GRID
(Grid File) A file format used by SURFER (Golden Software) to store single precision floating point data with 3 coordinates of information (X, Y and Z). The file is a binary file and may be read from VB, FORTRAN, C or Pascal. A grid file always has the extension ".GRD". The format (v. 6 Surfer) is as follows :
cdum a 4 byte string containing the characters 'DSBB' (not null terminated)
ixgrid, iygrid two integer*2 values containing the grid density
xmin, xmax two real*8 values containing the X data minimum and maximum
ymin, ymax two real*8 values containing the Y data minimum and maximum
zmin, zmax two real*8 values containing the Z data minimum and maximum
data ixgrid * iygrid real*4 values containing the Z data values
Starting with Surfer 7, a new GRD file format is utilized which is also supported by Probe for EPMA and Probe Image (a full featured image acquisition and analysis application available from Probe Software). The older grid file format used by Surfer 6 and under is supported by Probe for EPMA for output but not by Probe Image. See the PROBEWIN.INI file parameter "SurferOutputVersionNumber" in the [software] section to define the version of the GRID file format for PFE.