Lecture 1 (Jan. 21) Agenda

Introduction, Syllabus, Assignments, Quizzes, Office Hours


What this class will cover (course schedule, subject to change!):

What this class won't cover:
   Formal Programming Languages (e.g. FORTRAN)
   The room with paper (as much as possible, "handouts" and "handins" will be electronically submitted)


My academic and professional background


(Verbal) assessment of students' computer and UNIX experience

Review of booting the maproom PC's and choosing Windows or Linux

Remote access to our system (document will be emailed to all students)


A quick look at the basic categories of meteorological data types, and where this data is stored on our system:

  1. text data: e.g. a zone forecast, climate report, storm data report

  2. gridded data: e.g. model output, both raw (e.g. GRIB format) and processed (e.g. GEMPAK format)

  3. image data: e.g. NEXRAD data, satellite data

Neither (2) nor (3) can be viewed in plain-text! One must use a program such as GEMPAK/N-AWIPS or IDV to display these types of data.


Unix Tutorial


Text editors: vi; emacs; gedit; nedit

Assignment of your personal METAR site, WFO site, NEXRAD site

Use of the weather program: interactive and comand-line mode; weather guide (full); weather guide (quick)


Using weather for 48hr/3-5 day local forecasting contest

Homework # 1