WXSVR-AU Implementing WXSVR-AU messages

This page details suggested methods of enabling and implementing the WXSVR-AU messages that are being generated.

HOME USERS

Client applications such as UI-View and Xastir can be set up to use the WXSVR-AU messages in exactly the same way as the NWS setup used in the USA. The only significant difference is that you must download the shapefiles from this site (NOT the ones from the NWS). There are a couple of limitations

• You can only use the Australian shapefiles OR the NWS shapefiles - not both!
• The "Finger" functionality will not work, as the standard applications query the NWS servers, which do not know about us.

UI-VIEW (UI-NWS plugin)

To be able to use UI-NWS, you need the WXSVR-AU shapefiles. UI-NWS is useless without these files. They are the shapefile sets prefixed "c_aus", "z_aus" and "mz_aus". Each set contains three files - .DBF, .SHP and .SHX. (There may be additional files in the archive, but these three extensions are the ones required by UI-View)

When you have got the files, they need to be unzipped into a folder that will be created the first time UI-View32 V1.5 or later is run. The folder is \NWS\Shapefiles in the UI-View32 program folder. Make sure you put them in the correct folder, or UI-View32 will not find them! You can tell if you are putting them in the correct folder, because it will contain a file called "Put the NWS shapefiles in here.TXT".

Restart UI-View and then go to FILE->UI-NWS
This opens the NWS application that processes the messages, and controls the display of the shapes.

UI-View uses the following colours for various messages:
ADVIS = Yellow
WATCH = Orange
WARN  = Red
OTHER = Purple

Xastir

Xastir must be compiled to support ESRI Shapefiles. (shapelib)

Shapefiles must be extracted to /usr/local/share/xastir/Counties (Check your installation path if different to default)

You will need to rename the original NWS .dbfawk files in the config directory so that the Australian shapefiles will work.

mv nwsc_ddmmyy.dbfawk _nwsc_ddmmyy.dbfawk
mv nwsmzddmmyy.dbfawk _nwsmz_ddmmyy.dbfawk
mv nwsz_ddmmyy.dbfawk _nwsz_ddmmyy.dbfawk

Download the .dbfawk files for the Australian shapefiles from the Shapefiles link above, and place them in the /config directory.

You can also do this for the remaining nws*.dbfawk files, however at this stage these are not used by WXSVR-AU.

Under the "MAP" menu, ensure that Enable Area Color Fills and Enable Weather Alerts are checked.

Xastir uses the following colours for various messages:
ADVIS = Cyan   
WATCH = Yellow 
WARN  = Red  
CANCL = Orange
TEST  = Blue
OTHER = Green 

KENWOOD D7, D700, D710 RADIOS

The Kenwood APRS radios will display the objects and messages generated by WXSVR-AU when they are recieved, however they do have a limited message memory. To help avoid the memory filling too quickly, it is recommended that the MESSAGE GROUPS feature be used.

We recommended that the following be included in the MSG GROUP in these radios:

NWS-*,BOM*

Setting NWS-* will restrict the display of the ZONE messages to only those of a WARNING level (ADVISE and WATCH level are transmitted with an underscore (NWS_*) which does not match the message filter)

Setting BOM* will allow the plain text warning messages to be displayed.

Provided that the local IGate has implemented thier end correctly, you will only see messages for the area you are currently in.

<Example D700 message capture images>

IGATES

Weather warnings are strictly LOCAL in nature, and it is highly recommended that IGates allow WXSVR-AU messages for the local area to be gated to RF.

Messages should be gated based on the three letter CWA code, which will be the first three characters of the originating callsign.

For example, an IGate at Wagga Wagga covers two forecast areas (CWA's), being South West Slopes and Riverina. The CWA's for these areas are SWS and RIV, so the IGate should be configured to gate ALL messages from SWS* and RIV* to RF (ALL ensures that the Area message, Plain Text message and Object are gated).

The digipeater path used should be fixed so that the messages only remain within the forecast regions that they are intended for.

The images below shows this configuration using UI-View.

If the coverage area of an IGate is too large (for example covers the entire state), it is worth considering the establishment of dedicated "WX and Recieve Only" IGates that pass any traffic heard on RF to the Internet, but ONLY gate weather messages to RF via one or two digipeaters, using a static path if necessry to avoid messages going to areas they are not intended for. The setup of any new IGate should be coordinated with the rest of the network to ensure that the RF network is not saturated with duplicate data being sent to RF.

In order to recieve the WXSVR-AU stream from APRS-IS, you can include the e/WXSVR-AU filter definition when connecting to APRS-IS. This will enable the streaming of NWS protocol messages (Limiting it to only those originating at our server - i.e. Australian). The filtering of what appears on RF is then configured on the IGate based on the three letter CWA prefix as discussed above.

Alternatively, the Prefix filter (p/xxxx) can be used to recieve only the messages for your local CWA areas - for example to recieve messages from stations with VK4 prefixes and the DDG area, use a filter of p/VK4/DDG

Of course both methods above rely on the use of the custom filter port 14580 on any of the APRS-IS servers.