World Meteorological Organization

1999 WWW TECHNICAL PROGRESS REPORT ON THE
GLOBAL DATA-PROCESSING SYSTEM

GDPS Technical Progress Report Series No. 9
WMO/TD-No. 996

INTRODUCTION

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The forty-third session of the Executive Council (1991) endorsed the decision of the extraordinary session of the Commission for Basic Systems (1990) that information on the operational status of the Global Data-processing System (GDPS), which had earlier been published partly in the CAS Numerical Weather Prediction (NWP) annual progress report and partly in WMO Public No. 9, Volume B, and in the Guide on GDPS should be combined, enhance and published annually as a separate WWW Technical Progress Report on the GDPS. This publication is in response to this decision and subsequent CBS updates, and will no doubt be of considerable value to all Meteorological Services, including those of developing countries who are commencing work in the operational use of NWP and are in the process of equipping their centres with computer facilities.

The annual publication will serve as a means of updating the rapidly evolving facilities and services being implemented at GDPS Centres as requirements and technology advance. It will provide to operational experts up-to-date information on the status of implementation of operational equipment and related facilities including analysis-forecast systems at the GDPS Centres.

All WMO members are urged to submit annual national contributions to the Secretariat on the operational status of the GDPS of their NMCs for the previous year, at the beginning of each year. Combined reports will be distributed in the form of this publication.

Several Member Countries/Centres who have contributed to this report also participate in forecast verification of NWP products and they exchange among themselves, on a monthly basis, the results of such verification. The standard GDPS NWP verification procedures used are as specified in the Manual on the Global Data-processing System. To facilitate dissemination of this information worldwide, the annual verification results, where applicable, are included in the individual national contributions in the present progress report.

Web Editor Sary Vargas, 19 March 2003