pydata / pydata/xarray

Append along an unlimited dimension to an existing netCDF file

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API design contrib-help-wanted topic-backends
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Description

This would be a nice feature to have for some use cases, e.g., for writing simulation time-steps:
https://stackoverflow.com/questions/46951981/create-and-write-xarray-dataarray-to-netcdf-in-chunks

It should be relatively straightforward to add, too, building on support for writing files with unlimited dimensions. User facing API would probably be a new keyword argument to to_netcdf(), e.g., extend='time' to indicate the extended dimension.

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Research direction

Start with the existing support for writing files with unlimited dimensions and the to_netcdf() API, then review the linked Stack Overflow use case for chunked simulation time-step writes. Done means an existing netCDF file can be extended along a selected dimension, such as time, through the proposed API.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Assessment

Tech stack
python
Domain
data
Issue type
Feature
Difficulty
4/5
Estimated time
3-5 days
Activity status
Stale
Clarity
Mostly clear
Newbie friendliness
35/100

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