Satellite Communications Blog - Beyond Expectations | Pulsar

Free GRIB Software Now Offered As Part of XGate Satellite Data Service

Written by Kinley Paisley | Mar 10, 2015 1:00:00 PM

XGate Satellite Data Service Now Offers FREE GRIB Weather Software and An Integrated GRIB Viewer At No Extra Cost

Now, with just a few clicks, XGate users can easily see weather forecast visualizations so they can make critical decisions based on weather patterns, and be confident on the water or in remote areas.


XGate Satellite Weather on iOS, Android, Mac, and Windows

There are many different options for getting weather over satellite, but the easiest is using the brand new built-in weather feature within XGate satellite data service. This compression data service allows you to send and receive email over very narrow bandwidth satellite devices (like a satellite phone).

The new weather feature in XGate has two different functions:

iOS and Android

From within the XGate app in iOS and Android, there is a full-featured weather forecast section that allows you to see the weather forecast and meteorological information about a chosen location. 

Mac and PC

From within the XGate program on Mac and PC, there is a new GRIB file retrieval and viewer built directly into XGate. You can choose your location on a map and request and view weather information for that location (wind direction and speed, primary wave heigh, wave period, and wave direction, and convective precipitation). 

Powerful GRIB File Weather Viewer

The GRIB file viewer that is now integrated in XGate is based on GRIBPlot - an easy-to-use GRIB viewer that also retrieves GRIB files through XGate's compression email service. GRIBPlot has many features for viewing GRIB files, including:

  • Layers
  • Contour Data
  • Vector Lines
  • Bitmap Data
  • Zoom
  • Animate 

With the built-in GRIB viewer you can retrieve GRIB files by pointing the cursor over the geographical area where you would like weather information for and then clicking the "Email" button. This will send a request to your XGate outbox. When you're ready to download your GRIB file, you do a session in XGate, wait a minute or two, and then do another session to retrieve the GRIB file. 

Learn More

XGate uses Global Marine Network's popular GRIB retrieval system and can retrieve the following information for GRIB files:

  • Wind
  • Wave
  • Pressure
  • Precipitation

The GRIB robot also has a batch mode to schedule GRIB files to be delivered to you daily. 

You can learn about the GMN GRIB Service here.

XGate is a prepaid subscription service with service lengths from as little as 7 days to up to 2 years. You can learn more about XGate herearn More About XGate