20010304: NEXRAD data and McIDAS

>From: 10 <address@hidden>
>Organization: NMSU/NSBF
>Keywords: 200103042227.f24MRSL24149 McIDAS-X NEXRAD NEXR

Robert,

>I am ingesting NEXRAD data from my downstream site and have
>been looking at it with GARP.  When I try to look at it with
>McIDAS (7.704 Solaris 8 Sparc) on uldbldm I get the following errors:
>
>IMGLIST RTNIDS/BREF1.ALL ID=HGX                                        
>Image file directory listing for:RTNIDS/BREF1                          
>IMGLIST: ADIRSERV failed on exec of nidsadir                           
>IMGLIST: done  

This is telling us that the dataset was setup with an image type of NIDS.
This was the correct setup _before_ SSEC adopted my server and wanted
the type changed to NEXR.  The NEXRAD Level III product server in the
current SSEC and Unidata distributions supports only the type of NEXR.

To correct this, you have three options:

o edit the BATCH file used to setup the dataset in the first place

o use DSSERVE.BAT file in the Unidata McIDAS-X distribution to create
  a local copy (recommend LSSERVE.BAT) to create/define the RTNEXRAD
  dataset group and descriptors (see below)

o directly edit the ADDE dataset definition file, RESOLV.SRV

If you decide to edit RESOLV.SRV, you will:

o find it in the ~mcidas/workdata directory

o need to change the 'K=NIDS' entries to 'K=NEXR'

The other difference between the serving of NIDS versus NEXRAD products
is the difference in dataset descriptors:

NOAAPORT NEXRAD      WSI NIDS
--------------------+----------------------------
N0R                  BREF1
N1R                  BREF2
N2R                  BREF3
    ...

I suggest that you adopt the NOAAPORT conventions.

>The data is being ingested on psnldm(SPARC) (still running McIDAS 7.613)
>and is being file like this:

Hold on.  Where will the data be served from?  If the answer is from 7.613,
then there are two things to note:

o NIDS.CFG would have to be changed so that the files can be correct
  found and identified BUT

o the 7.613 NIDS server does not understand the zlib-compressed format
  of the NEXRAD Level III products

If you want to serve the data from McIDAS 7.70x, then I recommend that you
setup a new dataset to conform to new standards.

>/var/data/ldm/nexrad% cd NIDS
>/var/data/ldm/nexrad/NIDS% ls
>HGX/  FDX/  FWS/  SHV/
>/var/data/ldm/nexrad/NIDS% cd HGX
>/var/data/ldm/nexrad/NIDS/HGX% ls
>N0V/  N0R/  NCR/  NTP/
>/var/data/ldm/nexrad/NIDS/HGX% cd N0R
>/var/data/ldm/nexrad/NIDS/HGX/N0R% ls
>N0R_20010304_2218   N0R_20010304_2208   N0R_20010304_2158   N0R_20010304_2148
>/var/data/ldm/nexrad/NIDS/HGX/N0R% 

OK, this shows use of the NOAAPORT descriptors for NEXRAD products:  N0R,
N0V, NCR, NTP, ...

>My NIDS.CFG file in ~mcidas/workdata looks like this:
>
>DIRMASK=/product/nexrad/NIDS/\ID/\TYPE
>FILEMASK=\TYPE_*
>IPMASK=*

Since you can not serve this data from 7.613, I will concentrate on the
setup for 7.704.

The thing facing you is the mismatch in ADDE dataset descriptors you
currently have (BREF1, BREF2, etc.) and the NOAAPORT product types the
products are being filed by (N0R, N0V, etc.)

The absolute easiest thing to do to serve the data from 7.70x is:

cd ~mcidas/data
cp DSSERVE.BAT NSBFNEXR.BAT
<edit NSBFNEXR.BAT and
  o remove all lines NOT related to the dataset RTNEXRAD>
  o set the INFO= sequence to point to the configuration file for the
    RTNEXRAD dataset:  INFO=NSBFNEXR.CFG
cd ~mcidas/workdata
cp NIDS.CFG NSBFNEXR.CFG
<the settings in NSBFNEXR.CFG are already correct given your examples
 above>
batch.k NSBFNEXR.BAT

At this point the RTNEXRAD dataset should be setup on your machine.  To
test this, you should run:

IMGLIST RTNEXRAD/N0R ID=LIST
IMGLIST RTNEXRAD/N0R ID=HGX STA=HGX EU=BREF REFRESH='EG;MAP H;BAR'

>Where /product/nexrad/NIDS is the way the data directory is automounted
>on uldbldm from psnldm.  As you can see it finds the data fine:
>
>/product/nexrad/NIDS% ls
>HGX/  FDX/  FWS/  SHV/
>/product/nexrad/NIDS% cd HGX
>/product/nexrad/NIDS/HGX% ls
>N0V/  N0R/  NCR/  NTP/
>/product/nexrad/NIDS/HGX% cd N0R
>/product/nexrad/NIDS/HGX/N0R% ls
>N0R_20010304_2218   N0R_20010304_2208   N0R_20010304_2158   N0R_20010304_2148
>/product/nexrad/NIDS/HGX/N0R% 
>
>Where am I going wrong?

You got thrown by:

o having to serve the data from 7.70x since previous distributions do not
  support the zlib-compressed product format

o my having to modify my code to suit SSEC (NIDS->NEXR, I had a big battle
  over this one, by the way).

>Thanks,

Let me know if this does not make sense.

Tom

>From address@hidden Sun Mar  4 20:24:21 2001
>Subject: Re: 20010304: NEXRAD data and McIDAS 

Yes it makes complete sense.  The data will not be served from 7.6 I am
only ingesting it on that machine and then accessing it via NFS for
testing purposes. That machine will be upgraded to 7.704 after the
Australian campaign is over.  The first balloon failed shortly after
launch..  they will launch another with a dummy payload as the science
window has ended.  If I were still at NSBF I would have been in YBAS
for 70 days now...

Thanks for the help as always.

Robert