Simple instructions for translating binary data to grd/netcdf file (courtesy of J.Konter):

1. Grab whatever file you need from the ftp site and type unzip at the command line.

2. Below is a bash script to translate any srtm tile into a grd file (assuming you call it proc_srtm.cmd you'd run it like this):

prompt:> proc_srtm.cmd s03e152.hgt

#!/bin/bash
# first translate the binary data into a grid:
# get the coordinates:
w=`echo $1 | sed 's/.hgt//' | sed 's/S/-/' | sed 's/W/ -/' |\
	sed 's/N//' | sed 's/E/ /' | awk '{print $2}'`
e=`expr $w + 1`
s=`echo $1 | sed 's/.hgt//' | sed 's/S/-/' | sed 's/W/ -/' |\
	sed 's/N//' | sed 's/E/ /' | awk '{print $1}'`
n=`expr $s + 1`
# translate into a netcdf grd:
xyz2grd $1 -G$1.grd -I3c -R${w}/${e}/${s}/${n} -ZTLh -L -V -N-32768