On February 11, 2004, the Argo DACs (data assembly centers) and GDACs (global data centers) converted all data files to new NetCDF file formats, version 2.01 .
The new formats address several shortcomings identified in the current file formats and were approved by the Argo Data Management Team at its annual meeting in November 2003.

The files in the old format, are still available for download for a few days following the transition at:

	US GDAC: ftp://usgodae1.fnmoc.navy.mil/pub/outgoing/argo-old
	French GDAC: ftp://ftp.ifremer.fr/ifremer/argo/argo-old

Documentation on the new file formats, example files and example NetCDF CDL (text) files :

	Argo user's manual describes the new data format ;
	Argo profile example ;
	Argo trajectory example ;
	Argo meta-data example ;
	Argo technical data example.

All of the files on both GDAC sites will be updated to the new format on this date. Access to the real-time data may be interrupted during the transition on this date (the GTS distribution of data will be unaffected).