1. Severe Weather
2. IEMBot Project

• IEMBot Channels

iembot is a Jabber chat bot that relays National Weather Service issued text products to Jabber chat rooms hosted on the conference.weather.im multi-user chat service. iembot was written to aid the dissemination and use of NWS issued warnings by their chat partners.

Where to access iembot messages?

• Public Chatrooms (requires Jabber client and public Jabber account)
• HTML web interface anybody can view and monitor online!
• Weather.IM Live Client, interactive chat client.
• Follow iembot on Twitter
• Configure IEMBot to post messages to your twitter account.

How does iembot work?

iembot consists of two programs that run on the Iowa Mesonet server. The first is a parser that ingests text products issued by the NWS. The parser picks out the important information regarding the product and sends it via a Jabber instant message to the bot logged in on the chat server. The bot then routes the incoming message to a WFO chatroom from which the product was issued. The entire process takes much less than a second.

Why was iembot written?

1. During chats, the NWS should not need to relay details of already issued products to the chatroom. Replication should always be avoided.
2. During onair coverage, the media often are not able to quickly read severe text products that come off the printer. Instead, they can quickly view the chatroom and clearly see what has just been issued.
3. The NWS can get instant verification that their product was disseminated over NOAAport and processed by a computerized ingestor.
4. With the advent of Valid Time Extent Code (VTEC), the NWS can issue complex statements. The bot's report of these products can help clear confusion with the media partners.
5. With the products and timestamps in the chatroom logs, it is an outstanding log of how the severe weather event played out for historical review.
6. It is a proof of concept for how NWS products can be disseminated securely and synchronously to clients in an Open Source and standards based framework.

What does iembot look like in the chatroom?

Here is a screenshot from the "botstalk" chatroom where iembot dumps all processed messages. The text in blue can be clicked on for the product text and perhaps a visual display.

Channels

The following is a reference of the association of a NWS Text Product and the channels it is assigned. If you click on the plus button, you can expand the listing to show an example product. The channel templates should not be used literally, but the following are the placeholders used and what they mean.

<afos_pil>

The 4-6 character 'AWIPS ID' or 'AFOS PIL' used within the products WMO header.

<vtec_phenomena>

2 character VTEC Phenomena

<vtec_significance>

2 character VTEC Significance

<vtec_significance>

2 character VTEC Significance

<wfo>

3 character NWS Forecast Office Idenitifer

<ugc>

6 character UGC Code

NWS Products with P-VTEC and/or H-VTEC Included

NWS Local Office Products