Classifications

• • G—PHYSICS
  • G01—MEASURING; TESTING
  • G01W—METEOROLOGY
  • G01W1/00—Meteorology
  • G01W1/10—Devices for predicting weather conditions
• • H—ELECTRICITY
  • H04—ELECTRIC COMMUNICATION TECHNIQUE
  • H04L—TRANSMISSION OF DIGITAL INFORMATION, e.g. TELEGRAPHIC COMMUNICATION
  • H04L67/00—Network arrangements or protocols for supporting network services or applications
  • H04L67/2866—Architectures; Arrangements
  • H04L67/30—Profiles
  • H04L67/306—User profiles
• • H—ELECTRICITY
  • H04—ELECTRIC COMMUNICATION TECHNIQUE
  • H04L—TRANSMISSION OF DIGITAL INFORMATION, e.g. TELEGRAPHIC COMMUNICATION
  • H04L67/00—Network arrangements or protocols for supporting network services or applications
  • H04L67/50—Network services
  • H04L67/51—Discovery or management thereof, e.g. service location protocol [SLP] or web services
• • H—ELECTRICITY
  • H04—ELECTRIC COMMUNICATION TECHNIQUE
  • H04L—TRANSMISSION OF DIGITAL INFORMATION, e.g. TELEGRAPHIC COMMUNICATION
  • H04L67/00—Network arrangements or protocols for supporting network services or applications
  • H04L67/50—Network services
  • H04L67/52—Network services specially adapted for the location of the user terminal
• • G—PHYSICS
  • G01—MEASURING; TESTING
  • G01K—MEASURING TEMPERATURE; MEASURING QUANTITY OF HEAT; THERMALLY-SENSITIVE ELEMENTS NOT OTHERWISE PROVIDED FOR
  • G01K2203/00—Application of thermometers in cryogenics

Definitions

• the present invention relates to a method for correcting/providing weather forecasts and to a weather warning method
• the weather forecast correcting/providing method is utilised in the weather warning method for establishing a higher level of predictability of the weather in the nearest future
• a method for alerting a user of weather phenomena is provided The method is based on a weather forecast, and the alerting of a user is being based on a user profile comprising at least one surveillance parameter to be monitored, such as wind speed, temperature, incident solar radiation and/or humidity, a changeable position parameter governing the geographical position of monitoring the at least one surveillance parameter and a surveillance function prescribing at least one alerting criterion, said method comprising extracting/looking up from the weather forecast, weather characteristic(s) corresponding to the position parameter and to the surveillance parameter(s), evaluating the surveillance function so as to determine whether the owner of the user profile is to be alerted.
• at least one surveillance parameter to be monitored such as wind speed, temperature, incident solar radiation and/or humidity
• said method comprising extracting/looking up from the weather forecast, weather characteristic(s) corresponding to the position parameter and to the surveillance parameter
• monitoring can refer to a direct monitoring at the geographical position, but refers normally to the situation of looking up the characteristics corresponding to position.
• a method has been provided being able to alert a user in advance of occurrence of certain weather characteristics whereby, for instance, the user in case his/hers work depends on the weather will have the possibility of not going into work - or initiating the work - just for closing down the work before he/she gets started.
• the user profile may preferably further comprise a surveillance function prescribing an alerting service to be executed in case a user is to be alerted.
• a surveillance function may stipulate the kind of service to be provided to the user, that means that while the alerting criterion sets out the criterion for alerting the alerting service sets out the stipulate the type of service to be provided.
• the alerting service may comprise certain measures to be considered by the user. Such measures may typically be based on the magnitude of the extracted weather characteristics and may provide steps to be taken by the user. Examples of such steps could be close down work and secure all building materials and apply suntan lotion to areas of your body being exposed to sun radiation.
• the alerting service may preferably comprise instructions for alerting by sending an electronic mail, preferably comprising information requested by the recipient, preferably the user, of the alert, contacting by phone or the like.
• the user of the method is automatically located.
• This feature is embodied in the method by including into the method the step of locating the user so that the extracting of information corresponding to the position parameter is based on the present geographical position of the user.
• This step will typically be executed every 5 minutes, such as every 10 minutes, preferably every 30 minutes, such every 45 minutes or even preferably every 1 hour. Combinations thereof are of course also possible.
• location of the user takes place in connection with updating of the weather forecast. This alternative may, of course, be combined with the previous alternative.
• the location of the user may preferably be performed by GPS.
• the steps of extracting/looking up and evaluating in case more than one user profile are to be assessed comprises preferably extracting/looking up weather characteristics corresponding to all user profiles to be assessed before - evaluating all the surveillance functions.
• the weather characteristics being extracted/looked up are being extracted/looked up from a database.
• a method for forecasting weather has been provided which is suitable for but not limited to providing a weather forecast on which the alerting method according to the present invention is based.
• the weather forecast may be provided by at least the following steps detecting weather characteristic(s), such as wind speed, temperature, incident solar radiation and/or humidity, at geographical locations inside a geographical region, selecting at least one geographical amending location inside said geographical region, said geographical amending location(s) may preferably be coincident with the geographical locations at which weather charactehstic(s) is(are) detected, - assigning weather characteristic(s) to the selected amending location(s), said weather characteristic(s) being typically and preferably amended weather characteristic(s); and determining, such as calculating, weather characteristics at geographic positions belonging to said selected geographical region by interpolating and/or by another mathematical means, such as solving a differential equation, between characteristic(s) being assigned to the at least one selected geographical amending location.
• weather characteristic(s) such as wind speed, temperature, incident solar radiation and/or humidity
• the weather characteristic(s) being assigned to the at least one selected geographical amending location is(are) characteristic(s) detected at these location or in the vicinity of this(these) location(s). This procedure may be particular useful in cases where discrepancies are detected between forecasted weather characteristics and the actual detected ones.
• the weather characteristic(s) assigned to the at least one selected geographical amending location is(are) correction(s) to characteristic(s) detected at this(these) location(s).
• Such weather correction(s) evolves preferably in a predefined manner, such as being constant in time, such as decay or grow linearly, exponentially, logarithmic or the like. This may preferably apply, that for instance a 10% cut off of a detected temperature may be reduced to a 5 % cut off of the next detected temperature etc.
• the determined weather characteristics are being combined with a former weather forecast in order to obtain a new weather forecast.
• the combining of weather characteristics may very advantageously be performed by superimposing weather characteristics of the former weather forecast and the determined weather characteristics.
• the determined weather characteristics may preferably be determined as corrections to the former weather forecast and the combining may preferably be performed by adding the characteristics belonging to the former weather forecast and the weather characteristics determined by interpolation and/or by use of mathematical means.
• the corrections are corrections provided by a meteorologist to detected weather characteristic, and these corrections are then assigned as weather characteristics to the selected amending locations.
• the determined weather characteristics are typically absolute values and the combining of the weather characteristics of the former weather forecast and the determined weather characteristics is preferably performed by summing up, such as averaging, the two characteristics. In embodiments wherein summing of characteristics is applied, the summing up will preferably involve weighting of the characteristics to be summed up.
• the interpolation is preferably performed by linear interpolation.
• the interpolation may be performed by cubic and/or higher order interpolation.
• the interpolation is typically preferred as one-dimensional interpolation and/or multidimensional interpolation, such as two and/or three-dimensional interpolation.
• the geographical region is displayed on a displaying means and said geographical positions are selected by pointing by use of a pointing device on the displaying means.
• the weather forecast aspect of the present invention is applied for generating the weather forecast on which the alerting method is based.
• a system for alerting users of weather phenomena comprises a database comprising forecasted weather characteristics, preferably established by weather forecast method according to the present invention, a set of user profiles, each user profile comprises at least one surveillance parameter and a surveillance function, - means, such as computer implemented match ascertaining means, adapted to ascertain matches between surveillance parameters and forecasted weather characteristics means, such as computer implemented alerting means, adapted to alert a user if a match is found between the surveillance parameter(s) belonging to said user and the forecasted weather characteristics.
• Fig. 1 is a data flow diagram
• Fig. 2 is a forecast update diagram
• Fig. 3 is a description of the database of personal profiles
• Fig. 4 shows an example, probability for a weather phenomenon (thunder), produced by the present invention.
• a method for alerting a user of weather phenomena is provided.
• the method is based on a weather forecast, and the alerting of a user is being based on a user profile comprising at least one surveillance parameter to be monitored, a changeable position parameter governing the geographical position of monitoring the at least one surveillance parameter and a surveillance function prescribing at least one alerting criterion, said method comprising - extracting/looking up from the weather forecast, weather characteristic(s) corresponding to the position parameter and to the surveillance parameter(s), evaluating the surveillance function so as to determine whether the owner of the user profile is to be alerted.
• monitoring can refer to a direct monitoring at the geographical position, but refers normally to the situation of looking up the characteristics corresponding to position.
• a method has been provided being able to alert a user in advance of occurrence of certain weather characteristics whereby, for instance, the user in case his/hers work depends on the weather will have the possibility of not going into work - or initiating the work - just for closing down the work before he/she gets started.
• the weather forecast may be provided by at least the following steps detecting weather characteristic(s), such as wind speed, temperature and/or humidity, at geographical locations inside a geographical region, selecting at least one geographical amending location inside said geographical region, said geographical locations may preferably be coincident with the geographical locations at which weather character ⁇ st ⁇ c(s) ⁇ s(are) detected, determining calculated weather characteristics at geographic positions belonging to said selected geographical region by interpolating and/or by another mathematical means, such as solving a differential equation, between character ⁇ st ⁇ c(s) being assigned to the at least one selected geographical amending location
• the aim of the system is to give qualified personal weather service to a large group of users
• the weather service can cover a large area and give precise weather forecasts to any single location on the area
• the weather service can be offered to an infinite number of users because the users demands are treated automatic Every single user sets up his/her own personal profile on a password-protected interface
• the system comprises two software packets (1 , 2) and two databases (3, 4)
• One software packet (1) is a newly invented procedure for current semiautomatic treating of meteorological data and thereby frequent updated weather forecasts
• the other software packet (2) is a programme that current finds matches between the weather forecast data base (3) and the data base of all user profiles (4) and hereby gives every single user the weather service corresponding to a personal profile
• the system presents the weather forecast on a graphical interface
• Input to the system is observation data, model output and/or current corrected weather forecasts
• Output from the system is an updated weather forecast
• a meteorological data set (e g a weather forecast) has a graphical representation If the observations show deviations in relation to the weather forecast, the meteorologist can change data in the weather forecast by using a pointing device on the graphical interface
• the meteorologist can change the hole data set by using a graphical interface
• the meteorologist chooses a set of correction points using a pointing device From the set of correction points the system makes an area wide update of the weather forecast for the selected geographical region e g a country
• the programme makes an interpolation of the values between the corrected points and the result is a fast update of the forecasts for all locations
• the system is supported by current observations which are used for frequent correcting short range forecasts
• the update can be done at all moments, but a suitable schedule for updating is shown in figure 2
• the way the system provides the new weather forecast is the following At the corrections points the meteorologist provides either a change or an absolute value of the characteristic or characteristics, which are to be modified
• the meteorologist wants to correct the temperature within the area of interest he/she picks (or selects) a number of correction points and assign either a temperature difference with respect to the former weather forecast or and absolute temperature to the correction points
• characteristics in the whole area of interest are determined, for instance by interpolating between characteristics assigned to a selected number of correction points
• the interpolation is based on a selection of at least three correction points and characteristics within the triangle defined by these three correction points are made by interpolation
• the interpolation may preferably be performed by a cubic interpolation Correction will then be most dominant close to the correction points and values being distant from the correction points will then take values closer to the values forecasted by the former weather forecast
• the weather forecast may be provided by averaging the characteristics belonging to the former weather forecast and the field determined
• the averaging may be a weighted average
• the advantage of this feature is that the meteorologist can save time when he/she is making corrections
• Example The model output predicts the temperature to be 12 °C at the time 001125, 0600 (yymmdd, time) at a specific location
• the meteorologist decides to elevate it to 16 °C He/she chooses that the correction shall be expanded for 8 hours and that the weight of the expansion shall be 50% after the said 8 hours
• the shown expansion example is linear but can be also be logarithmic, exponential or other
• the users set up their specific demands to weather subjects and make their own personal profile This is done on a password protected interface (e g a homepage) and the first time the user accesses the interface, he/she is given a login name, a password and one or more user licenses per login name At this level the payment will take place Login name, password and relations about the licenses can always be altered by the user if wanted Data given to the interface is stored in a database of all personal profiles
• a software programme extracts specific weather data for every postal code, municipality and for selected geographic locations, from the weather forecast for a large area This means that users automatic receive an often updated weather forecast according to their specific personal profiles
• the user sets up his/her own profile by choosing which weather data is most interesting and choosing between specific locations or location by GPS or other dynamic localisation system
• the parameters can be all kind of meteorological data and includes the following examples
• Airborne pollution in different levels different weather phenomena probability for the different weather phenomena uncertainty for the different weather phenomena
• Airborne pollution in different levels When the user logs in to the weather service he/she will automatic receive weather data according the personal profile. This profile can always be changed and the data base is automatic updated.
• the user can choose to be warned if certain weather situations appear.
• the user sets up his/her own demands about when to be warned and additional by what probability for a certain weather situation.
• the criteria's can be all kind of weather situations and meteorological relations. This service is available on chosen locations and locations by GPS or other dynamic localisation system.
• algae blooms If there is an algae bloom in the summertime, people going to the beach wants to know about it
• the distribution of algae blooms is drawn into a digital map
• the information about algae blooms can be presented for example on the Internet as maps or as text information
• Ozone can be a contributor in the development of cancer Therefore
• the Ministry for Health or a cancer society could be interested in alerting people of high concentrations of ozone in the atmosphere
• ozone concentration forecast On the interface the meteorologist on the background of observations, model output and his/her knowledge about atmospheric processes gives a forecast of the ozone concentration He/she can choose between giving absolute values to different places on the chosen geographical area or giving a relative value The relative value could be high, medium or low health risk
• the actual data can be presented on a map showing different areas with different colours according to the ozone concentration or to a relative risk
• data can be extracted from the entire ozone forecast and presented for smaller regions or for locations
• postcode or location by GPS Data can in all cases be presented on web sites, WAP phones, i-mode phones, PDA ' s or printed
• a device for surveillance of weather observations and weather forecasts The device can be formed like a pager and it can instantly receive information about the development of different observations and forecasts. The device has a screen where the received information can be shown.
• the device contains a surveillance function.
• the user can choose some weather parameters which has to be watched.
• the device gives a signal, for example a beep.
• the meteorologist makes his/her forecasts for a selected geographic region.
• the relevant forecasts will be superimposed on a digital roadmap and data for example for slippery roads will be extracted from the combination of forecasts and roadmap.
• the extracted data can be presented on a new map that shows for example slippery roads, but it can also be used "smart":
• the driver keys in his or her starting point and destination on an interface. A programme finds the best route in relation to time and it shows the driver where and on the route he/she can expect for example slippery roads.
• This route alerting system is thought to handle the weather parameters: storm (closed ferry routes, closed bridges, difficult driving), snow, sleet, glaze, frost (slippery roads, difficult driving), heavy rain (difficult driving).
• Case # 1 John is a farmer: John saves money and resources by using forecast2u.com
• the pesticide needs 3 hours dry weather to work and the weather forecast predicts rain from the west during the day. According to the yield John want to do the spraying, but he is afraid of wasting both working hours and the pesticide if it starts raining.
• Forecast2u.com Today he is a forecast2u.com customer and receives a weather forecast which is updated every hour and concerns the specific area where he works. In the afternoon he consults the precipitation forecast for the coming night at forecast2u.com and if the probability for precipitation is less than 10 % he does not use coverage. For a secure he chooses that forecast2u.com shall alert him if rain will reach his area anyway.

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• Engineering & Computer Science (AREA)
• Computer Networks & Wireless Communication (AREA)
• Signal Processing (AREA)
• Environmental & Geological Engineering (AREA)
• Life Sciences & Earth Sciences (AREA)
• Atmospheric Sciences (AREA)
• Biodiversity & Conservation Biology (AREA)
• Ecology (AREA)
• Environmental Sciences (AREA)
• Management, Administration, Business Operations System, And Electronic Commerce (AREA)

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• 2000
  • 2000-11-27 EP EP00979454A patent/EP1257851A1/de not_active Withdrawn
  • 2000-11-27 WO PCT/DK2000/000650 patent/WO2001038903A1/en not_active Application Discontinuation
  • 2000-11-27 AU AU16932/01A patent/AU1693201A/en not_active Abandoned

Non-Patent Citations (1)

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