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and when
they are finished and the objects must delete themselves when
they are no longer needed. COM uses operating systems and
application permissions to determine if a particular client can
load the object.
To use the Prometheus COM, one must first check the
consistency between the user data and the Prometheus data. If
the data is not consistent a conversion must be completed. This
would be performed in the user's application. The converted
data can then be used as input into the Prometheus COM. The
Prometheus COM Model is built using five separate low-level
COMs. Since low level COMS are very difficult to use directly,
a higher level Prometheus COM has been built by the Alberta
Sustainable Resource Department to access the five separate
low level COMs. The Prometheus COM architecture is shown
in Figure 4:
User Application rm»; Fuel COM
> Fire Engine
COM
Prometheus COM
I—P| Grid COM
—— | Weather COM
Figure 4: Prometheus COM Architecture
With this set up, all the functions available in the low level
COMs can be called individually and used by this system. To
activate the COM on the WMMS Webpage one would click the
“Use COM” button seen in Figure 3. Next, the user must go
through a sequence of five screens to enter the necessary
parameters for all of the low level COMs. On the web page
these screens are designed to look like a file folder with five
separate tabs. The defining name of each screen is written on
the tab of the file folder. This was done so that the user can
quickly flip back and forth between screens to enter in all the
necessary information. The fist of the five screens is shown in
Figure 5.
A Premtheus COM - Microsoft Internet Explorer
Prometheus COM Simulation
Project Name:
test
Project Description
Demo Project]
Simulate >>
Figure 5: Screen Shot of COM Interface
The information requested for each screen of the COM
interface is illustrated in the following flow chart.
69
International Archives of the Photogrammetry, Remote Sensing and Spatial Information Sciences, Vol XXXV, Part B-YF. Istanbul 2004
€ Used to name a simulation project (name
and description).
€ Name can be re-entered into the system
during a subsequent user session to access
the model again with the previously
entered parameters intact.
Identification
€ Used for diurnal weather modeling.
€ Satisfies the FWI COM
® Includes:
® Location information to calculate the
sunrise and sunset variables,
WV
QQ.
e
2
N
=
=
<
-
= Time zone and spheroid information to
convert the regional time to Greenwich
Mean Time,
® Elevation data to calculate the Fuel
Moisture Content in the FWI module.
€ Used to define attributes of fire behavior.
€ Satisfies the Fuel, Grid and Weather
COMs.
€ Fuel grid map information describes the
distribution of the fuel types in the
landscape.
Model Tab
© Weather Station and Weather Stream
specify the parameters used in the weather
model. .
€ Used to define the elements influencing
how fire spreads across a landscape as a
function of time lapse and fire ignitions.
€ Satisfies the Fire Engine COM
Scenario
Tab
Ed
H * Asks for the name of the output file that
— the results should be printed to.
Simulate
Tab
Figure 6: Flow Chart Describing Steps of COM Interface
Pressing the “Simulate” button on the Simulate page allows the
COM to compute a fire perimeter on the map of Alberta that is
displayed on the main page of the website.
All the variables used by the Prometheus model can be entered
in real-time to the system. This allows users to simulate fire
propagation scenarios at any time and location. After all the
necessary information is entered (projection, fuel grid, weather
condition, etc.), the website will link to the necessary
components of the Prometheus COM via the PHP Server and
MapServer to display an image, on the main map, of the
predicted growth perimeter for the fire.
It must be noted that Prometheus’s COM is still under
development. Version 2.0.1 is currently being used in this
application. Some functions and capabilities are currently
unavailable in the COM. One such function is that fire lines
that define fire barriers are not available. Ideally, ignitions
