• Color tables
• The data chooser user interface
• The derived quantities and formulas
• Jython libraries
• Display defaults for parameters
• Parameter aliases
• Help tips
• Projections
• Available data sources
• Available displays
• Where the favorite bundles are
• Maps
• Station models

By default the IDV looks in three places for the resources it uses to configure itself:

• User path. This is the ~user/.unidata/idv/<Application name> directory that gets created for each user. Note: the "Application name" is usually "DefaultIdv"
• Site path. This is the file directory or URL directory that can be defined as a command line argument, -sitepath, or through the user preferences dialog.
• System path. This is a directory, /ucar/unidata/idv/resources, in the system Java jar files.

idv.properties = %SITEPATH%/idv.properties;%USERPATH%/idv.properties;

-properties your_properties_file

Once the properties have been processed the IDV initializes its resources by reading in one or more resource definition files. We call these files "RBI" files - (Resource Bundle for the IDV). These are XML files, the locations of which are defined by the idv.resourcefiles property:

idv.resourcefiles=%USERPATH%/idv.rbi;%SITEPATH%/idv.rbi;%IDVPATH%/idv.rbi

These RBI files define the location of different collections of resources. For example, from the system RBI file, idv.rbi, we have the entry that defines where the IDV can find the XML files that define the color tables:

  <resources name="idv.resource.colortables">
    <resource location="%USERPATH%/colortables.xml"/>
    <resource location="%SITEPATH%/colortables.xml"/>
    <resource location="%IDVPATH%/colortables.xml"/>
  </resources>

Note: as a further complexity, errr, convenience, if there is a property defined in the properties file which is the resource name than the IDV just uses the value of the property (it treats it as a semi-colon delimited list of paths) as the resources and ignores the resources in the RBI file. So, for example, if you had a property:

idv.resource.colortables=%USERPATH%/colortables.xml;http://yourwebsite.edu/specialtables.xml

Using the RBI file, what are the set of steps you need to take to configure your site to use a set of special color tables that you have created. What you would do is bring up the IDV. Create the color tables. They would get saved off in your local .unidata/idv/DefaultIdv directory in the file colortables.xml (as defined by the resource paths defined in the default RBI). You could simply copy that file to an area on your web site or on a shared file system that is pointed to by the IDV sitepath. Now, your users simply need to define the sitepath and they will naturally pick up the color tables you have created.

Most site configuration can be accomplished through the default user/site/system resource locations. However, you can modify the RBI file to include other resources. For example, you could add in an entry:

 <resource location="http://yourwebsite.edu/specialcolortables.xml"/>

Unidata's Integrated Data Viewer > Miscellaneous