2011 Satellite Direct Readout Conference

The 2011 Satellite Direct Readout Conference will be held April 4-8, 2011 in Miama Florida.  For more information visit http://directreadout.noaa.gov/miami11/

The conference will provide information on:

● International Cooperation:

• Global Earth Observation System of Systems (GEOSS)
• WMO, EUMETSAT, NOAA/NESDIS
• Satellite Providers and Users from the Americas
• Frequency Management

● Current and Future Polar Direct Readout Services:

• APT, LRPT
• HRPT, AHRPT
• LRD, HRD
• Argos DCS

● Polar Systems:

• POES
• MetOp
• EOS
• NPP
• JPSS
• Polar Field Terminals

● Current and Future Geostationary Direct Readout Services:

• GVAR, GRB
• GOES DCS
• LRIT, HRIT
• EMWIN

● Current and Future Geostationary Systems:

• GOES-13, 14, 15, and R/S
• MSG
• MTSAT, etc.
• Geostationary Field Terminals

WxLoader - Interfaced to the Pro-Lite Scrolling Led Sign

After 5 months, I have gotten back around to testing my new Pro-Lite II scrolling led sign.  After I learned how to program the unit, I change WxLoader to support sending text to the Led Sign.  It works great.  I am still working with the colors so that I can make watch and warnings look different.

This is a picture of the Pro-Lite PL-M2014RV6.

WxMap - Adding a logo to the saved map image

The next release of WxMap will allow you to insert a user defined logo in the saved map image.  This allows you to personalize the image that you use on websites.  The Map Save tab allows you to specify the location on the map.  The logo must be saved in the same directory as WxMap.exe or WxMapNet.exe, generally c:\Program Files\WxMesgNet, with the name WxMapLogo.png.

If you create the logo with tranparency the map will show through the logo.  I created a test logo that will go out with the next beta.  Here is what it looks like this:

I used Paint.Net to create the image and make the background semi-transparent.

EMWIN Success Stories

I am collecting user testimonials on how EMWIN has been used to "save the day". If you use EMWIN to protect citizens, save life, and property, I would like to hear your story.

With your permission, I will list your testimonial on www.emwin.net for others to read. We need to let others know the value of EMWIN.

You can email your testimonials to me or post them here on the Weather Message Yahoo Group. If you do not want your name or agency included with your testimonial, please let me know. I will respect your wishes.

Weather Message Support for Windows 2000 will end soon

Weather Message will no longer support Windows 2000 after version 3.7 is released.  Microsoft has dropped support for Windows 2000 in the Microsoft .Net Framework version 4.0.  I am planning on moving the software to the .Net Framework 4.0 version with the 3.8 beta. 

Here are the system requirements for Microsoft .Net Framework 4.0.

Supported Operating Systems:  

• Windows XP SP3
• Windows Server 2003 SP2  
• Windows Vista SP1 or later
• Windows Server 2008 (not supported on Server Core Role)
• Windows 7
• Windows Server 2008 R2 (not supported on Server Core Role)

Supported Architectures:

• x86
• x64
• ia64 (some features are not supported on ia64 for example, WPF)

Hardware Requirements:

• Recommended Minimum: Pentium 1 GHz or higher with 512 MB RAM or more
• Minimum disk space:  x86 – 850 MB, x64 – 2 GB

Twitter and Facebook Support in Weather Message

Weather Message Beta 7 includes the new Twitter authentication changes.  This release also introduces Facebook support.  The F1 help's supplement section contains example setups for Twitter and Facebook.

Note:  After discussing the facebook implementation with one user, I discovered that you can only post to your personal page.  If you manage multiple facebook "pages", the current implementation will not post to those pages.  I have been testing changes that will allow you to post to any page that you administer.  Those will be available in the next beta release.

Update:  Beta 8 now includes support for multiple facebook pages.

Twitter Changes

Twitter is changing their authentication mechanism from "Basic Authentication" to "OAuth".  Twitter provides this description: "OAuth is an authentication protocol that allows users to approve application to act on their behalf without sharing their password."

Twitter will be disabling Basic Authentication at the end of this month.  For Weather Message to continue sending tweets, I will need to make some involved changes.

I have moved this item up on my priority list and will try to add this capability to Weather Message.

WxLocal - Speaking the local weather conditions

WxLocal is receiving the ability to speak the local weather conditions.  The program can also write out the speech to a wave file.  It sounds good with the Windows 7 text to speech processor. 

I sure would be nice if WxLocal would send that wave file to Weather Message so it could upload it to a website and/or send it on to the clients to play.

The ability to play wave files in the Message Client would be nice addition.

Sending Multiple Emails

Weather Message's email routines send email sequentially using a background worker thread.  When an alarm matches a received product, a task is created for each email group associated with the alarm.  These tasks are added to the email queue for processing.

The email processor will generally work through the queue in short order.  If the email group has a large number of email addresses, it does take some time to send each email address to the smtp server.  While all of that is taking place the other email tasks are waiting.

I have completed the code to create a pool of threads.  This pool could be used to spawn multiple threads that will take a task from the email queue and start sending it to the smtp server.  The question for now is whether this will make the overall sending faster.   If the smtp server is throttled per connection, having multiple connections could make sending emails faster. 

I ran into a situation with a SNPP server that was slow per connection.  In this case, using multiple threads could have made that faster.

Now that the code is complete, I will be running some tests to see how this will work.  If the smtp server allows for multiple connects from one user, we might be able to deliver emails faster.  For users that only have a few groups, this would not have any affect.  For users that have bunches of email groups that are activated often, this may make delivery faster.

Note:  If the limiting factor is the internet pipe speed, there is nothing that we can do to make it faster.

I will report further as testing starts later this week.

Siren Controller - Activation Notice

The Weather Message Siren Controller now has the ability to send email notification of siren activations.  Previously, you would email the actual activation product.  Now the program can generate activation notificates whether automatic or manual.  The Siren Controller sends activation notices to Weather Message Server for processing like normal NWS products.

Here is a example manual activation to cancel the sirens:

NOXX02 KWXM 052011

SIRWXM

WEATHER MESSAGE SIREN CONTROLLER
ACTIVATION MESSAGE
311 PM CDT MON JUL 5 2010

SIREN ACTIVATION TYPE: MANUAL
ACTIVATION CLASS : Cancel

GROUPS:
1
2
 
SIRENS:
801
803
$$

This gives the agency feedback on the sirens and groups that were selected for activation.

National Weather Service Survey

The National Weather Service is asking users to complete a survey. In this survey you will have the option to selecting EMWIN or NOAAPort as your data source. I recommend that you take the opportunity to give the NWS feedback on your ingest method and their services and products.

The NWS is undertaking research on how satisfied you are with our products and services and would appreciate your feedback. The purpose of this research is to help the NWS improve its services. The survey will take approximately 15 minutes to complete and need not be finished all at once. We also encourage you to take a moment and complete one or more of the optional sections focused on Marine, Aviation, and Hazardous Weather.

The Survey is at the following link: https://svy.cfigroup.com/cgi-bin/qwebcorporate.dll?idx=3XRBCG

Backlog of files to be processed

A couple of users have reported a large backlog of files to be processed in their received files directory.  Under normal circumstances, this should not occur.  The processing of files depends on the number of alarms, number of connected clients, speed of the files being received, load on the computer and the speed of the computer itself. 

I have not seen this problem myself, however, I knew that the ingesting routine in Weather Message Server was ready for a make over.  I spend some time over a couple of days to rewrite the queue processing and ingest routines.  These changes will help with the backlog of files.

I moved the file processing to an independent thread. I moved the ingest directory read operation to another independent thread.  The ingest processing routine will now read all files in the directory at one time and queue them for the processing routine. The processing routine will then process them back-to-back without any internal delay.  The previous routine had some delay between each file.

I downloaded and processed the 3 hour EMWIN ftp archive.  This archive contains over 2400 files.  The server processed them in about 2 seconds.  The performance was definately improved.

I have to admit that I have a new 64bit Windows 7 computer with an i7 processor.  That cpu contains 4 cores with hyper-threading.  The i7 appears in the performance monitor as 8 cpu's.

A word of caution is always in order when creating additional threads.  Some think that the more treads you create the faster the processing.  That may not be the case for a single core computer.  Each thread has to share time on that one cpu.  You start to see the benefits of multiple threads when you have mulitple cores.

The changes will definately improve the program's processing speed, regardless of the number of cpu's.

User Defined Product File

The next beta release of Weather Message will add a user defined Product file.  In the current release, users that want to change the descriptions of products manually change Product.dat.  If they have user defined products, they update this file with their specific information.

The Weather Message Program Update installer asks the user if they want to install a revised Product.dat.  If this question is answered Yes, the installer overwrites the user's Product.dat.  In most cases that is not a problem.  For those users that are manually maintaining their Product.dat, it is a big problem.  The user can always restore the Product.dat file from the backup folder.  They however will not get the updated product file.

In the next beta, users that want to modify the product.dat file should update ProductUser.dat instead.  All additions and changes will be added or overwrite those in Product.dat.  This will allow users to easily add and change products without losing the ability to receive an updated Product.dat file.

This capability will allow me to easily define user specific products for the siren controller application.  I will not have to worry that the next update will wipe out my settings.

Thanks for the suggestion Todd.

Senate, House, Noaa, FCC Contacts

Regarding FCC ET Docket No. 10-123:  If you do not know your senator or representative's contact information, you can use the following links.

Representative
https://writerep.house.gov/writerep/welcome.shtml

Senator
http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm

Noaa Administrator

Dr. Jane Lubchenco

Under Secretary of Commerce for Oceans and Atmosphere and NOAA Administrator
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration

1401 Constitution Avenue, NW
Room 5128
Washington, DC 20230
jane.lubchenco@noaa.gov

National Weather Service Administrator

Dr. Jack Hayes

Assistant Administrator for Weather Services and Director, National Weather Service
National Weather Service
1325 East West Highway
Silver Spring, MD 20910
jack.hayes@noaa.gov

Department of Commerce Secretary
 
Secretary Gary Locke

United States Department of Commerce
1401 Constitution Ave., NW
Washington, DC 20230


FCC Filing

http://fjallfoss.fcc.gov/ecfs/

EMWIN Satellite Transmission Threatened

On June 4, 2010 the FCC Office of Engineering and Technology "Requests Information on use of 1675 – 1710 MHz Band", ET Docket No. 10-123.  They are requesting information on the current users of this frequency spectrum.  The EMWIN Satellite data stream uses 1690.725 Mhz and 1692.7 Mhz. 

This release seeks to reallocate this frequency spectrum for "broad band" internet.  This action would completely destroy EMWIN and LRIT services. Users have until June 28, 2010 to comment on this request.  See FCC Release for more information.

I plan on posting a reply and writing to NOAA and my congressmen.  Now is the time for action - all EMWIN users, both satellite and internet based, should object to any reallocation.

I will be updating the blog on this as I learn more.

Support for WinFax Pro retired in 3.7 release

Support for WinFax Pro will be removed from Weather Message version 3.7.  WinFax Pro is no longer being sold by Symantec.  According to wikipedia, "Symantec discontinued sales and support of WinFax PRO on June 30, 2006."

Users that need support for WinFax Pro can continue to use version 3.6.

AT&T Natural Voices on 64 bit Windows 7

It took some time to figure out how to get the AT&T Natural Voices to work on Windows 7 64 bit.  Apparently the control panel applet for selecting the default voice only works with 64 bit voices (Anna). 

In order to change the 32 voices, you have to run:
             %windir%\SysWOW64\speech\SpeechUX\sapi.cpl

This is the 32 bit control panel applet.  I need to keep reminding myself to look at the 32 bit control panels when I cannot get something to work.

Dell T1500

I am in the process of changing out my old Dell 8400 3.4ghz Windows XP system with a new Dell T1500 i7 2.8 ghz Windows 7 64bit system.  I already have spent about 6 hours reloading all of the software.  I am still not finished.

There are some software applications that I have not been able to get to run on Windows 7 64 bit.  For the most part everything else seems to work. 

I will say that this is a nice computer.

Get control over the Message Box position

Alot of the Weather Message programs display message boxes to tell the user that they entered something wrong or to ask a Yes or No question.  The built-in message box appears centered in the screen.  You cannot center it over the calling form without a bunch of win32 calls.

I took several hours this morning to write a new message box class.  This message box works like the old one and has two new features.  It can be centered over the calling form and it now has the ability to automatically close after a programmed number of seconds.

I will be working to change the existing message box calls to this new class.  Users will not have to chase after the message box when this change is completed.

EMWIN Software Demodulator

Several users have reported problems with installing the NWS EMWIN Software Demodulator on Windows 7 computers.  Those problems are related with User Account Control (UAC).  In most cases turning off UAC allowed the software to install properly. 

I had a user attempt to install the EMWIN Software Demodulator on a Windows 7 64 bit system.  The NWS installer kept reporting that Data1.cab was corrupted.  Right now I don't know why it reported that file as corrupted.

In order to get around this problem, I created a new installer for the EMWIN Software Demodulator.  The new installer corrects a number of problems associated with Windows 7 (and I suspect Vista).  The new installer does not require the user to unzip the installer to a directory, then run setup.exe.  It also defaults the demodulator to the EMWIN-N signal (19200 speed).

For Windows 7 users, with UAC enabled, the EMWIN Control panel would not start or stop the Data Source or Demodulator services.  This happend because the control panel applet was not running with elevated privileges.  The new installer creates the menu option with the options necessary to launch the control panel with elevated privileges.  (WxEmwin should start it properly.)

I went ahead and included the Weather Message Software Demodulator extentions.  These extensions allow the EMWIN Software Demodulator to send status message to WxEmwin so that it can display operational information about the EMWIN Software Demodulator.

The NWS EMWIN Software Demodulator is provided free by the National Weather Service.  The repackaged installer is available on the Weather Message website.