Hi Joseph,
You might try the following link as a resource for configuring pqact.conf:
http://unidata.github.io/awips2/docs/devguide/regular-expressions.html
The page is written for AWIPS II, but it can probably be tailored for 
your application, I'm assuming you already have a data feed and are 
interested in saving products to file or piping to a script for 
additional use.
Blue sky idea for Unidata developers: Either include something similar 
to this with the default LDM tar bundle or create a script to generate 
this (similar to the gen_pqact.csh that comes with Gempak, but replacing 
references for decoders with references to file products within a 
directory structure).
Slightly off topic: At Plymouth State, we're migrating generation of 
some model products from Gempak to NCL.  We're finding that there are 
some operational limitations to using NCL with Opendap GRIB/netCDF 
datasets and are investigating using local GRIB products ingested by LDM 
as an alternative source.  I've been doing one off edits of pqact.conf 
on a case by case basis, but it would be nice if there were a resource 
to generate a pqact.conf for all current model products (& subsequently 
keeping it up to date as new products come out).  If NCL could handle 
Gempak files directly, it would be less of an issue.
Hope this helps,
Brendon
--
Brendon Hoch, M.S.
MSC 48, Boyd Science Center 319
Plymouth State University
Plymouth, NH 03264
(603)535-2818 Fax: (603)535-2723