While Grid Translator can be used to view the pre-stored images of the elevation and data-density grids, it can not be used to display the grids, such as those shown in Figure 5 below. For this purpose, a MS Windows an Linux-x86 application called Hydro-Plot is included on the CD/DVD. Hydro-Plot provides an interface for displaying both the elevation grids and the data-density grids as either color images or contour plots. Hydro-Plot works with the 1° x 1° grids or custom-sized grids, the only limitation is that the grids must be in the NGDC format. Hydro-Plot can read grid files with both LittleEndian and BigEndian byte order integer.
Working with Hydro-Plot, the user can display a grid in its entirety, or interactively zoom in to view close-ups of areas within the grid. The color table for the grid image may be changed as can the depth range over which the color table is applied. As the mouse is moved across the image of the grid, Hydro-Plot continuously displays the latitude and longitude of the mouse location within the grid area. If the mouse is clicked in the grid image, then Hydro-Plot also displays the row and column number of the grid cell underlying the mouse, as well as the grid cell elevation. Like Grid Translator, Hydro-Plot presently can only be run in MS Windows. Solutions for UNIX Xwindows users are being developed, and will be made available through NGDC Marine Geology and Geophysics bathymetry web page: www.ngdc.noaa.gov/mgg/coastal/
