THE OPENDAP PROTOCOL PROVIDES A DISCIPLINE-NEUTRAL MEANS OF REQUESTING AND PROVIDING DATA ACROSS THE WORLD WIDE WEB. THE GOAL IS TO ALLOW END USERS, WHOEVER THEY MAY BE, TO ACCESS IMMEDIATELY WHATEVER DATA THEY REQUIRE IN A FORM THEY CAN USE, ALL WHILE USING APPLICATIONS THEY ALREADY POSSESS AND ARE FAMILIAR WITH. IN THE FIELD OF OCEANOGRAPHY, OPENDAP HAS ALREADY HELPED THE RESEARCH COMMUNITY MAKE SIGNIFICANT PROGRESS TOWARDS THIS END. ULTIMATELY, IT IS HOPED, OPENDAP WILL BE A FUNDAMENTAL COMPONENT OF SYSTEMS WHICH PROVIDE MACHINE-TO-MACHINE INTEROPERABILITY WITH SEMANTIC MEANING IN A HIGHLY DISTRIBUTED ENVIRONMENT OF HETEROGENEOUS DATASETS.