Monitoring weather and climate from space

Data Centre Newsletter

The EUMETSAT Data Centre Newsletter is regularly updated with latest articles and information of enhancements or changes to services and known issues.

Last updated: May 2013

Removal of Ground Segment Headers from MSG Meteorological Products

Data Centre users have reported usability issues for MSG Meteorological products ordered from the Data Centre archive. Known formats such as JPEG, BUFR for the MSG Meteorological products have an extra number of bytes at the start of the delivered products and this causes them not to be compatible with existing off-the-shelf tools that can work with these formats.

These additional bytes specify a Ground Segment Header which is used by the Data Centre software for the creation of metadata for the products. This header is not intended for external use and can, therefore, be removed.

This announcement is to inform the Data Centre users that the Ground Segment Header will be removed from all MSG Meteorological products by the end of 2013. The current formats with this Header will still be available for order from the Data Centre, to mitigate against the impact of this update. These formats will be renamed to 'Native' where applicable, whereas the format with the Header removed will be identified by the appropriate format name e.g. JPEG, BUFR in the Ordering Application.

 

NetCDF format for Data Centre products

In December 2012 all EPS level 1 and level 2 products, apart from GOME and GRAS, became available for ordering from the Data Centre Ordering Application.

This NetCDF page has more details.

Meteosat-10 (MSG-3) products available to order

MSG-3 was successfully launched on 5 July, 2012. Satellite commission activities have been progressing well. Since 18 December 2012, several Meteosat-10 products have been available for ordering.

Note: Meteosat-9 is still the prime satellite.

Metop-B products available to order

Metop-B was successfully launched on 17 September, 2012. Satellite commission activities have been progressing well. Since 13 December 2012, the following Metop-B products have been available for ordering from the Data Centre.

  • AMSU-A L1B
  • ASCAT L1B
  • AVHRR L1B
  • GRAS L1B
  • HIRS L1B
  • MHS L1B

Note: Metop-A is still the prime satellite.

Fast track ordering of data

In response to users’ feedback, upgrades to the ordering system were implemented to improve the delivery speed of small orders. Orders containing up to 10 items are delivered faster online. Delivery speeds can still vary depending on the number of small orders being processed in parallel.

Future activities

New user ordering interface

This ‘thin client’ interface is currently being developed using the Google Web Toolkit (GWT). The advantages of the new interface are:

  • Any internet-enabled browser or smart mobile device can be used to order products from the Data Centre. The installation of the Java virtual machine is no longer a requirement to access products from the Data Centre.
  • Usability improvement through step-by-step entry of the information needed to create an order. The steps are designed to be simple and intuitive for the majority of user orders.

The current Java ordering application will be available in parallel with the new ordering interface to support more complex orders. It is planned to phase out this interface, once the new ordering interface has been enhanced to fulfil all the requirements of the current ordering application.

Expected Availability: 3rd quarter 2013

Availability and performance improvements

Hardware and software improvements to the Data Centre will be introduced to reduce the down time when maintenance is performed, as well as provide significant process speed of the whole system.

Expected Availability: 2nd quarter, 2013

Automated user feedback tool

User feedback is very important to the Data Centre as it helps us focus resources on the areas that are important to our users. An automated user feedback tool is being developed to easily allow users to provide us with feedback and to present the feedback to the Data Centre team for analysis.

Users who make orders of a particular type will received a web link in their ‘Order Delivery’ email, providing them with access to the feedback tool.

Expected Availability: 2nd quarter, 2013

Introduction of new archive media and drives

To support the expected archive volume growth due to new EUMETSAT programmes, new T10000C media and their associated drives will be introduced to the Data Centre robots. The new media replaces the current T10000A media. This upgrade will increase the storage capacity per media from 0.5 TB to 5TB (native size), and improve access speeds for data retrievals from tape.

Expected Availability: 1st quarter, 2013
 
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