JUPYTER NOTEBOOK TO RUN "DE-BUGGING" NEXRAD LEVEL 2 PLOTTING tutorial

"DE-BUGGING" NEXRAD LEVEL 2 PLOTTING is a simple introduction to plotting and animating NEXRAD LEVEL 2 data. It introduces the Griffin user the index service to download NEXRAD data. It demonstrates radar reflectivity plotting using the Python module pyart, and some simple filtering techniques that can be used to clean the NEXRAD L2 data. Finally, this tutorial uses some clever HTML manipulations to allow the user to produce weather animations within the Jupyter Notebook.

SECTION I: How to configure vanilla Ubuntu VM for this tutorial

NOTE: the Griffin public image is already configured & ready to go

1. Add Griffin proxies as variables in .bashrc

   printf "export no_proxy='griffin-objstore.opensciencedatacloud.org'\nfunction with_proxy() {\n\tPROXY='http://cloud-proxy:3128'\n\thttp_proxy='\${PROXY}' https_proxy='\${PROXY}' \$@\n}" >> ~/.bashrc
   

2. Source .bashrc

   . .bashrc
   

3. Install Miniconda

   with_proxy wget https://repo.continuum.io/miniconda/Miniconda2-latest-Linux-x86_64.sh
   bash Miniconda2-latest-Linux-x86_64.sh -b 
   

4. Install requisite Python modules

   with_proxy conda update conda
   with_proxy conda install -c https://conda.binstar.org/jjhelmus pyart
   with_proxy conda install jupyter
   with_proxy conda install basemap
   

5. Install tools for visualizations

   with_proxy sudo -E apt-get update
   with_proxy sudo -E apt-get install -y libav-tools 
   with_proxy sudo -E apt-get install -y python-qt4
   

SECTION II: How to run Jupyter Notebook

1. From your Local Machine (e.g. your laptop):add following lines to ~/.ssh (replacing <OSDC username> with your OSDC username)

   Host 172.17.*
   User ubuntu
   ProxyCommand ssh <OSDC username>@griffin.opensciencedatacloud.org nc %h %p 2> /dev/null
   

2. From Griffin VM

   	jupyter notebook --no-browser
   

3. From your Local Machine

   ssh -L <local port>:localhost:<griffin port> -N <Griffin VM IP Address>
   

   replacing <griffin port> with <port> given in jupyter notebook --no-browser output as

   The Jupyter Notebook is running at: http://localhost:/

4. From your Local Machine

   open browser, enter http://localhost:<local port>

SECTION III: What are these directories and files?

• miniconda: from Miniconda installation, ignore
• nexrad: working directory for this tutorial
  • mayfly_arks.txt: file containing ark IDs for relevant NEXRAD L2 data
  • mayfly_data: directory into which we will download NEXRAD L2 data
  • nexrad_display_id_service.ipynb: Jupter Notebook for tutorial
  • plots: directory into which we will save weather radar plots
  • README.md: file you are currently viewing