The METRANET software package is a complete and powerful Radar Data Processor (RDP) system designed to ingest the moment data from one or more radars and to create/distribute/display/archive radar "products".
METRANET RDP products are distributed on-line to the remote clients of the RDP system or to external systems using the BUFR format or other standard graphic formats. In addition to displaying the RDP products, METRANET can also display moment data. The display module can also accept interactive user requests to generate new products from existing moment data sets. The display programs can run on any client workstation.
The METRANET suite includes a wide variety of products: basic reflectivity; precipitation; wind velocity; hydrometeor classification; forecast and warning products. New products can easily be added to the system.
The METRANET RTDC (Real Time Display and Control) module allows the user to control the transmitter, the antenna servo system, and the signal processor, according to the desired scan and processing requirements.
The METRANET scheduling module automatically manages the execution of several sets of user-designed system setups (scanning modes) that can be sequenced as a function of time and/or external events.
The METRANET RDP program runs on a standard Linux-based server workstation networked with the Radar Control Processor (RCP) and with any number of client workstations, which share the RDP database and accept the RDP products distribution stream. Radar control functions are managed through a user-friendly Graphical User Interface available in the RTDC module. Time-critical data-ingest and product-generation functions are accomplished through the execution of prioritized tasks monitored by a parent task.
The flexible system architecture allows a variety of system configurations, such as having product generation centralized at the radar site, or at a server, or distributing it over several servers for higher throughput, or doing it on the individual workstations.
METRANET provides flexible archiving and retrieval for moment data as well as for RDP products.