Author Topic: From WU " Webcam hosting service will be discontinued on October 21, 2021"  (Read 3859 times)

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Offline Mabcmb

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From the article " Weather Underground will discontinue the webcam hosting service effective October 21, 2021 in order to better focus on the core products that make Weather Underground one of the best destinations for weather enthusiasts. Webcam data will be deleted from our servers on or after this date." ......

  Full update here : https://support.weather.com/s/article/Webcam-hosting-service-is-discontinued-effective-October-21-2021?language=en_US

Offline rormeister

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At least it's official. My cam has been FUBAR for nearly a year. The big question...what's next to be yanked?

Offline jpk1018

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Could easily see this coming.

Offline Eguraldia

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My webcams(2) not working with WU for a long long time...so  :lol: #-o





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Offline ValentineWeather

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It's been unusable for several years now so no surprise. I think they were allowing a few cams but now they are going. What it really comes down to is their lack of willingness to spend for the extra bandwidth needed to host cameras.
Rapidfire will be the next to go I've already seen issues actually had 2- long-time stations just disappear along with the account. No explanation, nothing, and what's weird is they used these stations for the area observations on android phones instead of the airport.  I waited for over a week and nothing came back online so signed back up with new stations.  Couldn't sign in to the old account it was also gone. I think it had to do with both were using rapid-fire but not sure like I said no explanation. I now upload data every minute and still occasionally get the Brutus screen server issues so I know their bandwidth is suffering.   
Randy

Offline ocala

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Nice to see you posting Randy.
Don't be a stranger.
So far my rapid fire has been rock solid.
No issues at all.
Knock on wood. :twisted:
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Offline box

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I was hoping to get into weather cams but with WU withdrawing, is there any other equivalent service out there?

I see discussions about Rapidfire - what is that?

Offline ocala

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Rapid fire is a free service offered by WU that updates data from your PWS every 3 seconds.
The blues had a baby and they named it Rock & Roll

Offline box

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Rapid fire is a free service offered by WU that updates data from your PWS every 3 seconds.

Ah, hence the expectation that its going next!

Offline WheatonRon

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It would be nice if WU just worked properly and 100% of the time. For those that want Rapidfire or webcams—just charge those users a fair fee for such service and leave everybody else alone.
Davis VP2 with SHT31 (3 complete VP2 systems—2 with a daytime fan and 1 that has a 24 hour fan); CWOP--CW5020, FW3075 and FW4350; WU--KILWHEAT17, KILWHEAT36 and KILWHEAT39; WeatherCloud.net; CoCoRaHS--IL-DP-132; and Weatherlink 2.0

Offline Bashy

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Re: From WU " Webcam hosting service will be discontinued on October 21, 2021"
« Reply #10 on: October 07, 2021, 07:11:41 PM »
Wondered why my webcam stopped late July of this year, worked great up till then
Kind regards
Bashy

Offline konz

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Re: From WU " Webcam hosting service will be discontinued on October 21, 2021"
« Reply #11 on: October 07, 2021, 08:42:04 PM »
I was hoping to get into weather cams but with WU withdrawing, is there any other equivalent service out there?

I post my webcam to Windy.com.  Not equivalent, but a place to post and share your weather webcam.

Offline konz

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Re: From WU " Webcam hosting service will be discontinued on October 21, 2021"
« Reply #12 on: October 07, 2021, 08:44:33 PM »
I guess I'll go ahead and stop my cron job tonight.  Tsk, what a shame.
« Last Edit: October 07, 2021, 10:08:47 PM by konz »

Offline chief-david

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Re: From WU " Webcam hosting service will be discontinued on October 21, 2021"
« Reply #13 on: October 07, 2021, 11:08:44 PM »
thinking about discontinuing WU attachment all together. I know some have.



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Offline awsum140

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Re: From WU " Webcam hosting service will be discontinued on October 21, 2021"
« Reply #14 on: October 08, 2021, 08:43:42 AM »
I think that all disgusted WU users, webcam or not disgusted, should disconnect from WU on October 21.   I'm sure IBM has already calculated the possible data loss into their decision, but actually seeing and experiencing it, especially if it is a large data loss, might make them at least regret their decision somewhat.

The excuse that "cameras are so different" is so weak as to be laughable.  A jpg is a jpg no matter what camera produces it.  The size are already very limited, so where's that problem coming from?  Just more mealy mouthed excuses from IBM.  Why can't they openly admit it's all about squeezing every last dollar out of the data they receive for free other than the inherent overhead of collecting and collating it.
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Offline dupreezd

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Re: From WU " Webcam hosting service will be discontinued on October 21, 2021"
« Reply #15 on: October 08, 2021, 09:31:14 AM »
My signature and website (dupreezwx.com) says it all since about 3 years ago.

Icon, courtesy of Cutty Sark Sailor. 

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Offline chief-david

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Re: From WU " Webcam hosting service will be discontinued on October 21, 2021"
« Reply #16 on: October 08, 2021, 09:44:25 AM »
This station is disconnecting from WU on Oct 12. The reduction of services, access and recognition of its contributors have led me to this decision. Thank you for your support.



You can't phase me-I teach Middle School.
It's not you-It's WU.

Offline jdoff

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Re: From WU " Webcam hosting service will be discontinued on October 21, 2021"
« Reply #17 on: October 08, 2021, 09:48:56 AM »
I spent a few minutes writing a Bash script to download my WU webcam time lapse videos. Here it is; sorry in advance for it being somewhat unreadable and probably fragile. Edit the all-caps variables at the top of the script with your values. The script iterates through each day between START_DATE and END_DATE and downloads a video if one exists, failing silently if it doesn't. The video URLs look like this:

https://icons.wunderground.com/webcamarchive/j/a/jamyles/1/2018/05/20180513.mp4

You'll probably want to check a few URLs manually with a web browser to make sure you have everything right (your ID, your camera ID, etc.) before running the script. No guarantees that running this won't get you banned from WU or something.

Code: [Select]
#!/bin/bash

URL_STUB="https://icons.wunderground.com/webcamarchive/j/a/jamyles/1"
START_DATE=$(date -d "2017-11-27" +%s)
END_DATE=$(date -d "2021-08-01" +%s)
OUT_DIR="/tmp/webcamarchive"

mkdir -p "$OUT_DIR"

date=$START_DATE
while [ $date -le $END_DATE ]
do
  IFS=':' read -a a <<< $(date -d "@$date" +%Y:%m:%-d:%d)
  url="${URL_STUB}/${a[0]}/${a[1]}/${a[0]}${a[1]}${a[2]}.mp4"
  echo $url
  curl -sf -o "${OUT_DIR}/${a[0]}-${a[1]}-${a[3]}.mp4" "$url"
  sleep 1
  date=$((date+86400))
done
« Last Edit: October 13, 2021, 08:23:06 AM by jdoff »

Offline ValentineWeather

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Re: From WU " Webcam hosting service will be discontinued on October 21, 2021"
« Reply #18 on: October 08, 2021, 09:56:57 AM »
Can't blame anyone for leaving the unfortunate consequence is many members here are consciences with instrument placement using professional stations giving accurate data and it's Weather Undergrounds loss.   
Randy

Offline ValentineWeather

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Re: From WU " Webcam hosting service will be discontinued on October 21, 2021"
« Reply #19 on: October 08, 2021, 10:27:59 AM »
I spent a few minutes writing a Bash script to download my WU webcam time lapse videos. Here it is; sorry in advance for it being somewhat unreadable and probably fragile. Edit the all-caps variables at the top of the script with your values. The script iterates through each day between START_DATE and END_DATE and downloads a video if one exists, failing silently if it doesn't. The video URLs look like this:

https://icons.wunderground.com/webcamarchive/j/a/jamyles/1/2018/05/20180513.mp4

You'll probably want to check a few URLs manually with a web browser to make sure you have everything right (your ID, your camera ID, etc.) before running the script. No guarantees that running this won't get you banned from WU or something.

Code: [Select]
#!/bin/sh

URL_STUB="https://icons.wunderground.com/webcamarchive/j/a/jamyles/1"
START_DATE=$(date -d "2017-11-27" +%s)
END_DATE=$(date -d "2021-08-01" +%s)
OUT_DIR="/tmp/webcamarchive"

date=$START_DATE
while [ $date -lt $END_DATE ]
do
  IFS=':' read -a a <<< $(date -d "@$date" +%Y:%m:%-d:%d)
  url="${URL_STUB}/${a[0]}/${a[1]}/${a[0]}${a[1]}${a[2]}.mp4"
  echo $url
  curl -sf -o "${OUT_DIR}/${a[0]}-${a[1]}-${a[3]}.mp4" "$url"
  sleep 1
  date=$((date+86400))
done

Pretty cool,  [tup]
Randy

Offline jdoff

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Re: From WU " Webcam hosting service will be discontinued on October 21, 2021"
« Reply #20 on: October 08, 2021, 10:49:27 AM »
I was able to download 1189 days of my videos (nearly 1 GB total), so it seems to work fine. I did fix a small bug in the script (-lt should have been -le), so if you try it copy it from my original (edited) post.

Offline awsum140

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Re: From WU " Webcam hosting service will be discontinued on October 21, 2021"
« Reply #21 on: October 08, 2021, 12:11:09 PM »
I'm pulling the plug on October 21.  I have an AccuRite, AccuWrong, weather station so I'll be using their Backyard Weather app for my own monitoring.  Maybe I'll replace it with an EcoWitt when the funds become available which might be a while the way the economy is going.
If it's not a Boerboel it's just a dog.


Offline PaulMy

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Re: From WU " Webcam hosting service will be discontinued on October 21, 2021"
« Reply #22 on: October 08, 2021, 12:39:13 PM »
@jdoff,
Thanks for posting and sharing.
However I am not quite understanding how to actually run or use it, and what I need to change in the script for my videos.  My cameras ID are PaulMyCAM1 and PaulMyCAM4. 


I started to send images to WU webcams around 2010 and there were a number of long periods when it wasn't working, but at the moment it still is for me.  I also have the Bloomsky and that was sending images as well from 2016 but that hasn't worked for months now.


Appreciate any specific help on How To :oops:


Enjoy,
Paul

Offline jdoff

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Re: From WU " Webcam hosting service will be discontinued on October 21, 2021"
« Reply #23 on: October 08, 2021, 02:05:18 PM »
@jdoff,
Thanks for posting and sharing.
However I am not quite understanding how to actually run or use it, and what I need to change in the script for my videos.  My cameras ID are PaulMyCAM1 and PaulMyCAM4. 

I could have provided a bit more context. You'd need a Linux (or other Unix environment, maybe MacOS) computer to run this script. Based on the IDs you mentioned, your direct video URLs would look something like this:

https://icons.wunderground.com/webcamarchive/p/a/PaulMy/1/2021/10/2021108.mp4
https://icons.wunderground.com/webcamarchive/p/a/PaulMy/4/2021/10/2021108.mp4

So your script variables would look like this:
Code: [Select]
URL_STUB="https://icons.wunderground.com/webcamarchive/p/a/PaulMy/1"
START_DATE=$(date -d "2010-01-01" +%s)
END_DATE=$(date -d "2021-10-08" +%s)
OUT_DIR="/tmp/webcamarchive/PaulMyCAM1"

That said, I'd be happy to run this and download your camera timelapse videos since they're publicly accessible anyway. If you want me to do this, would it work for you if I put them all in a big zip file on Google Drive?

Offline PaulMy

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Re: From WU " Webcam hosting service will be discontinued on October 21, 2021"
« Reply #24 on: October 08, 2021, 03:05:53 PM »
@jdoff,
Wow, that first link works \:D/
I am good at cut and paste, trial and error, but lost outside of Windows...

Quote
I'd be happy to run this and download your camera timelapse videos since they're publicly accessible anyway. If you want me to do this, would it work for you if I put them all in a big zip file on Google Drive?
Yes I think that could work though I am not familiar with Google Drive, but in another life maintaining our local hockey team website I've received batches of images from Komoka Kings Game Photos - Google Photos and that works well for me to download.


Thank you,
Paul