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Skytap™ Alphanumeric Weather Software

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SKYTAP™ Alphanumeric Weather Software runs under Windows-NT or Windows-2000 operating systems, and automatically accesses Marta Systems' database of real-time alphanumeric weather products via the Internet at the customer's desired interval. Internet access occurs automatically to Marta Systems' SKYTAP Weather Service and disconnects after product reception has completed.

The display portions of the software are capable of running in the Windows environment for networked workstations (requires site license).

The software does not require special video cards. Any card which supports a 256-color mode in the desired resolution is acceptable.

Alphanumeric Products include Domestic and Public data.

ALPHANUMERIC SOFTWARE FEATURES:

(a) Data can be recalled by any of the following means:

  • Station and Products
  • City-Pair Route and Products
  • Geographical Area and Products
  • Wild-card word or phrase search from any combination of stations and products, or the entire database.
  • By age, or by most recently available.

(b) Data is flagged if older than 2, 4, 12 or 24 hours to alert the operator.

(c) Ten user-programmable Hot Buttons for each recall method (Station, Route, and Area) are available. Each button may be individually programmed to display products by type and age.

(d) Multiple, simultaneous display windows may be open at one time.

(e) Each display window may be update enabled, so that if new products of that type are received, the display is updated with the new data.

(f) Each display window is a full text editor, allowing the addition or deletion of comments, or items as necessary. The modified text can be saved to any disk or network path, or printed as required.

AUTOMATIC DATA HANDLING CAPABILITIES:

The software automatically performs many functions in the background, without user intervention. The user is given complete control of each product in the system, and can tag each individually for any or all of the functions listed below.

1. Purging of Old Data - The user specifies how many of each type of product to maintain. The software will remove the oldest version of each product when the number of products of that type exceed the specified count.

2. Alarms - The user may control which products, if any, cause alarms to be generated when those products are received. In addition, software alarms are generated if the system has difficulty performing background operations. The alarms can use any Windows-NT supported sound cards with wave files (special effects, voice, or any other sound can be used), or the internal speaker of the PC, or be silent alarms which are logged, but do not enunciate.

3. Disk Mirroring - A designated disk drive or network server can be specified as the target device for the built-in disk mirror. This function allows the user to specify on a per-product basis which products should be mirrored to the specified device. This function maintains an exact copy of the specified products on the target device, adding new ones and removing old ones as appropriate.

4. File Conversion and Export - User selected NEXRAD, Satellite and Difax images may be automatically converted to JPEG, TIFF, PCX or BMP formats and stored on a designated disk drive or network server. Separate destination paths can be specified for NEXRAD, DIFAX and satellite, and alphanumeric products.

5. Auto Print - Four separate printers are supported simultaneously, one each for Text, Satellite, Difax and NEXRAD. Each printer has a separate seven-day, 24-hour availability schedule, allowing the user to enable/disable autoprinting automatically throughout the week. Text autoprinting can be specified to occur by station and product as data is received, or by city-pair route and product, or geographical area and product, or station and product on a timed basis.

6. Archive - The software can archive selected products to separately specified destinations for NEXRAD., Text, Satellite/Difax and AFOS.

7. Transmitter - The software can resend text products through a specified serial port in either ASCII or BAUDOT codes at speeds up to 19200 BPS. The serial port RTS signal becomes active 10 seconds prior to transmission to accommodate a radio link.

8. The above Automatic Data Handling Functions are performed by Marta Systems' ROUTER program, included with the SKYTAP Alphanumeric software. Please refer to "ROUTER" features on this homepage fo additional information.

SKYTAP™ is a trade mark of Marta Systems, Inc.
SKYTAP is a service mark of Marta Systems, Inc.