/data/V/S/YYYY/MM/DD/filename' --remote-name --remote-header-name

    Pay attention to the single quotes and use them as shown to avoid problems from passing special characters. Some characters may require insertion of \ prior the symbol (consult curl docs and your OS/shell).

     

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