Re: The end of IDD?!! (fwd)

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Robb Kambic                                Unidata Program Center
Software Engineer III                      Univ. Corp for Atmospheric Research
address@hidden             WWW: http://www.unidata.ucar.edu/
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---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Sat, 28 Apr 2001 11:39:21 -0400
From: Michael W Dross <address@hidden>
To: Gilbert Sebenste <address@hidden>
     address@hidden, address@hidden
Subject: Re: The end of IDD?!!


I agree with Gilbert and others in terms of the cost of bandwidth to send
all of the NOAAPORT products. We purchased a couple
of NOAAPORT systems in the past  year or so and have been happy with them
for the most part. The cost was around 30K.  Most of the cost
was associated with the proprietary ingest software believe it or not. Here
is the rough break down on what it might cost to build your own NOAAPORT
system, provided you had your own ingest software.

     1) C Band Antenna                             $1,000
     4) ComTech/EfData SDR-54A Satellite Modems
          (Data Rate=2.4-5mb/sec, Reed-Solomon Encoding)          @ $1750
each.
     1) PTI 4 Port Synchronous Communications Card            ~$1000
     1) 600 MHZ Pentium PC with Linux or SolarisX86             $ 800
               1) NOAAPORT Software Package                     $(????)

                                         Total     $9,800


Now the only missing piece of this puzzle is the NOAAPORT ingest software.
From what I can tell it is not
terribly complicated.  What might be ideal is if the NOAAPORT ingest piece
was added to the LDM software,
maybe an enhanced "pqing" or something.  If Unidata or some group developed
this and included it in the LDM distribution, I think
most Universities could afford there own NOAAPORT systems and use the
LDM/IDD as a backup only.
I am only a novice when it comes to programming, but I would be willing to
help try and develop a NOAAPORT ingest
piece that would integrate directly into the LDM package.

Just FYI... Planetary Data, Inc sells a complete NOAAPORT system that is
reasonably priced and integrates nicely
into the LDM, for those who might want a system soon. They are very nice to
deal with I have found.

Mike Dross




                                                                                
                                             
                    Gilbert Sebenste                                            
                                             
                    n.niu.edu>                    cc:     <address@hidden>, 
<address@hidden>, General      
                    Sent by:                      Support <address@hidden>      
                                   
                    owner-ldm-users@unidat        bcc:                          
                                             
                    a.ucar.edu                    Subject:     Re: The end of 
IDD?!!                                         
                                                                                
                                             
                                                                                
                                             
                    04/28/2001 03:21 AM                                         
                                             
                                                                                
                                             
                                                                                
                                             




On Fri, 27 Apr 2001, David Wojtowicz wrote:

> Buried deep in a newsletter from our campus communications service
office,
> I found a reference to a proposed "funding plan" for campus networking
> services.   It almost looked too boring to bother typing in the URL to
learn
> more.   I'm glad I did though!   Actually, not glad at all.  What I
> found was a proposal to start charging departments for the
> internet traffic they use (in addition to monthly charges per network
> jack, IP address and other things)

First of all, at NIU, this is in the works. From what I have heard, it is
something like this: You can have so much bandwidth, but if you want a
consistent, guaranteed amount...you'll have to pay for it.

I have schmoozed the folks in the NOC and although they don't mind the
data going in, they do going out. This has kept me out of hot water...but
as NOAAPORT goes to 5 channels next year, with the "HDS" version doubling
in data...

I have already warned my boss that in 2002, we're going to have to get our
own satellite system. End of story. This will be tough for us. Very tough.
But as I see it, it may be the only way out. Bandwidth isn't getting any
cheaper for T3's and better. And 5 T1s inbound and 15 outbound for 3
relays? Whew.

I hope this won't happen. But the proposals are at UIUC and NIU. What I
want to know is: will we be punished for bringing this data in and
shipping it out? Sounds like it to me. The OC-3 we're getting has already
been split: A T3 for full-screen video/distance learning, and the rest we
battle for...

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Gilbert Sebenste
********
Internet: address@hidden    (My opinions only!)                     ******
Staff Meteorologist, Northern Illinois University                      ****
E-mail: address@hidden                                 ***
web: http://weather.admin.niu.edu                                      **
Work phone: 815-753-5492                                                *
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