The python-awips package provides access to the entire AWIPS Maps Database for use in Python GIS applications. Map objects are returned as Shapely geometries (Polygon, Point, MultiLineString, etc.) and can be easily plotted by Matplotlib, Cartopy, MetPy, and other packages.
Millersville University in Pennsylvania will be hosting a Unidata Regional Software Training Workshop April 6-8, 2017. Unidata software developers will be leading the Python-focused workshop, which will cover the use of the MetPy and Siphon packages in the context of atmospheric science and introduce the National Weather Service's Common AWIPS Visualization Environment (CAVE) along with Python tools for working with AWIPS data services. A basic familiarity with Python is assumed — check out the Unidata Online Python Training for a refresher.
Unidata holds regional workshops in part to facilitate easy access to software training for those who may not be able to travel to training workshops held at the Unidata Program Center in Boulder, Colorado. Attendance is explicitly not limited to Millersville students and staff; we encourage those within easy travel distance to consider attending.
The Python AWIPS Data Access Framework can be used to query available grid parameters and levels if given a known Grid name (as of AWIPS 15.1.3 we can not query derived parameters, only parameters which have been directly decoded).
