Author Topic: weather link 2.0 is anyone going to pay for it?  (Read 5242 times)

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Offline David9723

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weather link 2.0 is anyone going to pay for it?
« on: January 01, 2018, 11:28:28 AM »
Just wondering if anyone here is going to pay for the pro? I'm really considering it. I am on the trial.

It looks way better than the old 1.0 that i never used and has a few features that have really sold me on it.

I don't know why they don't update weather link software. I guess most people will buy the new IP data logger so you don't need a PC or the software?

My big complaint is that i have been using cumulus for 4 yrs and hate to loose all that data if i switched over to weather link 2.0.

Offline johnd

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Re: weather link 2.0 is anyone going to pay for it?
« Reply #1 on: January 01, 2018, 12:28:33 PM »
I don't know why they don't update weather link software.

Because Davis seem to have made a decision that the future is online and not primarily with local software. So they see no mileage in any significant future updates to WLfW - I think it will just be left to fade away.  (And presumably there's also an implication that VP-next - whenever it might appear - might have an Ethernet or WiFi interface built-in - total speculation on my part, but you could see how that would fit in with the strategy.)
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Offline Mattk

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Re: weather link 2.0 is anyone going to pay for it?
« Reply #2 on: January 01, 2018, 04:41:06 PM »
WL "software" will always have a place especially in regard configuration and for that matter data storage as well especially at a local level the user has some control over. It may be time for those like Davis to realize users require options not what Davis thinks users need.   

Offline johnd

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Re: weather link 2.0 is anyone going to pay for it?
« Reply #3 on: January 01, 2018, 04:48:13 PM »
WL "software" will always have a place especially in regard configuration and for that matter data storage as well especially at a local level the user has some control over.

You don't need standalone software for configuration though. My guess would be that future products will have an Ethernet interface exposing a web interface, much like the Meteobridge (or, in a primitive way, even WLIP) and that's how configuration will be achieved. And assuming that there's some significant buffer memory in the unit then that will provide local storage. Or maybe just a slot to add a USB stick or SD card for backup local storage?
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Offline Mattk

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Re: weather link 2.0 is anyone going to pay for it?
« Reply #4 on: January 01, 2018, 05:01:51 PM »
WL "software" will always have a place especially in regard configuration and for that matter data storage as well especially at a local level the user has some control over.

You don't need standalone software for configuration though. My guess would be that future products will have an Ethernet interface exposing a web interface, much like the Meteobridge (or, in a primitive way, even WLIP) and that's how configuration will be achieved. And assuming that there's some significant buffer memory in the unit then that will provide local storage. Or maybe just a slot to add a USB stick or SD card for backup local storage?

Davis do have some thinking to do on this one and if it's a web interface much like a MB then all users at all levels are catered for, if it's some locked in online cloud system then this is basically only in the interests of Davis.

Offline dalecoy

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Re: weather link 2.0 is anyone going to pay for it?
« Reply #5 on: January 01, 2018, 05:39:01 PM »
My guess would be that future products will have an Ethernet interface exposing a web interface, much like the Meteobridge (or, in a primitive way, even WLIP) and that's how configuration will be achieved. And assuming that there's some significant buffer memory in the unit then that will provide local storage. Or maybe just a slot to add a USB stick or SD card for backup local storage?

My guess would be some flavor of IOT (InternetOfThings).  Entirely wireless.  Most "appliances" today do not have cabled data interface.

Offline Mattk

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Re: weather link 2.0 is anyone going to pay for it?
« Reply #6 on: January 01, 2018, 05:44:14 PM »
My guess would be that future products will have an Ethernet interface exposing a web interface, much like the Meteobridge (or, in a primitive way, even WLIP) and that's how configuration will be achieved. And assuming that there's some significant buffer memory in the unit then that will provide local storage. Or maybe just a slot to add a USB stick or SD card for backup local storage?

My guess would be some flavor of IOT (InternetOfThings).  Entirely wireless.  Most "appliances" today do not have cabled data interface.

Well they should (have cabled ability as well) instead of a single point of failure.

Offline dalecoy

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Re: weather link 2.0 is anyone going to pay for it?
« Reply #7 on: January 01, 2018, 07:20:34 PM »
My guess would be some flavor of IOT (InternetOfThings).  Entirely wireless.  Most "appliances" today do not have cabled data interface.

Well they should (have cabled ability as well) instead of a single point of failure.

Perhaps.  But Davis' current products have "communication by wire" as a single point of failure.  And (as far as I know) all IOT appliances have "communication by wireless" as a single point of failure.

Offline johnd

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Re: weather link 2.0 is anyone going to pay for it?
« Reply #8 on: January 02, 2018, 03:19:05 AM »
My guess would be some flavor of IOT (InternetOfThings).  Entirely wireless.  Most "appliances" today do not have cabled data interface.

Indeed. I'd expect ZigBee from sensors to some sort of receiver/interface box indoors and then maybe WiFi onwards. Given that Davis have obviously got transmitter designs developed for ZigBee for the EM range, it might be a little surprising if this technology weren't also used in other ranges, but who knows.

But not sure that I'd anticipate anything new for a while now - Davis will have had their hands full during 2016/17 developing EM and the new WLC2 platform - can't have left a lot of time for anything else, especially with both of these projects still actively ongoing. So very possibly other major new products are still at least a year or two off. But again who knows?
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Offline Joel

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Re: weather link 2.0 is anyone going to pay for it?
« Reply #9 on: January 02, 2018, 08:50:04 AM »
At short term I don't see any reasons to pay for this service.
WL website is only a repository of my data amongst others, from the master being a local pc
Of course for people who doesn't want to run a dedicated pc or maintain their own website, WL website seems to be a good opportunity

Offline captgadget

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Re: weather link 2.0 is anyone going to pay for it?
« Reply #10 on: January 03, 2018, 09:53:05 AM »
I signed up for the trial version, downloaded the mobile app and my station and many others are not there. I contacted Davis and they got right back to me to tell me they are migrating the old into the new and it would be the 2nd quarter of 2018 before all stations are shown. So they suggested I continue to use the 1.0 version yet. I think the 2.0 is pretty nice but not sure I'm willing to pay $4/mo. We'll see as time goes on. They may have something up their sleeve even better than this. I think it's a work in progress.

Offline Old Tele man

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Re: weather link 2.0 is anyone going to pay for it?
« Reply #11 on: January 03, 2018, 12:25:56 PM »
DEVIL's ADVOCATE -- It's not a question of whether you pay for it or not, but rather a question of "when" DAVIS *forces* current WL1.0 users to "pay again" or be dropped.
« Last Edit: January 03, 2018, 12:46:13 PM by Old Tele man »
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Offline johnd

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Re: weather link 2.0 is anyone going to pay for it?
« Reply #12 on: January 03, 2018, 12:35:14 PM »
DEVIL's ADVOCATE -- It's not a question of whether you pay for it or not, but rather a question of "when" DAVIS *forces* current WL1.0 users to "pay again" or be dropped.

 :? :? :? Isn't it the other way about? What's happening is that, in future, 2.0 users will get for free what 1.0 users currently pay for.

Sure, you can opt to pay for a bunch of extra features in the Pro level, but no-one's being forced to do that. Sadly I don't have a crystal ball to see what the plan structure might be in 5 or 10 years time, but no huge reason to think it will change.
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Offline Old Tele man

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Re: weather link 2.0 is anyone going to pay for it?
« Reply #13 on: January 03, 2018, 12:49:40 PM »
DEVIL's ADVOCATE -- It's not a question of whether you pay for it or not, but rather a question of "when" DAVIS *forces* current WL1.0 users to "pay again" or be dropped.

 :? :? :? Isn't it the other way about? What's happening is that, in future, 2.0 users will get for free what 1.0 users currently pay for.

Sure, you can opt to pay for a bunch of extra features in the Pro level, but no-one's being forced to do that. Sadly I don't have a crystal ball to see what the plan structure might be in 5 or 10 years time, but no huge reason to think it will change.
Tongue-in-cheek response: Unfortunately, my crystal ball is black, made by AMF bowling, and has three holes drilled in it, so maybe I'm 'seeing' a different "vision" but I find it rather hard to believe DAVIS will provide "free" what they were charging for...forever.

Just one man's opinion.
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Offline waiukuweather

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Re: weather link 2.0 is anyone going to pay for it?
« Reply #14 on: January 03, 2018, 12:57:42 PM »
they entice you to sign up for the extra nice features though with providing the basic features but with the extra nice features not available
so in a way the people who do sign up with subsidise those who do not

Offline wicked

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Re: weather link 2.0 is anyone going to pay for it?
« Reply #15 on: January 06, 2018, 03:52:48 PM »
Since I am a new users (just got a station up and running in December).  I have only been on the WL2.0 - so looks like I may end up paying.

Wish they had an annual prepay plan that discounted it.  My other concern is I see several bugs on the weatherlink.com interface and concerns of actually how long and how much (low intervals) of my data they will keep once I pay.  Davis cannot even give me a straight forward answer on this.

I just feel the WL2.0 site and app are just not ready for prime time and they should be heavily discounting the monthly rate until its ready for prime time or allowing users who report bugs and good feedback free service for a while.

Offline johnd

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Re: weather link 2.0 is anyone going to pay for it?
« Reply #16 on: January 07, 2018, 07:33:01 AM »
Wish they had an annual prepay plan that discounted it.

 :???: I'm not aware that there is any other option than annual prepay. (The monthly figure is just to give you a sense of the monthly breakdown - actually I'm not convinced it makes any sense to advertise this monthly figure at all.)

Quote
My other concern is I see several bugs on the weatherlink.com interface

Might be useful if you could list what bugs you've identified. Having used this platform for 12 months' or so now (with EM initially) I'm not aware of many.  The only significant one seems to be - as you're reported elsewhere - the issue that your archive records have disappeared on clearing your logger. (Resetting the archive interval automatically clears the logger.). If you're _sure_ that the older records have gone (and eg it's not just a result of the timespan that you have selected in the Data view) then it's well worth reporting the issue to support@weatherlink.com . That certainly shouldn't be happening.

Sounds like there are other issues that you've encountered too? (Other than issues of features not working exactly how you'd prefer them to work, which isn't really a bug as such.)

Quote
and concerns of actually how long and how much (low intervals) of my data they will keep once I pay.  Davis cannot even give me a straight forward answer on this.

Answered elsewhere and I think your comment is just based on one single conversation with a - probably - inexperienced frontline support person at Davis. Of course all public-facing staff should be fully briefed and conscientious enough to pay 100% attention to their briefing, but doesn't always happen that way in the real world. Just look at the wl.com pricing webpage - that implies that historical data is fully available on the Pro plan.
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Offline wicked

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Re: weather link 2.0 is anyone going to pay for it?
« Reply #17 on: January 09, 2018, 11:55:58 AM »
A couple issues are:

1) Wind rose - monthly - not working
2) Mobilize tab on weatherlink.com and in app - the THSW index is not populating - always says “- -“
3) 2.0 app will not auto refresh or allow pull to refresh. Must close app and restart for refresh

There were others. I’ve been writing them down at home but these are 3 I could remember off the top of my head.

Offline VaJim

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Re: weather link 2.0 is anyone going to pay for it?
« Reply #18 on: January 09, 2018, 12:15:04 PM »
I paid for the annual Pro last night. 

Offline johnd

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Re: weather link 2.0 is anyone going to pay for it?
« Reply #19 on: January 09, 2018, 12:42:47 PM »
A couple issues are:

1) Wind rose - monthly - not working
2) Mobilize tab on weatherlink.com and in app - the THSW index is not populating - always says “- -“
3) 2.0 app will not auto refresh or allow pull to refresh. Must close app and restart for refresh

There were others. I’ve been writing them down at home but these are 3 I could remember off the top of my head.

OK, would be good to maintain a list. I suspect that Davis are aware of all 3 but wouldn't do any harm to email support@weatherlink.com . I would say that THSW always seems to be one of the more 'sensitive' parameters. Presumably you do have a solar sensor?

I can add:

4) Bulletin tiles can only be reordered by the account owner and not supplementary users of the account (which doesn't mean all-comers, but those with whom the account has been explicitly shared and who ought to be able to see the data as they prefer);

And not a bug but a caveat: It's important with EM stations certainly (but potentially in other contexts too) that the ISS type is correctly entered during initial set-up, eg if you have a metric rain gauge then the ISS type must be added as an 'M' suffix unit in the EM app. Failure to observe this requires that the station be completely deleted and then re-added (and which doesn't always seem to work first time!).
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Offline wicked

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Re: weather link 2.0 is anyone going to pay for it?
« Reply #20 on: January 09, 2018, 12:47:32 PM »




OK, would be good to maintain a list. I suspect that Davis are aware of all 3 but wouldn't do any harm to email support@weatherlink.com . I would say that THSW always seems to be one of the more 'sensitive' parameters. Presumably you do have a solar sensor?



Yes solar and UV.

Offline DrBobDavisV2

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Re: weather link 2.0 is anyone going to pay for it?
« Reply #21 on: January 09, 2018, 01:25:03 PM »
I'm left wondering why I have to pay for anything, even 2.0.  I bought my Davis Vantage Pro 2 Wireless and Vantage Connect Nov 16, which as advertised and as far as I know or can remember, allowed free access to Weatherlink.  is that not right?


added....


–  Use your WeatherLink.com Pro Tier (included in your annual service plan) to chart and graph your data anywhere & anytime in any major browser, or download data to your PC for further analysis.
« Last Edit: January 09, 2018, 01:29:59 PM by DrBobDavisV2 »

Offline Old Tele man

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Re: weather link 2.0 is anyone going to pay for it?
« Reply #22 on: January 09, 2018, 01:30:15 PM »
I'm left wondering why I have to pay for anything, even 2.0.  I bought my Davis Vantage Pro 2 Wireless Nov 16, which as advertised and as far as I know or can remember, allowed free access to Weatherlink.  is that not right?
I don't think so...as I recall, WL cost was "part of" WL-IP purchase and not available separately.
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Offline johnd

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Re: weather link 2.0 is anyone going to pay for it?
« Reply #23 on: January 09, 2018, 01:40:27 PM »
I don't think so...as I recall, WL cost was "part of" WL-IP purchase and not available separately.

100% correct. The only sense in which access to weatherlink.com 1.0 was ever free was if you bought the IP logger. Other means of uploading (ie WL program or Connect) required a data plan with an annual subscription.

Things have relaxed a little with the 2.0 platform in that you can also now upload for free from the WL program to the Basic level of WLC2, which continues all the features of the 1.0 platform. If you wish to use the new additional features of the Pro level then yes that requires an annual plan (but these extra features were never previously available so no-one's lost anything relative to the 1.0 situation).

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Includes many details on 6313 Weatherlink console.
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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.

Online wvdkuil

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Re: weather link 2.0 is anyone going to pay for it?
« Reply #24 on: January 09, 2018, 02:21:36 PM »
. . . shortened . . .
Things have relaxed a little with the 2.0 platform in that you can also now upload for free from the WL program to the Basic level of WLC2, which continues all the features of the 1.0 platform. If you wish to use the new additional features of the Pro level then yes that requires an annual plan (but these extra features were never previously available so no-one's lost anything relative to the 1.0 situation).
With wl.comv1 one did not need a weather-program at all if one was using a WLIP.
Maybe it is easier and less expensive to upload to wl.comv2 compared to the past. Who cares, there are multiple free sites offering the same facilities as wl.comv2 will offer.

But they shredded ONE essential feature in the move from v1 to v2. PLEASE do not "forget" that in every post you write:   ALL owners of a WLIP using WL.comv1 will probably certainly loose the xml download which contained alomst the same weather-data as the PC Weatherlink program uses. And all that data , including high-lows was updated multiple times per hour also. V2 continues to update current conditions 1/minute. But all other data is now only updated 1/hour.

Therefor, before June 2018, current  WLIP owners who use the xml to get the data to their private websites will be left in the cold. That are Saratoga- and Leuven-template users but also WLIP owners who painstakingly developed their own private websites or other weather-scripts.  N0-xml also means a new device or weather-program one has to acquire, and time to learn the  new and different tags for weather-data, and time to adapt or write new scripts,  and so on.

Maybe their will be something yet unknown but usable solution, but there is no description yet what it will be. And certainly we do not need  a CSV download via e-mail? or a current-condition-only json file?

When
do the previous customers who bought a WL-IP to use that device to get the data to their website get the needed information
about what
they can use to continue to get their own data to their websites from wl.comv2.

You seem to have close contacts with the development teams at Davis, maybe you could point them to our posts and to the remarks from Ken True, me and others about the lack of decent information.

If Davis does not want to offer a xml-v1 replacement in some form, please let them tell us NOW. We should be able to develop alternative solutions before the forced move from wl.comv1 to v2 starting in the near future.

Wim

P.S. Maybe a class-action suit from all WLIP owners about the "forced downgrade" will help. Anybody some ideas about that?
« Last Edit: January 09, 2018, 02:27:25 PM by wvdkuil »

 

anything