The Global Loader is a new interface to load and manage GIS data and projects. It includes GOM3 data but is specifically designed to allow you to manage all other GIS data at your company. The next webinars to demonstrate how to use this new tool are now scheduled for June 8th and June 13th (updated from June 2nd). The webinars are free and will last approximately 25 minutes before time for questions and suggestions. Each one is limited to 25 attendees, but please contact us if you would like a webinar for a group within your company; we can go over some of your internal datasets and make some recommendations about the best way to categorize the data for your company.
Please register here to attend.
For a larger overview of Global Loader, please see this newsletter.
Storm Forecast Improvements
Hurricane season is already underway and improved forecasting is now included in the Storms section of GOMsmart and the What's New section of the GOM3 toolbar.
Last year ESA developed and implemented a system that uses the National Hurricane Center's (NHC) disturbance analysis to make forecasts on where the system will move if it were to develop into a cyclone. The forecast is made up to five days earlier than the NHC's forecast. This year there have been many improvements to the algorithm that generates the forecast and accuracy has been improved. The function, which assigns weights to past tracks (analogs) which are then averaged to find the forecast, has been altered to more severely diminish the influence of poor analogs.
In addition, the shape of the NHC disturbance plays a larger role in the forecast. A paper which details the methodology has been sent to the NHC for review before it is submitted for publication.
More information can be viewed in the GOMsmart Help.
ArcGIS Version Notes
ArcGIS 10.4.0 is now officially supported for GOM3. All versions from ArcGIS 10.1 to 10.4.0 are supported. However, version 10.4.1 has not been tested yet so do not upgrade to 10.4.1 at this time.