AWS Convergence Technologies, INC

Our school has a firewall/proxy server. How can we still be an AWS Online site?

AWS has an installed network of over 2500 weather stations across the US and across the world. Many of these units are connected to the Internet, allowing high speed, real-time transmission of the observed weather conditions.

In order for your weather data to be accessible from the Real-time Weather Web Page and AirWatch software in remote locations, your weather station PC or Mac must be running a "weather server" program developed by AWS. This program constantly grabs current weather data from the Master Control Unit, or data logger, and stores hourly readings on your hard drive. When the server program receives an external request for the current weather information, the program sends a reply packet of about 100 characters. Data packets sent and received by the AirWatch Server use the TCP/IP Protocol. Transmissions are usually through port 95, but just about any port can be used if necessary.

The security concerns surrounding this application are minimal, but we understand that when it comes to computer applications in schools it is often good to be overly cautious. AWS Tech Support has worked with many network administrators to come up with ways to "punch a hole" in a firewall without opening a school district's network to the potential of abuse and misuse. Common solutions to the "firewall" problem have included:

Opening up Port 95 to all incoming traffic

Opening up Port 95 to specific IP ranges (e.g. AWS [204.156.11.xxx] and your local TV station)

Opening up Port 95 to a specific list of IP addresses

As you go further down this list, your network will be more secure, but AirWatch will be more and more limited in its capablities. If you block all IP addresses outside AWS Headquarters for example, the weather data available to other schools and web surfers will be up to an hour old. This is because the data will be coming from the AWS archive of auto-accesses rather than from a real-time connection.

Two more points to consider are static IP addressing and outgoing traffic. The computer running the AirWatch server must have a static, Class C IP address. If you use address translation, please make sure there is a class C address AWS can use from outside your network to contact the computer. The computer must also be able to transmit data out to the internet, so please make sure your firewall is setup to allow the "server" PC or Mac to transmit out.