Custom Weather Leverages Web Standards For Delivery Of Weather Information

CustomWeather (San Francisco, USA) provides syndicated weather content over the internet, taking advantage of XML and OGC Web Services. CustomWeather takes in over 8 GB/day of National Weather Service raw model data, satellite feeds, radar feeds and lightning feeds. From these constantly changing inputs the company generates forecasts and weather maps for over 58,000 unique locations worldwide, delivering real-time and forecasted mapping layers through interfaces that implement the OpenGIS® Web Map Service (WMS) and Web Feature Service (WFS) standards. Portrayal of the data is tailored to customer needs.

OGC standards also play a role in CustomWeather's delivery of electrical grid sensor data and weather data to users of a number of industry leading Outage Management Software systems, which provide integrated views of weather and electric power grid operation. Other application domains include transportation, travel, defense, wireless, consumer services, and insurance.

Among the weather variables that can be plotted using CustomWeather's OpenGIS-based map server are high and low temperatures, humidity, precipitation, fire danger, UV index, surface wind speed and direction, visibility, sunshine, dew point, and jet stream winds. CustomWeather has also added the ability to plot synoptic weather features for all portions of the world. (Synoptic-scale weather phenomena are those at the continental or oceanic spatial scale, such as migrating cyclones and anticyclones, air masses and fronts.)

Murray Armstrong, V.P. Sales and Business Development, CustomWeather Inc. explained that all of the weather maps are available through CustomWeather's proprietary mapping system, which allows its clients to request custom maps with specified layers for any portion of the globe for a variety of forecast times over the next 7 days. Based on OGC standards, CustomWeather's mapping system also allows for the specification of metric or imperial units, image type, image size, and bounding coordinates, as well as color and font type and size. "In the true spirit of CustomWeather, we have given control to our clients to request exactly the type of map that they are looking for along with the specific area that they want covered. Our contour weather maps are available for resolutions as small as 1 kilometer for all portions of the world. CustomWeather clients can create their own custom contour map in real-time or rely upon our wide selection of pre-generated maps.''

For more information visit www.customweather.com or check the weather at www.myforecast.com.