ESEAS Software
Within the ESEAS-RI project, the development of an ESEAS sea level data quality control and management software has been proposed. Most sea level data collecting organizations within ESEAS have developed their own software to validate incoming data in varied formats and media that are specific to their requirements. However, it would benefit the community if there was a platform independent package available, to ensure that there is consistency of quality control for ESEAS tide gauge data. Although this will not be available within the time frame of ESEAS-RI, two developments have taken place. The UK National Tidal and Sea Level Facility have made an on-line tidal analysis facility available here. In addition, a new user friendly WINDOWS based tool, named "TASKS for WINDOWS" has been developed by P18 (IOLR) building on the DOS based, widely used, tide analysis and forecasting software package TASK, developed by a group of scientists at POL (P3). A first version (then named WINTASK) was presented at the ESEAS-RI workshop in Malta (November 2004). Following remarks, comments and suggestions, a second version has been developed, including some significant improvements. This was presented at the second workshop in Split, Croatia (October 2005).
Originally it was intended to develop the TASK software package under WINDOWS by translating the FORTRAN 77 code to a Windows based FORTRAN 90 or C++ compiler. However, finally a more user-friendly version was produced by using the original TASK 2000 executables, preserving all file reading and writing formats, by developing an interface for the software using EXCEL of Microsoft Office 2000 or later and Microsoft Visual Basic. "TASKS for WINDOWS" runs on Windows' 98, Windows 2000 or XP. The software interface operates under the Microsoft EXCEL software, enabling import of data files of a number of formats and export in the format requested as input file by the TASK-2000 software package executables (TIRA for tide data analysis and MARIE for tide forecasting). EXCEL's graphic capabilities enable simple visualization of the input and output data (sea level, tide and residual) and the facility to remove erroneous spikes during the visual inspection.
"TASKS for WINDOWS" together with the TASK software package is available for free download and use by the international scientific sea level community from the MedGLOSS web site upon registration, while for commercial users it is provided from the same address on payment of a fee.
