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19th North America-Europe Data Exchange Meeting

3-5 May 2006 Silver Spring, MD, United States

David Hennings, Met Office

Telecommunication Links Status Report

Datalinks

Link Speeds

Message switching systems

-Frost

- Netlink

Washington Link Data Volumes

Toulouse Link Data Volumes

RMDCN, ECMWF stats

Supercomputer News

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Main Communications Links from Exeter

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RMDCN Connections with Exeter

National Meteorological Service Protocol PVC Speed (Kbs-1)

Belgium FTP 32 in / 32 out

Denmark TCP Sockets 32 in / 32 out

DWD FTP 64 in / 64 out

France FTP 128 in / 384 out

Iceland FTP 16 in / 16 out

Ireland FTP 64 in / 64 out

Italy FTP 16 in / 16 out

Netherlands TCP Sockets 64 in / 64 out

Norway TCP Sockets 32 in / 32 out

Portugal FTP 32 in / 32 out

Russian Federation FTP 8 in / 64 out

Spain TCP Sockets 32 in / 32 out

From http://rmdcn.ecmwf.int/services/computing/rmdcn

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Message Switching Systems - Frost

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Frost WMO Message Switching System

HP UNIX 9000 L3000 servers running HP-UX 11i

Active and Hot Stand-by set-up

Synchronisation via 1Gbs-1 Fibre

100Mbs-1 to LAN for data transfers. Upgrading to 1Gbs-1

Corobor MessirComm for WMO switching

Nexor Mailer for X.400 & SMTP

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GTS Link with NOAA TOC Washington

BT Frame Relay link – NOT RMDCN

64 Kbs-1 Committed Information Rate

Three logical data channels (Alpha-Numeric, GRIB & T4)

TCP Sockets protocol

Number of Messages (Data Volume in Mb). (compared with previous year)

On 12th March 2006 via Frost system. An increase in GRIB of approx. 29% was due to additional Eumetsat bulletins switched from Offenbach to Washington

Type Received Transmitted

Alpha-Numeric 40815 (49)44502 (41.3) +10%, (-19)%

30128 (17.3)38395 (19) +27%, (+10)%

GRIB 46083 (190)

45619 (205) -1%, (+9)%42790 (318)

50896 (410) +19%, (+29)%

T4 39 (3.7)

177 (7.9) +450%, (+213)%78 (6.9)

69 (6.3) -12%, (-9)%

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GTS Link with NOAA TOC Washington- trends

Yearly (1 Day Average)

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GTS link to NOAA TOC

Issues: Require regular exercising of ISDN backup Use non-specialist operations staff working from documentation

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File transfer links with Nesdis

Issues:Swing tail circuit to new offices (Aug 2005!)

Consider viable backup routes and procedures (use of Internet now feasible at UK end)

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Message Switching Systems – oVMS Netlink

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Netlink FTP File Switch

Dec Alpha DS15 servers running OpenVMS

Active and Hot Stand-by set-up

100Mbs-1 to LAN for data transfers

In-House application for file switching

Non WMO switch for Model & Sat products

Switches fewer messages than Frost, but 10 times data volume.

Interim upgrade completed Oct 2004, est 2 years growth

“Rationalisation of File Transfer” project to replace these systems.Rollout of Linux/RH on commodity h/w Dell/Intel

Security issues – DMZ working.

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Present Data Volumes on Washington NOAA – OSA (NESDIS) Link

Requirements Description Daily Data Volume (MBytes)

NOAA AMSU-A Level 1B 115

NOAA AMSU-B Level 1B 301

DSMP SSM/I Brightness temperatures 227

NOAA TOVS MSU Level 1B 1

NOAA TOVS SSU Level 1B 3

QuikScat Scatterometer data 216

NOAA AVHRR Products on a HIRS Grid. 23

NOAA AVHRR 100km and 50Km SSTs 8

NOAA AVHRR Mapped Global Area Composites 6

NOAA Ozone Retrieved profiles and/or total column from SBUV 1

AQUA AIRS Brightness temperatures 569 (100%)

AQUA AMSU-A Brightness temperatures 12

NOAA TOVS HIRS Level 1B 66

NOAA ATOVS HIRS Level 1B 255 (+20%)

GOES cloud-tracked VIS/IR/WV Winds 9

SSMIS Level 1c (test mode) 295

TOTAL 2106 (+23%)

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Netlink data: NOAA-OSA (NESDIS) Washington

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GTS Link with Toulouse (RMDCN)

Via RMDCN

Three logical data channels (Alpha-Numeric, GRIB & T4) for output

Two logical data channels (Alpha-Numeric + GRIB, & T4) for input

Link capacity 384 out.

Number of Messages (Data Volume in Mb).

Type Received Transmitted

Alpha-Numeric 18549 (43) (inc GRIB) 53541 (80)

GRIB 18549 (43) (inc A-N) 30144 (105)

T4 & Radar 1275 (18) 1527 (65)

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File Transfer Links with Toulouse (RMDCN)(Netlink)

Node TRMTF

Number of files daily and data Volume in Mb. () = previous year

Note:Received - increase due SAF/OCEAN ICETransmitted - NOAA – 8 SSM/I gone (via ECMWF)

Type Received Transmitted

SAF/Ocean & Ice, Arpege Ensemble etc.

94 (73) files85 (69) Mb

---

Satellite Imagery, AIRS, ATOVS, Qscat, SSM/I

---- 580 (590 ) files1120 (1025) Mb

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Traffic over RMDCN to Toulouse

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2Mb/s Megastream link(saturation at times)

Data link ECMWF

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Supercomputing -NEC [2004-]

No change since April 2005 upgrade, the 128-processor NEC SX-8 system doubled the computing power of each of the two existing 120-processor NEC SX-6 systems, which remain operational since April 2004.

See http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/corporate/pressoffice/2005/pr20050412.html

Theoretical peak power of an industry-leading 16 billion calculations per second per processor

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Future Plans

To continue to move away from legacy protocols (X.25)

IP links only

Make use of Internet VPN’s where possible

Upgrade Internet connectionUpgrade Link to ECMWF

Replace Netlink service – new architecture – DMZ’s for all!new hardware, O/s and applications (RH and AFD)rationalise FT applications across production and switching areas