A software application that provides METAR weather data for your web cam and website

METARs Downloader is a handy utility for anyone interested in watching weather trends for sites around the world or in their own back yard.

Add extra information to your web site or web cam with this software. Also fishermen and hunters can benefit by knowing where the temperature and barometer is headed. These are just a few uses for METARs Downloader.

Updating the Metar data and your site is easy, just set the scheduler for how often you want the update/uploads done, every 30 to 360 minutes, and METARs Downloader does the rest.

METARs Downloader will tell you everything you want to know about the weather.

METARs Downloader accesses METAR weather data for over 7,000 locations worldwide, the data retrieved is used in several ways, as an overlay for a web cam, uploaded in a text file or as .gif images to be included on a page on the Internet, and/or to create charts showing temperature, dew point, visibility, and barometer readings that is saved locally or uploaded to be included in a page on the Internet.

These are the main features of this software

• Line Symbols On Line Charts: Add line symbols to your line charts. Choose any one of three: circle, square, or triangle. You have the option not to add them to the thumbnails while still having them on the main charts..
• Choose Either Bars Or Lines To Be Displayed: You can set the data display style for your charts. Each data type has the option to be added to the chart as line data or bar data. You as well can set the colors of the bars and lines
• Upload Chart Data: Upload a tab delimited text file containing the time and data used in creating the displayed chart.
• Save Chart Images: Save a copy of the chart in one of five formats, JPG, BMP, GIF, PNG, and TIF. The size of the image is set manually or is the same as what is shown in the chart window
• Raw TAF Data: Upload a text file with the raw TAF data as it comes from the ADDS servers.
• Raw METAR Data: Upload a text file with the raw METAR data as it comes from the ADDS servers.
• Upload Charts To Server: Upload your weather chart(s) to your web site as .JPG, .GIF, or .PNG · Upload Thumbnails Of Charts: Upload thumbnail image of the chart in the dimensions you specify (.GIF only)
• Charting: View the trends with the charting feature. To view the types and options available for the charts generated by METARs Downloader Visit the page.
• Upload Statistics: Upload weather statistics for the amount of time covered by the charts as text or .GIF image
• NDBC (N)ational (D)ata (B)uoy (C)enter Browser: Integrated browser used to display data from buoys and C-MAN stations around the world.
• Compact/Restore: Hide/Show the charts and decoded displays in the main window
• Save Data To Delimited File: Data may be saved to a delimited file that may be imported into a third party application just like a spreadsheet. The delimiter is selectable by the user.
• Save Copies Of Current Output Locally: Select a local directory where copies of the current uploadable files will be saved. Perfect for those running a server on the same system as METARs Downloader.
• Log Data To File: Record weather data to weather.log for review.
• Weather log Upload: By setting the log cycling to the number of days you want to display on your server and uploading the resulting file
• Log Cycling: You set the days to let the logs build, 1 to 365. Use the resulting weather log as a added data item for your site with the log upload.
• Upload Decoded METAR Data: Upload a text file and/or a .GIF containing the decoded METARs data to your server to be used on your page.
• View Decoded METAR Data: This option downloads the decoded METAR data from the database and displays it in the main window and makes it available for use in the program, This data is just updated in the database once an hour.
• Upload To Server: Upload files to remote server containing weather data.
• Selectable Display: Display English results or Metric results or a combination of the two.
• Internet Update: Check for updates to program by selecting Update Program in the Help menu.
• Set The Data Labels For Output: i.e. use temp., temperature or any other name you want for the identifier.
• Turn On/Off Output File Creation: Turn off output file if you are using the program to upload to server exclusively
• Automatic Mode: Set program to begin the download cycle when started instead of waiting for the user to press the start button. This comes in handy when using the program with the task scheduler where the scheduler has been set to start the web cam software and the downloader at a pre-set time
• Customizable: You set the font and background colors for all image displays and uploads, charts and data
• Language - Localization: Various text and labels used in the program and in the uploaded output is changed to suit the users preferences. Allows output to be displayed in different languages.
• AutoRange: Five of the seven charts automatically select the optimum scale in that to display the data.
• Selectable Refresh Interval: 30 to 1440 minutes (24 hours)

· Selectable Connection Modes:
Standard data retrieval mode is FTP but user may choose to use the alternate HTTP technique if having problems

Requirements for this software

· .Net Framework

Limitations of this software

• 15 days trial

· The trial version operates just at the full version except the trial version charts are marked with the words Trial Version

What's new in this release

• Updated help file
• When Visible selection for data item in Options>>Output & Misc. is unchecked that data is no longer included in the statistics output.
• Added Current Statistics to Extras. Displays the current highs and lows for the charted period.
• Renamed Statistics to Run-Time Statistics

· Barometer chart still not displaying properly when data was missing in METARs data under certain conditions...