Supported formats.

• HRIT
• LRIT
• HDF5
• Native
• bzip2 data from Himawari
• 10 bits per pixel plain format
• 8 bits per pixel plain format
• HRPT format of NOAA
• EPS format of METOP
• Admin messages (xml based)
• JPEG files coming from David's MSG Data Manager
• DWDSAT formats:
  • currently only file management
• preview by launching an external viewer
• export by translating and copying data to destination directory

Settings.

Some tabs contain a 'Save' button, to store the settings in that tab. Currently this is done for the 'main' tab (under 'More'), 'Record' tab, and 'Received' tab. (This replaces the 'gui state sav' option in previous versions of xrit2pic.)

There are 3 places where xrit2pic.ini are searched after starting xrit2pic:

• Directory where xrit2pic is started (not necessarely where the program is located!)
• In $HOME directory (Windows: C:\)
• On same location as where the program is installed

The 2 most important settings are:

• Source location: Place where Tellique dumps the files; by default:
  • Linux: from_msg/received
  • Windows: c:\Program Files\T-Systems\Business TV-IP\received\
• Destination location: place where translated pictures are dumped; by default:
  • Linux: the location where the program is started.
  • Windows: C:\

Xrit2pic and MSG Data Manager.

Receiving.

• xrit2pic moves received data to received\done, in record mode
• MDM deletes raw data after translation, or moves raw data to a certain directory

• Don't use xrit2pic and MDM together on the same 'received' directory.
  Also don't use MDM on the 'done' directory of xrit2pic.

• In xrit2pic: Set the 'received' directory to the location where MDM stores the jpeg files.
• If IR channels have to be handled, make sure that MDM uses thermal mapping for all channels. Note that by default WV channels are NOT translated the right way!

• Special mappings like airmass etc. (see second note!),
• generating movies
• using HRV channel in combination with other channels to make high resolution colour pics
• Etc.

Main window.

• Main: showing an organized tree structure of all received data.
  From here, items can be selected to view and export.
• Record: organize what to do with just received data. For this, the 'Update' mode needs to be enabled; this will update the tree in the main tab, generate pictures/movies as soon as all needed data is received, and also will remove data not needed anymore, or data exceeding a certain age.
• Received: Here you can define the location where received data is to expect. Multiple locations may be defined, from which one needs to be choose to work on.
• Archive: This will move raw data to another location, so it is not shown in the main tab anymore, but can be accessed for later processing. While data in the main tab may be removed in an automatic way, archived data will not be touched/deleted, except if done explicitely in a manual way.
• Exported: Showing all data generated from the raw data. External viewing programs may be defined to show these files, like eog, irfanview etc.
• Program info: showing some program info, like version.

Description main window:

• The blue lines show the available 'groups', i.e. received pictures of a particular time and type (e.g. LRIT, HRIT).
  • The code in the colum 'Format' shows briefly the channels available; V=Visible spectrum,I=Infra-red, W=water vapour
• Opening an entry will show all received channels of that session.
  A channel which is 'complete', i.e. all segments are available, is coloured green.
  A channel in which one or more segments are missing is coloured red.
  • The column 'Format' now shows the compression method used for the received picture (Wavelet, JPEG)
  • The column 'Segments' shows the amount of pieces (files) for each channel: actual amount and expected. Normally these 2 numbers are equal.
  
  For correct displaying of channel HRV the prologue file is needed. If this file is missing the HRV-line is coloured yellow.
• If desired a channel entry may be opened; this will show all segments of that channel.
  • The column 'Format' now shows the size of each segment.
  • The column 'Segments' shows the segment number.
  • The column 'Channel' shows a rough estimation of the lattitude range of each segment.

Selection can be done in several ways:

• Select a set of channels by clicking on a blue line.
• Select a channel by clicking on a green (or red) line.
• Select a segment of a channel, by clicking on a black line.

• Click on the first item to select, keep the mouse button pressed and move the mouse to the last item to select, then release the mouse button.
• Or: Click on the first item to select, scrol to the last item, then press shift-key and click on last item. All items in between will be selected.
• To add single items to the selection: Press control-key and click on items to add.
  

Buttons in main window.

Expand: Expand the tree 1 level, so all channels become visible. Clicking again will collapse the list.

Menu items

Preview.

Export.

• Select the picture (or message) to export (i.e., generate a file).
• Select 'Compose' to generate a colour picture (for this a group, i.e. blue line, has to be selected).
• Choose Europe and/or Anaglyph if desired.
• Choose overlay and overlay type if desired.
• Click on 'Export'.

• PGM16 for pictures transmited in Wavelet 10 format (e.g. HRIT)
• PGM8 for pictures transmited in Wavelet 8 format (e.g. foreign LRIT)
• PPM for colour pictures transmited in Wavelet 8 format (e.g. foreign LRIT)
• JPEG for pictures transmited in JPEG format (LRIT MSG)
• For AVHRR:
  • RAH if a group (blue line) is selected and NO colour mapping window is open (Only NOAA!)
  • PPM if a group (blue line) is selected and colour mapping window is open
  • PGM16 if a channel (green line) is selected

Overlay for MSG: Country boundaries etc.

1. Use the "picture" overlay files of Eumetsat
2. Use vector-based overlay files

"Picture" overlay files.

"Vector" overlay files.

Colour pictures.

Geographic mappings.

• Plate Carree
• Mercator
• Polar north
• Polar south

Translation multiple pictures.

Generation of multiple pictures.

• Select which channel(s) should be translated. E.g. if 10 HRIT-sets are selected then it is possible to generate pictures for just VIS006 and VIS008. This would result in 20 pictures.
• Select output format (pgm, jpeg, default).
• If zoomed pictures have to be generated:
  • Click on 'Preview' in the popup window (NOT in the main window). A special preview window with the first selected picture will pop up.
  • Zoom in and change lum settings, if desired.
• Click on 'Do it'.
• Click on 'Abort' to stop all the translations. (The current translation will first be completed.)

Pressing 'Help' gives a overview of the meaning of the status-'led's':

Generation of movies.

• In the main window: Make sure just 1 type of picture is shown in the tree-list, e.g. "Hrit". ('List' section, at the bottom).
• Click 'Select all' or select manually items to include in the movie.
• Click on 'Export'. Now a Translate list will pop up.
• Select in this new window 1 channel to use for the film.
• Select 'Movie'.
• Select 'Time id' if you want date/time information on each frame (in left-upper corner).
• If a zoomed movie has to be generated:
  • Click on 'Preview' in the popup window (NOT in the main window). A special preview window with the first selected picture will pop up.
  • Zoom in and change lum settings, if desired.
• Click on 'Do it' to start generation.

Note on using preview window: The first picture selected will be shown in the preview window. If this pic is not suitable to do the settings then:

Some extra movie features:

• To generate colour movies enable 'Colour' (change colour mapping if desired).
• To use a limited amount of segments fill in the 'Segments' field in the Translate window.'
  E.g. enter 8 or 6-8 to use just these segments.
• To skip incomplete frames enable the button 'Skip incomplete'.
• Change maximum size if desired. The default, 2048x2048, can be changed in the preferences. If e.g. a HRIT movie is generated (size 3712x3712) the size will be changed into 1856x1856 (3712/2). (Note that some movie players, e.g. mplayer, can not handle movies with a size bigger than 2048x2048.)

In the Translate window, second row of buttons, choose near 'Tempfiles':

• Reuse: only generate if needed; don't delete temp files
• Replace: re-generate temp files, don't delete them
• Remove: remove all used tempfiles after generation of movie. (Files not used for the movie are not removed.)

Generation of zoomed/adjusted pictures or movies.

If multiple items are selected only the first item will get a preview. It is however possible to use another item to do the settings:

• Select the item which you want to use for the settings. E.g. if you want to generate a movie for one day you probably want to use the picture of noon to do the lum settings.
• Click on 'Preview'. After that you may select the actual set of items.
• Do the settings in the preview window (zooming/panning, lum settings, anaglyph settings if desired).
• Select 'Movie' and other features if desired.
• Click on 'Do it'. Now the settings in the preview window will be used for all selected items.

Recording.

'Show live' subtap

• To show pictures immediately after they are received click Show
• Select a satellite. HMSG? means: Hrit MSG1, 2, 3 or 4. This is usefull to cope with changing satellites, which takes place from time to time. (There are never 2 satellites with the same data active at a time.)
• Either choose 'Colour' or select a channel to show. Note that the colour mode of 'Live' is limited; just simple RGB mappings are possible. Default mapping, IR-016=red / VIS008=green / VIS006=blue, may be changed by opening the channel map window.
• Choose 'Invert' if you want to invert a selected IR channel.
• Set 'Brightness' to 0, 1 or 2 (0=bright, 2=dark; 1=best setting)

'Generate' subtap

File management.

xrit2pic uses following directory structure to handle xrit-data:

• received: directory in which Telicast dumps the received data
• done: a help directory; normally users don't need to know about it, except if you want for whatever reason to locate files without xrit2pic.
• archive: contains directories for each date containing data of that date.

• Move to Archive: Moves data from received to archive; data is divided into subdirectories for each date.
• Move back to received: Moves content of selected directory(s) back. (Normally this is never needed.)
• Load selected: Load selected directory(s) into active tree.
• Delete selected: Deletes content of selected directory(s).

• amsub
• hirs

Move data between received and done directory:
Normally never needed.

• Move to done:
• Move back from done:

Handle exported/generated files.

Click the Exported tab.

Exported/generated files (including movie files) in the destination directory are now visible. Files may be viewed using an external viewer (see 'Viewer programs' in preferences) or deleted. Temporary files, used to generate movies, are also accessible via this window.

Prologue/epilogue files.

Currently xrit2pic only uses prologue files to extract the position of the 2 parts of the HRV channel. The used prologue data is visible using Preview (select first the prologue file in the tree).
If data is processed using external programs the prologue/epilogue data may be needed. For this purpose they can be exported.
To extract a prologue/epilogue file select the item and click on 'Export'.

It is possible to export prologue/epilogue files in an automatic way together with the channels they belong to. See 'Other features'.

Other features.

Bitselect.

• Generation of color PPM (3x8 bits) format from 10-bits Wavelet.
• Preview: Pictures with more than 8 bits per pixel.

• [9:2]: The 8 most significant bits wil be used/saved; the 2 LSB's are lost.
• [8:1]: The MSB will be used for clipping, the next 8 bits wil be used/saved, the LSB will be lost.
• [7:0]: The 2 MSB's are used for clipping; the 8 LSB's wil be used/saved.

• [9:2] gives: 01000001 (LSB's '01' lost)
• [8:1] gives: 10000010 (LSB '1' and MSB '0' lost)
• [7:0] gives: 11111111 (MSB '01' lost; clip pixel on value 255)

Invert.

3D sh.

AVHRR Segment range

• Start: start segment
• Nbr: number of segments (0 means: all, with a maximum of 102 minutes of segments which is about 1 orbit).

Format.

By default files will be generated with highest possible quality:

• If source is 10-bits Wavelet: 16 bits PGM will be generated.
• If source is 8-bits Wavelet: 8 bits PGM will be generated.
• If source is 8-bits JPEG: JPEGwill be generated, without intermediate decompression.

	default	PGM selected		JPEG selected	Blue line selected
		black&white	colour	B&W or colour
LRIT (Meteosat)	JPEG 8 bits (1)	PGM 1 byte	PPM 3 bytes	JPEG 24 bit (2)	select window pops up
LRIT (foreign)	PGM 1 or 2 bytes	PGM 1 or 2 bytes	(not supported)	JPEG 24 bit	select window pops up
HRIT except HRV	PGM 2 bytes	PGM 1 or 2 bytes	PPM 3 bytes	JPEG 24 bit	select window pops up
HRIT HRV	PGM 2 bytes	PGM 1 or 2 bytes	(not supported)	JPEG 24 bit
HDF5	PGM 2 bytes	PGM 1 or 2 bytes	PPM 3 bytes	JPEG 24 bit	rah (for wsat, hrptreader)
AVHRR	PGM 2 bytes	PGM 1 or 2 bytes	PPM 3 bytes	JPEG 24 bit	rah (for wsat, hrptreader)
EPS	PGM 2 bytes	PGM 1 or 2 bytes	PPM 3 bytes	JPEG 24 bit	rah (for wsat, hrptreader)
Admin	text (ASCII) format
Other	binary format

Notes:

• (1) Generated without decompression. Advantage: No extra loss; disadvantage: picture upside-down (for most cases).
• (2) original is first decompressed, then segments are put together, then compressed again. Disadvantage: Extra loss; advantage: picture can be generated 'upside-up'.

Remarks on file formats.

• JPEG 12 bits, though a standard format, is not very common. (At this moment this format isn't transmitted anymore by MSG.)
• PGM 2 bytes seems not to be well defined; some programs use so-called Little Endian format (LSByte first), others Big Endian (MSByte first). The last one seems to be more common, so xrit2pic will generate Big Endian format. (If there is need for Little Endian format this is easy to add; let me know!)
• If PGM8 (1 byte PGM) or PPM is selected but the original has more bits per pixel then the bitrange is determined by 'Bitselect' (i.e., bits 9...2, or 8...1 or 7...0 are used).
• RAH ("Rob Alblas HRPT Format) contains all channels, and has space to add Kepler info etc. Readable by my wsat program and David Taylor's HRPTReader.

Non-gui mode.

The 2 PC's have the following functionality:

1. Receiving PC (R):
   • Equiped with Skystar2 tuner
   • Running Tellicast
   • Optional: Running xrit2pic to delete unneeded data
2. Processing PC (P):
   • Data-connection to receiving PC
   • Running xrit2pic to process data

Method A: (see detailed Windows settings below)

• On PC 'R' xrit2pic only deletes unwanted data (optional)
• On PC 'P' xrit2pic reads data from harddisk 'R' of PC 'R' via data connection and writes results to harddisk 'P' of PC 'P'

Method B:

• On PC 'R' xrit2pic only deletes unwanted data
• On PC 'P' remaining raw data is copied from PC 'R'
• xrit2pic reads raw data from harddisk 'P' and writes results to same or other harddisk on PC 'P'

Method C:

• On PC 'R' xrit2pic translates raw data into standard picture format, then deletes all raw data
• On PC 'P' the translated pics are copied from PC 'R'
• xrit2pic reads data (in standard pic format) from harddisk 'P' and writes results to harddisk 'P'

Advantage: Processing is quicker (decompressing Wavelet is processor intensive). Disadvantage: Bigger files (if used format is PGM) or data loss (if JPEG is used)
(Note: Working on adding losless compressed format with at least 10 bits per pixel.)

Method B is currently the best method: no data loss before processing, and file sizes relatively small.

Settings for remote access (Linux).

• yum install fuse-sshfs

• mkdir /mnt/msg

• sshfs abcd@192.168.1.40:/home/abcd

Settings for remote access (Windows).

Method A using Windows.

Now in detail:
Assumed is standard Tellique installation, i.e., received directory is:
Program Files\T-Systems\BusinessTV-IP\received
on your Receiver PC.

• On the Receiver PC: Set 'BusinessTV-IP' dir as 'Shared':
  • Browse to Program Files\T-Systems
  • Right-click on directory 'BusinessTV-IP' and select 'Properties'
  • Click on tab 'Sharing'
  • In part 'Sharing and protecting: Network' enable 'Shared'.
  • Click on OK.
  Check that the directory is shared:
  • Go to 'My network locations'.
  • Select from the menu "View -> Details".
  • Check that 'BusinessTV-IP' is present under 'Local network'. In the second column you can see the path to this directory:
    \\pcname\BusinessTV-IP (with pcname the name of your Receiver PC).

• On the Processing PC:
  • Start xrit2pic and go to tab 'Received'.
  • Enter the remote path in the field 'Directory to add':
    \\pcname\BusinessTV-IP\received
    Note that this is the same directory name found on the 'Receiver PC' under 'My network locations', but with directory received added.
  • Click on "Load selected" (button at bottom of window).
    Now the content of the directory on the remote 'Receiver PC' should be vissible in the main window.
  • If you want to save this setting: Go back to 'Received' tab and click on 'Save it'.

What works remotely:

What maybe doesn't work remotely: (to test)

Preferences.

• cycle: repeating cycle in seconds
• Show channel: Determine which channel to show during update. If empty then all channels are shown. Wild cards are allowed, e.g.: VIS*

• Tree updating: At program start xrit2pic starts immediately reading new received files, and updating the tree in the main window.
• Delete old: At program start old files (see "Delete old files" above) are deleted

If no viewer is specified the following built-in viewers are used:

• Linux:
  • for JPEG: xv, reverse-scan option: -record 180
  • for PGM: wsat, reverse-scan option: -sn
• Windows:
  • for JPEG: i_view32, reverse-scan option: /rotate_r /rotate_r
  • for PGM: i_view32, reverse-scan option: /rotate_r /rotate_r

• For jpeg xv is used. The command executed is:
  xv file.jpg
• For pgm/ppm wsat is used. The command executed is:
  wsat -w 500 -h 500 -i file.pgm
• For avi mplayer is used. The command executed is:
  mplayer -fps 3 file.avi -loop 0 &

• Track: Tracking (NORAD 2-elements)
  • Type in the file name (default: weather.txt).
  • Click on 'Search', to check if the file is found. See tap 'Misc' in preferences for suitable locations for this file.
• Earth maps: Background picture of earth, for tracks or scatterometer info (if no MSG data is used)
• Markers: City locations (format: gpx with waypoints)
  Also in this tab: Define location of one mark point
• LUT: LUT files
• Output: Define format of generated output files.
  • Uncheck 'Use fileformat' to use the default built-in names for generated files.
  • Check 'Use fileformat' and enter a format spec to define a custom filename format.

  format	example result	comment
  picture	picture.jpg	always same filename	%s%c_%t	MSG1VIS006_061220_1200.jpg

       %a     The abbreviated weekday name according to the current locale.

       %A     The full weekday name according to the current locale.

       %b     The abbreviated month name according to the current locale.
 
       %B     The full month name according to the current locale.

       %C     The century number (year/100) as a 2-digit integer. (SU)
 
       %d     The day of the month as a decimal number (range 01 to 31).
 
       %D     Equivalent to %m/%d/%y. (Yecch - for Americans only.   Americans
              should  note  that in other countries %d/%m/%y is rather common.
              This means that in international context this format is  ambigu-
              ous and should not be used.) (SU)
 
       %e     Like %d, the day of the month as a decimal number, but a leading
              zero is replaced by a space. (SU)

       %H     The  hour as a decimal number using a 24-hour clock (range 00 to
              23).
 
       %I     The hour as a decimal number using a 12-hour clock (range 01  to
              12).
 
       %j     The day of the year as a decimal number (range 001 to 366).

       %p     Either  \x{2018}AM\x{2019}  or  \x{2018}PM\x{2019} according to the given time value, or the
              corresponding strings for the current locale.  Noon  is  treated
              as \x{2018}pm\x{2019} and midnight as \x{2018}am\x{2019}.

Save colour mappings per source type:

Save zoom areas:

• Name (will be used in the pull-down menu)
• Center longitude and latitude
• Delta lon: degrees west and east of center longitude
• Delta lat: degrees north and south of center latitude

• Open the preferences window, tab Mappings, and alter the center/delta numbers.
• Quit the preview window, and re-open it again. (No need to save preferences at this point, or to restart xrit2pic.)

Calculations center/delta's to zoom areas:

• Use lon1=center.lon-delta.lon and lat=center.lat to calculate x1 (left pixel of area)
• Use lon2=center.lon+delta.lon and lat=center.lat to calculate x2 (right pixel of area)
• Use lat1=center.lat-delta.lat and lon=center.lon to calculate y1 (bottom pixel of area)
• Use lat2=center.lat+delta.lat and lon=center.lon to calculate y2 (top pixel of area)

Saving/restoring gui state.

• Main window (tab 'Main', including menu 'View after export')
• 'Translate list' (except channel choice) (pops up after clicking 'Export' or 'Preview' if multiple channels are selected)
• 'Channels to keep' (pops up after clicking 'Remove' in main window part 'New files')

• Make sure each window for which you want to store the gui state is open, and all buttons are in the desired state.
  • for 'Channels to keep' you need to enable 'Remove' to change selections; after that you may deselect 'Remove'.
• From the Edit menu select item 'Preferences' and click 'Save gui state'.

Installation.

Linux.

There are 2 files to download:

• xrit2pic.gz: the program
• decompr.tar.gz: 2 lib files

Unzip the 2 files and place the result into e.g. $HOME/bin.
For AVHRR bzip2 is needed. This is also present in each Linux distribution.

Windows.

There are 4 or 5 files to download:

• xrit2pic.zip: the program
• gtk_dll.zip: 8 dll's
• decompr.zip: 2 dll's
• xrit_install.exe: the installer.
• bzip2.exe (needed for AVHRR)

Installation using install program:

• Make sure that the 3 zip files and xrit_install.exe are downloaded in the same directory.
• Run xrit_install.exe.
• Copy bzip2.exe to the same directory as where xrit2pic is located. (Not yet done by installer.)
• Make a link to c:\Program Files\xrit\xrit2pic.exe
  • browse to the program, right-click on it and from the popup menu choose "Make Link" (or so))

Installation: (if install program is not used)

• Make directory: c:\Program Files\xrit (if there is no c:\Program Files try another disk).
• Place all zip files into this directory.
• Unzip the 3 zip files, e.g. using winzip.
• Copy bzip2.exe to the same directory.
• Make a link to c:\Program Files\xrit\xrit2pic.exe
  • browse to the program, right-click on it and from the popup menu choose "Make Link" (or so))

Example non-gui commands.

xrit2pic -nogui -type H -chan VIS* -segm 7-8 -time 12:00 

xrit2pic -nogui -type H -chan VIS* -segm 7-8 -time 12:00 -log
rm /home/user/from_msg/received/*

xrit2pic -nogui -type H -chan VIS* -segm 7-8 -time 12:00 -log
del c:\from_msg\received\*.*

Start it using 'Task scheduler'.

Details about movie generation.

• A special directory 'movietmp' is created, under the destination directory. If this dir already exist then the content of it will be moved to a sav directory (in the same temp. directory).
• All selected pictures are generated in jpeg format, in this temp. directory.
  • If 'Reuse' is choosen:
    • First check if the file with correct size already exist in the sav directory; if so, this file is moved to the temp dir. Otherwise the jpeg file will be generated from the raw data.
    • If 'Replace' is chosen: Always (re)generate each jpeg file.
• The jpeg files are combined into one avi formatted movie file.
• If 'Remove' is choosen: All temp. files are removed.

Adjusting.

• If a special channel is needed for depth tick button 'Dpthchan'. (See preferences for which channel is used.)
• Tick the "Init" button; type 'r' to refresh the window.
• Adjust Lbnd until the parts to show as lowest level are coloured red (type 'r' after each adjustment).
  Suggestion: Sea and cloudless low-land.
• Adjust Hbnd until the parts to show as highest level are coloured green.
  Suggestion: Clouds should just get some green spots.
• Deselect 'Init" and type 'r' again, to refresh.

• Tick 'Overlay' in the main window. This will give white coast/land boundaries. The 3D-effect is that the overlay seems to float at high altitude.
• Tick "OL_3D" if the overlay should appear at land-level.
• Adjust the brightness of the overlay using OL_lum. (Especially in 3D the overlay should not be too bright.)

Continuous movie generation.

• Go to Main tab.
  • Choose the colour mapping for your movie: right-under, nrgb_dn
  • Click on 'More', then 'Save' to save this setting.
• Go to Preferences, tab 'record'.
  • Set 'Delete old files' to e.g. 2 days.
  • Check "Round to days'. (This will result in removing old files at midnight.)
  • Click on 'Save' to save this setting.
  • Close Preferences window.
• Go to Record tab.
  • Go to 'Show live' subtab.
    • Check 'Show'
    • Check 'Colour'
    • Check 'HMSG?'
  • Go to 'Generate' subtab.
    • Check 'Enable'
    • Check 'Movie'
    • Set 'max. len' to 48
    • Set 'Repeat last frame' to 5 (pauze of 5 secs at end of movie)
    • Check 'Add time' (to add time in movie)
    • Make sure 'msg_essential' is unchecked!
    Next is currently for Linux only. Extra settings to run mplayer, showing continuously the movie.
    • Check 'Run movie'.
    • Click on 'Construct command'.
    • At 'Movie program': Fill in 'mplayer'
    • Set Min/sec to 60 (This will set the speed such that each second a minute is shown, so speed is 60x real-life
    • Check 'Full screen'
  • Go to 'subtab 'Aging'
    • Click on 'Start Delete old'
  • In part 'Updating', at top of the 'Record' tab:
    • Click on 'Start upd.
    • Click on 'Save' to save all 'Record' settings.

• GTK2.0 for the graphical part
• IJG (Independent Jpeg Group) code for the JPEG decompression
• HDF5 API code
• Eumetsat code for the Wavelet decompression