weather on the scope fixed

[Keith Smith]

I found a bug in the logic associated with fetching weather for the scopes. This has been resolved and we should consistently see updated weather for all US airports on the scope from this point on. This important for pilots and controllers to know, so I thought I'd post it here rather than in only the controller's private forum.

[Rauerb3]

What was the problem? Inquiring minds want to know.

[Keith Smith]

The weather was being fetched from NOAA 2 secs after the top of every hour, using the most recent weather file from their server. There would typically be a bunch of weather stations that had not YET reported their weather for the previous hour (they typically make the reading 10 mins before the top of every hour).

As weather reports continue to come in, that same file is updated multiple times per hour. Had we been checking 15 mins after the top of the hour, we'd have had much better coverage.

As a result of the bug, many airports' weather was many, many hours old (basically, the last time they reported their latest weather in a timely fashion).

The solution? Stop pulling weather at the exact top of the hour. Now, the server just pulls it every 15 mins. The neat thing there is that if any interim METARs are reported, we'll catch 'em.