Topic: Anyone else use the SOAP or XML/REST service from NWS' NDFD? It's been flakey!

[JPB]

I've noticed that for the past few days, the NDFD database XML/REST service has been quite flakey. Providing a valid result only a fraction of the time.

This URL describes it: https://graphical.weather.gov/xml/rest.php

I am getting CURL errors from their end.

Here's a URL generated from their own web-based interface, accessing their service. The error I get refers to EDRAPI and not getting a valid result from it. To reproduce the error (or get the infrequent success) just click on this URL, then scroll down to the bottom of the page to the Submit button.

https://graphical.weather.gov/xml/sample_products/browser_interface/ndfdXMLclient.php?whichClient=NDFDgen&lat=38.99&lon=-77.01&listLatLon=&lat1=&lon1=&lat2=&lon2=&resolutionSub=&listLat1=&listLon1=&listLat2=&listLon2=&resolutionList=&endPoint1Lat=&endPoint1Lon=&endPoint2Lat=&endPoint2Lon=&listEndPoint1Lat=&listEndPoint1Lon=&listEndPoint2Lat=&listEndPoint2Lon=&zipCodeList=&listZipCodeList=&centerPointLat=&centerPointLon=&distanceLat=&distanceLon=&resolutionSquare=&listCenterPointLat=&listCenterPointLon=&listDistanceLat=&listDistanceLon=&listResolutionSquare=&citiesLevel=&listCitiesLevel=&sector=&gmlListLatLon=&featureType=&requestedTime=&startTime=&endTime=&compType=&propertyName=&product=time-series&XMLformat=DWML&begin=2004-01-01T00%3A00%3A00&end=2028-09-11T00%3A00%3A00&Unit=e&maxt=maxt&Submit=Submit

[JPB]

For whatever reason, the NWS NDFD point service fails in some % of the lookups, but will work a few seconds later, and so on. So, what I had to do in order to resolve this problem is simply "on failure, try the request again, and if it keeps on failing after a set # of times, hard fail and report failure."