Author Topic: VWS and METAR report  (Read 6461 times)

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Offline daybreak

  • Senior Member
  • **
  • Posts: 96
    • Alma Weather
VWS and METAR report
« on: December 20, 2020, 11:04:23 AM »
Yes I'm still running VWS... :-) :-)  On Friday my METAR reports quit working.  There is nothing on the METAR Observation Report, does anyone have any ideas?  Wait a few days? 

On another subject, what software would be good to migrate to?  I only use the html tags from VWS, the history and NOAA reports. 

Thanks,
Richard

Offline Blizzard

  • Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 127
Re: VWS and METAR report
« Reply #1 on: December 20, 2020, 02:15:29 PM »
Same problem here with Hamweather

Online saratogaWX

  • Administrator
  • Forecaster
  • *****
  • Posts: 9257
  • Saratoga, CA, USA Weather - free PHP scripts
    • Saratoga-Weather.org
Re: VWS and METAR report
« Reply #2 on: December 20, 2020, 03:09:45 PM »
Both VWS and Hamweather may be relying on http access to tgftp.nws.noaa.gov site which now only accepts https or ftp requests.  Since Ed hasn't updated VWS in multiple years, it's not likely to get fixed, and I think the Hamweather scripts are now out of support too.

It may be time to switch to a different weather software .. CumulusMX is nice, free and supported.  Weather-Display is great with a one-time fee and highly supported.
Ken True/Saratoga, CA, USA main site: saratoga-weather.org
Davis VP1+ FARS, Blitzortung RED, GRLevel3, WD, WL, VWS, Cumulus, Meteobridge
Free weather PHP scripts/website templates - update notifications on Twitter saratogaWXPHP

Offline Blizzard

  • Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 127
Re: VWS and METAR report
« Reply #3 on: December 20, 2020, 04:19:27 PM »
Thanks for the information saratogaWX

Since you seem to know those 2 softwares, do they aloow ftp download and upload? Do they both have the possibility to use templates to upload local observations to a website with personalised weather icon and finally, do they allow to download NOAA data and use it to generate a weather icon? Lots of questions, but which software is most likely to offer the same features or more than VWS.

Offline SoMDWx

  • Forecaster
  • *****
  • Posts: 1014
    • Southern Maryland Weather
Re: VWS and METAR report
« Reply #4 on: December 20, 2020, 04:44:01 PM »
The scary thing is that i have all this data since 2006 using VWS and so much on my site is based on this. I am scared switching all of this over to something new....

Online saratogaWX

  • Administrator
  • Forecaster
  • *****
  • Posts: 9257
  • Saratoga, CA, USA Weather - free PHP scripts
    • Saratoga-Weather.org
Re: VWS and METAR report
« Reply #5 on: December 20, 2020, 04:54:31 PM »
Yes, both CumulusMX and Weather-Display have FTP capability.  Both have multiple templates available.

CumulusMX does not currently use a METAR for sky conditions, but the CU-Plugin for the Saratoga template (and also the Leuven template) add that capability.  Weather-Display can natively use a METAR (in conjunction with a solar sensor) to produce sky conditions/Icon.

Both CumulusMX and Weather-Display produce near-realtime (5 or 10 second) update file and the Saratoga and Leuven templates can use that for more rapid updates on current conditions to your website.

Weather-Display has the most features, and because of that, it may also have a slightly more difficult configuration initially. 
CumulusMX uses a local website for customization and has fewer configuration options for an easier initial setup.

You can see what the Saratoga template with Weather-Display looks like here and with CumulusMX here

BTW, I've been running Weather-Display since 2004, VWS since 2007 (for template testing), Cumulus since 2011, CumulusMX since 2015, and WeatherLink since 2004.  My main site uses Weather-Display (and a bit of WeatherLink) for displays.  The other software continues to be used for live testing with my template sets.
Ken True/Saratoga, CA, USA main site: saratoga-weather.org
Davis VP1+ FARS, Blitzortung RED, GRLevel3, WD, WL, VWS, Cumulus, Meteobridge
Free weather PHP scripts/website templates - update notifications on Twitter saratogaWXPHP

Offline Blizzard

  • Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 127
Re: VWS and METAR report
« Reply #6 on: December 20, 2020, 05:35:58 PM »
So, all put together, I understand you would recommand Weather Display a bit more. I provide data to a private sponsor so I had to install VVP to split my data between VWS (personal need) and Weatherlink (private company needs). I never really got into Weatherlink, but it doesn't seem to allow NOAA download to generate an icon from another location. Unless you tell me it can, I guess I can get and run Weather Display to quicky replace the icon from amother location VWS allowed to generate (through NOAA data) and slowly move the rest of my site to Weather Display in the upcaming months or keep the 3 softwares running on my computer if I can't get Weather Display to fully operate as VWS. Thanks for your help...

Offline daybreak

  • Senior Member
  • **
  • Posts: 96
    • Alma Weather
Re: VWS and METAR report
« Reply #7 on: December 20, 2020, 07:13:07 PM »
Thanks Ken for the information.  I agree it's time to do something.  But I'm also with SoMDWx that I have 15 years of data that I would like to keep the history.  Do any of these incorporate the data?  Also is it possible for me to run VWS and WeatherDisplay at the same time to make an easier transition over to Weather Display and learning how to use the tags in Weather Display.  Does it work similar to VWS?

Thank you,
Richard

Offline Blizzard

  • Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 127
Re: VWS and METAR report
« Reply #8 on: December 20, 2020, 07:36:03 PM »
You can run up to 8 different softwares with Virtual VP Richard, So, not a problem. I run VWS and Weather Link and I will install Weather Display (free trial)to see how it works...

Offline Blizzard

  • Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 127
Re: VWS and METAR report
« Reply #9 on: December 20, 2020, 07:54:38 PM »
In order to add to the discussion, I've just noticed by opening the Metar Station txt file that it read: Service Temporarely Unavailable. I don't know if that is meaningful. Also, can we just use the FTP retriever tool to connect to another server to get the NOAA Station file and make it work?


Offline galfert

  • Global Moderator
  • Forecaster
  • *****
  • Posts: 6822
Re: VWS and METAR report
« Reply #10 on: December 20, 2020, 08:26:22 PM »
My recommendation for anyone running VWS is to get the WLL. Then you can keep running VWS and test out any of the other new software. You can run all software at the same time and they all get data from the WLL....Cumulus MX, Meteobridge, Weather-Display, and WeeWX. All of these now run on a Raspberry Pi too. You can even run multiple instances of the same software.

With the WLL, your old logger meanwhile keeps ticking along and stays connected to VWS. This way you can take your time testing, learning, and deciding on new software. You don't need to commit to any of these alternatives until you have thoroughly tested it.

Then when you are through testing then you can explore data export and import. Again this still doesn't take your existing station down with VWS. All of these software offer data importing and some may be more suited than others to do the data migration from VWS. But data is data and it can be manipulated and converted. In any case this data migration doesn't mess with the original data. If you have years of data to import do it little by little to test.

Part of your software testing and familiarizing should also entail migration of your website if you have one. You can mount a test site internally for testing that will not cost you anything. Or most probable that your existing hosting solution will let you have a different page that is not published that you can use for test.

The WLL is the the most flexible logger because it offers this great flexibility in allowing for all these multiple connections. The WLL does not require a Weatherlink paid plan for you to get all this live data as the live data is provided directly to these various software from the WLL right on your local network. The WLL is like a WeatherlinkIP on steroids and then some, because it also in some ways acts like an Envoy 8x with a logger (doesn't require the display console) and can get data from multiple ISS and transmitters. The WLL can connect to your network via Ethernet or WiFi...your choice. And best of all if any other software comes along and you've already made your decision to run whatever...then no problem...test out that other software and then migrate again at your leisure.

Then when you are done. And don't need VWS anymore, sell the old logger. Sell the display console too if you don't really need the display. That recovers some or all of the cost of the WLL.
« Last Edit: December 21, 2020, 09:06:01 AM by galfert »
Ecowitt GW1000 | Meteobridge on Raspberry Pi
WU: KFLWINTE111  |  PWSweather: KFLWINTE111
CWOP: FW3708  |  AWEKAS: 14814
Windy: pws-f075acbe
Weather Underground Issue Tracking
Tele-Pole

Offline daybreak

  • Senior Member
  • **
  • Posts: 96
    • Alma Weather
Re: VWS and METAR report
« Reply #11 on: December 21, 2020, 08:46:08 AM »
What is a WLL?

Richard

Offline galfert

  • Global Moderator
  • Forecaster
  • *****
  • Posts: 6822
« Last Edit: December 21, 2020, 08:53:22 AM by galfert »
Ecowitt GW1000 | Meteobridge on Raspberry Pi
WU: KFLWINTE111  |  PWSweather: KFLWINTE111
CWOP: FW3708  |  AWEKAS: 14814
Windy: pws-f075acbe
Weather Underground Issue Tracking
Tele-Pole

Offline 92merc

  • BismarckWeather.net
  • Forecaster
  • *****
  • Posts: 1308
  • BismarckWeather.net
    • BismarckWeather.net
Re: VWS and METAR report
« Reply #13 on: December 21, 2020, 08:52:16 AM »
Do any of these incorporate the data? 
WD does have an import feature.  If you have all of your VWS CSV files from all your years, it'll import right in.
https://www.BismarckWeather.net
Davis VP2, Cumulus, WeatherDisplay, Blitzortung, Saratoga Scripts, NOAA Stream via PI

Offline Blizzard

  • Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 127
Re: VWS and METAR report
« Reply #14 on: December 21, 2020, 09:22:47 AM »
The fact that the NOAA files still get downloaded in the VWS makes me hope that the problem is temporarily. Let's hope, but I'll slowly move towards WD thamks to your recommandations.

Offline Impala88

  • Senior Contributor
  • ****
  • Posts: 195
    • IrvineWx
Re: VWS and METAR report
« Reply #15 on: December 21, 2020, 10:43:28 AM »
When this has happened before I submitted a ticket on PWS.com.  I was unable to submit a ticket due to an issue on that site.  I did reply to one of their replies to me on my last ticket.  Hopefully, they can get this resolved soon.

Offline Impala88

  • Senior Contributor
  • ****
  • Posts: 195
    • IrvineWx
Re: VWS and METAR report **UPDATE**
« Reply #16 on: December 21, 2020, 10:57:20 AM »
Update:  I was able to submit a support ticket this morning on PWS.com.  Joe has been very responsive in fixing this issue so I am confident it will be resolved shortly.

Offline Blizzard

  • Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 127
Re: VWS and METAR report
« Reply #17 on: December 21, 2020, 11:22:20 AM »
Just to understand Impala88, my NOAA metar setting is set to Hamweather and not NOAA. Is pws.com the place it all comes from? I don't understand why it would change anything. Thanks for explaining.

Offline SoMDWx

  • Forecaster
  • *****
  • Posts: 1014
    • Southern Maryland Weather
Re: VWS and METAR report
« Reply #18 on: December 21, 2020, 02:05:42 PM »
I was able to modify Ken's METAR script to retrieve only the METAR closets to me and display the current sky and weather condition....
It is integrated successfully into my main page....

Thanks Ken for a great script!

Jim

Offline Blizzard

  • Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 127
Re: VWS and METAR report
« Reply #19 on: December 21, 2020, 03:25:00 PM »
Jsut to tell you that it is back and running. Gives us/me time to move to WD.

Online Otis

  • (aka Paul)
  • Forecaster
  • *****
  • Posts: 724
    • Lake Huron Weather
Re: VWS and METAR report
« Reply #20 on: December 21, 2020, 03:34:59 PM »

WD does have an import feature.  If you have all of your VWS CSV files from all your years, it'll import right in.

I used VWS for years and switched to WD after the degradation of the VWS program (no updates).

92merc is correct, I used the WD import function no problem for years of data.

Note: I still run VWS w/separate console, I still use/like some of the features from VWS however, WD is the driver of my site.

CW3699

Online saratogaWX

  • Administrator
  • Forecaster
  • *****
  • Posts: 9257
  • Saratoga, CA, USA Weather - free PHP scripts
    • Saratoga-Weather.org
Re: VWS and METAR report
« Reply #21 on: December 21, 2020, 03:37:49 PM »
I was able to modify Ken's METAR script to retrieve only the METAR closets to me and display the current sky and weather condition....
It is integrated successfully into my main page....

Thanks Ken for a great script!

Jim
Thanks, and happy you've found the get-metar-conditions-inc.php script useful for your site.
Ken True/Saratoga, CA, USA main site: saratoga-weather.org
Davis VP1+ FARS, Blitzortung RED, GRLevel3, WD, WL, VWS, Cumulus, Meteobridge
Free weather PHP scripts/website templates - update notifications on Twitter saratogaWXPHP

Offline longmire

  • Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 123
  • WD (latest) GRL3_2 WF TWI WR-25e Win10Pro
Re: VWS and METAR report
« Reply #22 on: December 28, 2020, 08:00:59 PM »
I too had a METAR interruption, but bless him, Joe worked with me for a bit and their team launched a special fix to talk to VWS in the "old language" haha. So now- days after the holiday - my system is generating METAR icons just like new.

Joe's the BEST!!! =D> =D> =D> \:D/ \:D/ \:D/ [tup]

Offline Blizzard

  • Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 127
Re: VWS and METAR report
« Reply #23 on: December 28, 2020, 09:25:04 PM »
That's great! But, how long can we hope this fix to hold?

Offline Blizzard

  • Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 127
Re: VWS and METAR report
« Reply #24 on: December 02, 2021, 09:28:03 PM »
The metar generated sky icon is down running here agin. Does anybody knows what to do or knows how to retrieve data to generate an icon trough a simple script?