The NOAA/MODIS near-real-time system was designed under the Computer Sciences Corporation (CSC) Central Satellite Data Processing (CSDP) contract in order to provide proof of concept that near-real-time processing of large volume data streams from MODIS (Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer) could be accomplished.

This project's main purpose is the generation of products as quickly as possible from the time of satellite observation. With the increase of technology, this project's original limited processing area of the Continental United States has expanded to global production of Level 2 products for the data streams from two satellites. As the data volumes have increased, so has the difficulty in keeping processing time to minimum.

This paper and presentation will discuss hardware, software, and networking solutions that have been developed and introduced over the last few years in order to attempt to meet this requirement, and some of the obstacles that have presented themselves in the course of development.