Author Topic: WeatherLink 6.0.3 - Internet Settings Grayed Out  (Read 7352 times)

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Offline shakasha

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Re: WeatherLink 6.0.3 - Internet Settings Grayed Out
« Reply #25 on: November 08, 2017, 04:32:38 AM »
Quote
But the point is that the max gust value (in each interval)
Is there any documentation on how to get the archive packets? I've seen how to get the XML, but don't remember seeing anything else.

Offline shakasha

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Re: WeatherLink 6.0.3 - Internet Settings Grayed Out
« Reply #26 on: November 08, 2017, 04:49:16 AM »
Hey Johnd, I saw this in another thread:
Quote
Look at the browser interface for EM to see where all the Davis software development has been focused for the past many months. I think this one is public:

https://www.weatherlink.com/bulletin/9722cfc3-a4ef-47b9-befb-72f52592d6ed
Is it possible for people to sign up for that with systems already installed? If so, how much?

Offline johnd

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Re: WeatherLink 6.0.3 - Internet Settings Grayed Out
« Reply #27 on: November 08, 2017, 05:37:39 AM »
Quote
But the point is that the max gust value (in each interval)
Is there any documentation on how to get the archive packets? I've seen how to get the XML, but don't remember seeing anything else.

Look at the Serial Tech Ref document. It's a bit buried these days in the new and (not!) improved Davis website, but look in Weather>Support>Software and search on Weatherlink. Current version is v2.6.1. Web Download protocol is on p36, with the format of the archive packets some pages before.
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Offline johnd

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Re: WeatherLink 6.0.3 - Internet Settings Grayed Out
« Reply #28 on: November 08, 2017, 05:43:10 AM »
Hey Johnd, I saw this in another thread:
Quote
Look at the browser interface for EM to see where all the Davis software development has been focused for the past many months. I think this one is public:

https://www.weatherlink.com/bulletin/9722cfc3-a4ef-47b9-befb-72f52592d6ed
Is it possible for people to sign up for that with systems already installed? If so, how much?

I don't really know what you can see. We have transparent access since we're already running an EM account, so it's tricky for me to know what non-users can see. That link is to one of Davis's own EM installations and AFAICS that's set to public access. I'm thinking that anyone should be able to access eg the chart option BICBW - maybe we have privileged access?

In general the owner of an specific EM account has full control over access rights to the data and they can make it available to other specific users or make at least part of the access public.
Prodata Weather Systems
Prodata's FAQ/support site for Davis stations
Includes many details on 6313 Weatherlink console.
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Offline shakasha

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Re: WeatherLink 6.0.3 - Internet Settings Grayed Out
« Reply #29 on: November 08, 2017, 06:13:24 AM »
Quote
In general the owner of an specific EM account has full control over access rights to the data and they can make it available to other specific users or make at least part of the access public.
I'd be interested to find out what it would cost to have an EM account and have our weather station available for public viewing.

Offline johnd

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Re: WeatherLink 6.0.3 - Internet Settings Grayed Out
« Reply #30 on: November 08, 2017, 07:54:11 AM »
Quote
In general the owner of an specific EM account has full control over access rights to the data and they can make it available to other specific users or make at least part of the access public.
I'd be interested to find out what it would cost to have an EM account and have our weather station available for public viewing.

Sorry, my fault, I've introduced some misunderstanding into the thread(s). Right now, to have an EM account you need to have an EM system rather than a 'traditional' wl.com account.

But it seems very likely  that Davis see the EM online presentations as the way forwards for the future and there is some speculation that at some point (maybe sooner, maybe later - I don't have any hard info) at least some of the previous wl.com presentation will move across to the EM platform. But right now the only way to see EM presentation is to buy an EM system. Apologies for any misapprehensions.
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Offline rhodesengr

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Re: WeatherLink 6.0.3 - Internet Settings Grayed Out
« Reply #31 on: November 10, 2017, 09:23:39 PM »
So did you ever figure out how to ungray the internet settings? I am in the same situation having a Vantage Connect sending data to WL every five minutes. I wanted to use the templates to make my own web page.

Another way of asking this is do any of the templates use the xml or binary URL calls to get data from WL? I don't think so. I can do a little hmtl and php programming but would not be able to parse the binary data call as described in the serial data document.

Maybe someone has already done that part and i could just modify with our station?

Offline shakasha

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Re: WeatherLink 6.0.3 - Internet Settings Grayed Out
« Reply #32 on: November 10, 2017, 10:33:48 PM »
Funny you should ask...

We put the station up last Friday afternoon. I suspect I have well over 100 hours of time on my PC since then trying different software and solutions to get what we need from WL.com using Vantage Connect. I've spent many hours on forums such as this one asking questions and seeking answers.

Here's the end results of all that time:

The ONLY place one can go to get the latest 5 minute data that includes Wind Gusts is the very boring fixed width 760 pixel wide WL.com summary page:

http://www.weatherlink.com/user/clearwaterbeach/index.php?view=summary&headers=0

Right now there is no way around that sad reality. Oh well, we have to suck it up.

Now to move forward with our goal to produce some kind of respectable web presentation on what we can get, here's the best we can do in my opinion, and I am not ashamed at what I have done with what we have to work with.

After extensive trial and error, and to skip the hours of discussion that you may find on this forum and others, here's what I am doing:

I use WeatherDisplay to download my data from WL.com at the default settings. It gets everything but Wind Gusts and Solar Radiation.

Then I have WeatherDisplay upload the data every 5 minutes to Meteotemplate. I tried using the Meteotemplate plugin and a cron job to update the Meteotemplate database once a minute but found I was still losing about 10 to 20 five minute records a day which created another problem for me. But so far WeatherDisplay has not missed one record.

I have WeatherLink 6.0.3 software on my PC and once an hour it retrieves all the data from WeatherLink.com, including the Wind Gusts and Solar Radiation.

Meteotemplate has a feature to import data manually using a CSV file. Since I am crazy about wanting accurate Wind Gust data, I am going every few hours and updating the Wind Gust and Solar Radiation data in the Meteotemplate database (which lives on our own server).

Sounds like a lot of work, right? And it is! UGH

BUT, the good news is that the Meteotemplate application is amazing, and very powerful. In fact, I am blown away by how well it works. A week ago I was almost about to find and visit the Davis HQ and beg them to let me build a somewhat decent modern data presentation webpage or pages so they could offer them to customers like me.

Here's my work in progress, almost ready to share to the public:

https://beachresortcondos.com/weather-station

I just have to tidy up some links and maybe add another block or two. But I am impressed.

It also has a pretty cool "Sticker" feature:



At this point in time, I applaud WeatherDisplay and Meteotemplate for helping me overcome what WeatherLink.com does not provide with my data. On the other hand the WeatherLink 6.0.3 software allows me to access my weather data and archive it on my PC or wherever else I want to save it.

Obviously WeatherLink.com is way behind the curve on what we want, and expect. They are ahead in that Vantage Connect is a fantastic tool in many regards, and allows us to upload weather data without an internet connection or even electric power. Bravo for that! And Bravo to WeatherDisplay and Meteotemplate for everything else!

So that's my thought on that.

 :-)






Offline johnd

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Re: WeatherLink 6.0.3 - Internet Settings Grayed Out
« Reply #33 on: November 11, 2017, 04:22:07 AM »
The ONLY place one can go to get the latest 5 minute data that includes Wind Gusts is the very boring fixed width 760 pixel wide WL.com summary page:

http://www.weatherlink.com/user/clearwaterbeach/index.php?view=summary&headers=0

But as per all the discussion upthread you know this isn't true. The archive data packets which are available every 5 minutes (in your data plan) contain both wind gusts and solar data. Not that it matters because you've clearly arrived at a data presentation that you're content with, but for anyone else who might be reading this thread in future...
« Last Edit: November 11, 2017, 04:37:51 AM by johnd »
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Offline johnd

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Re: WeatherLink 6.0.3 - Internet Settings Grayed Out
« Reply #34 on: November 11, 2017, 04:37:12 AM »
I can do a little hmtl and php programming but would not be able to parse the binary data call as described in the serial data document.

Don't be put off this just because it's binary - it really isn't very tricky to do, though you probably do need a language beyond HTML/PHP. All that you do is to read the data packet into a byte array and then pick off the bytes one or two at a time (according to how each weather reading is encoded) and convert to the appropriate variable type (integer, float/double, string etc). The key to the mapping of bytes to weather values is as per the table in the Serial Tech Ref document. But I guess if you don't have any experience at all with a language like VB, C#, Python etc etc then maybe it's not going to be feasible.
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Offline Mattk

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Re: WeatherLink 6.0.3 - Internet Settings Grayed Out
« Reply #35 on: November 11, 2017, 04:37:34 AM »
What I see in this thread is a back to front approach in which the backend was installed which was not technically capable of then providing the front end without a whole load of work a rounds and additional add on bits and pieces.

Maybe the better approach may have been to determine exactly what the front end requirement was etc then select the hardware that could simply provide this output with the least amount of run-a-round.

Offline johnd

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Re: WeatherLink 6.0.3 - Internet Settings Grayed Out
« Reply #36 on: November 11, 2017, 05:38:09 AM »
@Mattk: Well, I do know what you mean, but it's often quite tricky to get the end-user/customer to specify upfront exactly what they want and in sufficient detail that you can rule different solutions in or out. If you're not careful you end up with a specification for which there's no viable solution (at least short of a major software development project).

So inevitably you run through several iterations of what possible combinations of available hardware and software can deliver and see which compromises you're least unhappy with. But often it's not a very satisfactory process, partly because no-one has the time to specify or investigate things in sufficient detail in advance, and the user ends up at least partially disappointed with the end-result.

In this particular instance, having made the understandable choice to opt for a Connect unit (because of the real practical and admin benefits that it offers) then there actually is no available software solution that offers the perfect online presentation.
« Last Edit: November 11, 2017, 05:54:32 AM by johnd »
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Sorry, but I don't usually have time to help with individual issues by email unless you are a Prodata customer. Please post your issue in the relevant forum section here & I will comment there if I have anything useful to add.

Offline ocala

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Re: WeatherLink 6.0.3 - Internet Settings Grayed Out
« Reply #37 on: November 11, 2017, 08:50:44 AM »
Coming in late on this one.
I don't have a Vantage Connect but rather a VP2 with a serial to USB connection. Also using 6.03.
As for the grayed out options.
Just open Weatherlink. Do not open any of the windows on top.
All the options under set-up should not be grayed out. Once you open one of the windows, bulletin, strip charts, plots etc then those options will be grayed out.
At least that's how it's always been for me. Maybe with the Vantage Connect it's different.
The blues had a baby and they named it Rock & Roll

Offline johnd

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Re: WeatherLink 6.0.3 - Internet Settings Grayed Out
« Reply #38 on: November 11, 2017, 08:58:47 AM »
As for the grayed out options.
Just open Weatherlink. Do not open any of the windows on top.

No, it seems to depend on the current Communications Port setting. If you have TCP/IP and Web download both enabled (as you would eg for accessing a Connect's archive data) then you get the greying out. Otherwise the Internet Settings is accessible.
Prodata Weather Systems
Prodata's FAQ/support site for Davis stations
Includes many details on 6313 Weatherlink console.
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Offline dalecoy

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Re: WeatherLink 6.0.3 - Internet Settings Grayed Out
« Reply #39 on: November 11, 2017, 10:44:23 AM »

Here's my work in progress, almost ready to share to the public:

https://beachresortcondos.com/weather-station


Is that an actual picture of your station site and installation?

Offline rhodesengr

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Re: WeatherLink 6.0.3 - Internet Settings Grayed Out
« Reply #40 on: November 11, 2017, 11:09:04 AM »
grayed out or not, as far as i can tell none of the supplied templates include the required data calls. Here they are from page 36 of the serial protocol document:
http://weatherlink.com/webdl.php?timestamp=TimeStamp&user=username&pass=password&action=headers
http://weatherlink.com/webdl.php?timestamp=TimeStamp&user=username&pass=password&action=data
"The response is a binary encoded octet stream of the raw 52 byte archive records. These can be decoded per the definition in X.4"

So the fact that Internet Settings is grayed out when Weatherlink is set for getting data from a Connect feed is really a statement that none of  the web page templates supplied with WL  include those calls or the appropriate parser. That is pretty annoying as Davis clearly has the resources to put some templates together that include those calls. I do plan to email them but who knows if anything would come from that.

Like i said before, I have done some programming in my life but not recently and it would be too much work and time for me to get this all figured out. I was hoping someone else had already done it. There is that Python library here:
https://github.com/beamerblvd/weatherlink-python/tree/master/weatherlink
which has a downloader but I don't see a parser or an example of it integrated into a webpage.

Offline johnd

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Re: WeatherLink 6.0.3 - Internet Settings Grayed Out
« Reply #41 on: November 11, 2017, 12:11:37 PM »
grayed out or not, as far as i can tell none of the supplied templates include the required data calls.

Of course they don't. If you look for a moment into how WL works you'll find that data downloads are performed independently of the templates. You just check the 'Download weather station first' checkbox in the upload profile if you want to ensure that a data download is triggered before the template is parsed.

Quote
So the fact that Internet Settings is grayed out when Weatherlink is set for getting data from a Connect feed is really a statement that none of  the web page templates supplied with WL  include those calls or the appropriate parser.

As above, that really isn't the reason because it would work anyway in principle (were Internet Settings not greyed out). I suspect the reason for greying out is a combination of (i) no real-time web-tags being available (because only archive data is being downloaded) and (ii) Davis didn't want the AWS service continually being hit at frequent intervals by potentially many thousands of users feeding data to their templates/web pages.

Quote
That is pretty annoying as Davis clearly has the resources to put some templates together that include those calls. I do plan to email them but who knows if anything would come from that.

Almost certainly nothing, considering that 'traditional' WL development appears to have been ended (in favour of the EM approach).

Quote
Like i said before, I have done some programming in my life but not recently and it would be too much work and time for me to get this all figured out. I was hoping someone else had already done it.

As upthread, for anyone who's done some eg .Net or Python type programming it really isn't that difficult - just build a class or structure that maps all the entries in the record table and parse each downloaded archive record into that class.
« Last Edit: November 11, 2017, 12:43:56 PM by johnd »
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Sorry, but I don't usually have time to help with individual issues by email unless you are a Prodata customer. Please post your issue in the relevant forum section here & I will comment there if I have anything useful to add.

Offline dalecoy

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Re: WeatherLink 6.0.3 - Internet Settings Grayed Out
« Reply #42 on: November 11, 2017, 01:31:26 PM »


Here's my work in progress, almost ready to share to the public:

https://beachresortcondos.com/weather-station


https://beachresortcondos.com/images/Bobby-and-DavisPro2Plus.jpg

Is that an actual picture of your station site and installation?

Offline dalecoy

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Re: WeatherLink 6.0.3 - Internet Settings Grayed Out
« Reply #43 on: November 13, 2017, 05:57:11 PM »


Here's my work in progress, almost ready to share to the public:

https://beachresortcondos.com/weather-station


https://beachresortcondos.com/images/Bobby-and-DavisPro2Plus.jpg

Is that an actual picture of your station site and installation?

The reason I ask is that the picture shows a non-aspirated VP2 mounted about 4 ft. above the edge of a sloping roof, and approximately 65 ft. above ground level. 

The wind gust "measurements" (and the other measurements) from that station won't be anywhere near "standard".  If that's the station under discussion here, I'm not sure why 5-minute intervals are so important.

But perhaps the station is actually mounted somewhere else..........

Offline dalecoy

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Re: WeatherLink 6.0.3 - Internet Settings Grayed Out
« Reply #44 on: November 16, 2017, 12:07:12 PM »
Quote from: shakasha


Sorry, I must have annoyed shakasha by asking that question. 

Offline shakasha

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Re: WeatherLink 6.0.3 - Internet Settings Grayed Out
« Reply #45 on: November 18, 2017, 12:54:38 PM »
Quote
Sorry, I must have annoyed shakasha by asking that question.
LOL
No just haven't been back in here. My regular work was backed up and had to catch up.

But yes, that's the station. We will raise it up another few feet, but that is where it is to stay. 15 minute updates will probably work fine for everyone but me. That's what WU is getting and it's OK. I'll burn out on updating the database two or three times a day, and can always check WeatherLink.com for the latest gusts during a storm. So I'll be fine as well.

All that said, I am happy with the system. Had somebody told me that we'd be limited to 15 minute updates out of WeatherLink.com before we bought it (the salesman at Davis sure didn't bring it up and I didn't know there was a reason to ask), I would have done some more research, but likely would have done the same thing. No cables, we do not rely on power or internet, it is a stand-alone system and does the trick.

« Last Edit: November 19, 2017, 06:47:37 PM by shakasha »

 

anything