HAMweather FlightRules Map 1.0 (Mar 11, 2006)

Contents:

OVERVIEW:

The Flight Rules Map plugin can be used by HWdb Update Service Subscribers to plot flight rules based on the flight rules as defined by the following grid:

The above grid was obtained from the NOAA aviation web site.

To plot the flight rules map, the metar observations for hundreds of ICAOs are required to obtain the flight rulest. Since NOAA does not provide a single Flight Rules file an with all of the icaos and it would impractiable to query hundreds of ICAOS at one time from the NOAA servers, , the Flight Rules Plugin will query the HAMweather servers to obtain the flight rules for the US or a specific state. This HAMweather web service is open to anyone with an active HWdb Update Service subsription.*

With the data the plugin can generate maps similiar to the one below:

License:

The HW3 Flightrules Map plug-in falls under the HAMweather 3 Software suite license. You can find the latest version at:
http://www.hamweather.net/hw3/license.shtml

As part of the HAMweather 3 license, you must keep the credit phrase "HAMweather.com" on all maps unless HAMweather 3 has been properly registered.

NOTE: The Flight Rules Map plugin requires that you have an active HWdb Update Service Subscription. The flight rules maps querys an XML web service for the flight rule data so that it can quickly and easily generate the map. Access to this service is currently limited to HWdb Update Service subscribers. Visit the HWdb Update Service pages for more information.

Requirements:

The HW3 QPF plugin requires the following HAMweather products be installed and working correctly:

Downloading:

The HW3 Flight Rules Map plugin can be downloaded from the HAMweather Plug-in area.

Installation:

Installation of the HW3 Flight Rules Map Plugin is fairly simple, using the steps below:

  1. Make sure you have met the requirements stated above.
  2. Unzip the distribution with an unzipping utility, such as winzip, or the built in zip capabilities of Window XP.
  3. Open the cgi-bin/configs/fc_flightrules.ini file in a text editor. At line 5 you will see:

    flightrules_prefix=/wxACCESSCODE/flightrules/%%country%%/%%state%%.xml

    replace the word "ACCESSCODE" with your HWdb subscription access code. If you do not know this code, it is available online from the Members Area. Once logged into the members area, click on your active HWdb Update service Subscription. From here, click the "included Data Feeds" link, this page will include your access code.. Note that sharing your access code with others, can result in your access being terminated.

    For Example. if you access code is A1B2C3D4E5F then you would adjust the above line to be:

    flightrules_prefix=/wxA1B2C3D4E5F/flightrules/%%country%%/%%state%%.xml
  4. Upload the various files to your HAMweather 3 installation:
    1. Upload the "FlightRuleMap.pm" ("FlightRuleMap.php" for HW3php) to the hamlib/HW3Plugins directory

      NOTE: Your FTP program may not auto recognize ".pm" files as text files and may try to upload in binary mode. You should force your FTP program to upload these files in ASCII mode as uploading in binary mode will cause errors on UNIX/LINUX servers.

      The following should be installed in the paths indicated after you upload the file (Note: Unix servers are case sensitive):

           HW3perl (or HW3asp):
           hamlib/HW3Plugins/QPFDAY.pm

           HW3php:
           hamlib/HW3Plugins/QPFDAY.php
    2. Upload the files with-in the distribution's "configs" directory to the "configs" directory of the HAMweather 3 installation. NOTE: You are not replacing your current "configs" directory but simply uploading the ini files to the "ini" directory on the server.

      NOTE: Your FTP program may not auto recognize ".ini" files as text files and may try to upload in binary mode. You should force your FTP program to upload these files in ASCII mode as uploading in binary mode will cause errors on UNIX/LINUX servers.

      The following should be installed in the paths indicated after you upload the in the distributions "templates" directory:

           HW3Perl (or HW3asp):
           configs/fc_flightrulesmap.ini

           HW3php:
           configs/fc_flightrulesmap.ini      .php

    3. Upload the files with-in the distribution's "templates" directory to the "templates" directory of the HAMweather 3 installation. NOTE: You are not replacing your current "templates" directory but simply uploading the template files to the "templates" directory on the server.

      The following should be installed in the paths indicated after you upload the in the distributions "templates" directory:

           templates/flightrulemap.html
    4. Upload the imap file from with in the distributions "hw3dbs/us/imaps" directory to the corresponding directory of your HW3 installation.
    5. Upload the blankmap files with-in the distributions "images/blankmaps" directory to the "images/blankmaps" directory of your HW3 installation.

  5. The components required to use the Plugin are installed.

Accessing:

To access the plug-in with in HAMweather and have it generate the default map use a URL similiar too: :

    HW3Perl (or HW3asp):
    hw3.cgi?forecast=flightrulesmap&dpp=0

    HW3php:
    hw3.php?forecast=flightrulesmap&dpp=0

If you would to plot the flightrules on a different map you can provide the "usemap" parameter. I.E to plot the flightrules on the included southeast regional map, use a url similair too:

    HW3Perl (or HW3asp):
    hw3.cgi?forecast=flightrulesmap&dpp=0&usemap=southeast_albers_640x480

    HW3php:
    hw3.php?forecast=flightrulesmap&dpp=0&usemap=southeast_albers_640x480

If you want to plot the flightrules for a speicific state map that you may have you can use a url similiar to: NOTE: State maps are not included in this plugin but are available via separate download from the plugins area

    HW3Perl (or HW3asp):
    hw3.cgi?forecast=flightrulesmap&dpp=0&usemap=ga_640x480&state=ga

    HW3php:
    hw3.php?forecast=flightrulesmap&dpp=0&usemap=ga_640x480&state=ga

Notice in the above we used the state parameter to limit the XML fetching to just the flight rules for aiports with in GA. Do not provide the state parameter if you want to plot the rule for surrounding states on the map.

The plugin also supports a "country " parameter which allows you to plot flight rules for other countries. While this is available, you must note that each country can have its own flight rules & creiteria for each. The flight rules plotted by this plugin are based on the US flightrules and weather criteria noted at the top of this document.

Parameters:

Here is a complete list of all the parameters that can be passed to the plugin via the query string, form post or an INI file:

Parameter
 Description
Primary Query Settings
nocache Controls if image is cached or forced to be recreated. nocache=1 will force HW3 to recreate the image. Useful during testing, but should not be set or set to zero during production
usemap
 Can supply the name of the map (minus extension) to plot the contours on. If not set will default to qpf_usa which will plot ont he included qpf_usa.png map.
state Can be used to request the flight rules for a specific state
country Can be used to request flight rules based on the US criteria for other countries. Not recommended for use.


Template Variables:

Under normal use, there is no need to reveiw the template variables.

Template
Variable		 Description
%%map_name%% The name of the saved map

 

FAQ

SUPPORT

You can find support for this plug-in via the online support forums, specifically the HW3Plugins forum.

Release History:

Mar 11 , 2006 - 1.0 Release