writing ASCII data
NCL's ability to write out ASCII data used to be limited. Previously, the only option available was to use the function asciiwrite, which is restricted to writing ASCII files with one entry per line.With the introduction of the write_matrix function, users can write nicely-formatted integer, float, or double precision two-dimensional (2D) arrays to standard out or to an ASCII file. write_matrix also allows the user to control the format of the written data.
In general, if one wishes to output a 1D time series, asciiwrite should be used. If the user wishes to have control over the format of the written data, or wishes to output 2D arrays, then write_matrix should be used.
Examples of using the two ASCII output functions can be found on their respective documentation pages linked above.