I have been quite critical of the SEG file formats over the years. And with good reason. SEGD, SEGY and SEG2 should have been retired years ago. They are based on decades old ideas that perhaps suited the equipment at the time. Unfortunately, the SEG does not seem to have realised that time has moved on – recording systems, methods and requirements have changed (for the SEG – actually they changed a long time ago!). When SEGD and SEGY were first released, they arguably were suitable for use at the time. No Longer. And SEG2 of course should never have been released at all, but that is another story for another time.
The problem is that SEGY and SEGD were ‘extended’ by the SEG instead of replaced. I can maybe understand the first revision SEGD V1 to V2 for example, but now we have an abortion called SEGD V3. There is absolutely no excuse for its existence. Unfortunately there are people starting to use it (I don’t know why) and people who plan to use it (again, I don’t know why).
Some years ago, I proposed in a very basic way what a modern seismic acquisition file format should look like (IMNSHO). It was based around flat headers and no optional sections. So, instead of just complaining about SEGD V3, I have sat down and actually defined an alternative based on discussions and thoughts I have had. I will not claim it is perfect or even ready for use just yet, but it does solve the problems with SEGD V3 and does match the requirements of high production, high channel count multiple source recording. It does borrow a little from the existing formats, but only the good parts.
For anyone interested, see here, I call it SaneSeis: http://seismatters.com/SaneSeis.html
I will welcome constructive criticism, and distribution of the ideas.