Weather Updates

[ka7gzr]

Michael,
Hello!
I noticed today that my Forecasts for Max, Min and rain percentage have not updated for a month. The last Forecast received and last Weather received are current times but last changed are many days old. I turned debug on and attached the file. In the debug file I noticed the two weather sites it tried to access which returned no data. I put the two addresses in my browser manually and instantly got data back.
Thanks,
Jim

HS: v2.1.18.0
mcsSprinklers v2.5.0.24

[Michael McSharry]

The LastWeather and LastForecast are status devices that were added to allow an event to be setup to provide notification when internet data is not reporting. The LastChange times for these devices will be the time that the device's status changes between ON and OFF. The device status changes when no weather has been received in one hour or forecast in two hours. It is good when the LastChange times are very old and the Device String which shows in the Status column of Homeseer or General Status show the last update is relatively current. When the status of either of these two devices is OFF then the graphic will change to the slashed circle rather than the small clock.

The Forecast Min and Max are received from MSNBC or Weather.com depending upon your settings. They will be queried only once per 30 or so minutes. The last received data from the site is desposited in the folder \Data\mcsSprinklers. Is the contents of this data from this file consistent with the forecast min/max? Are both the data and the date stamp not the same?

A debug log with a single "no internet data" from a site is normal. The software issues the request and then 60 seconds later looks for the result. The first log message will occur when the URL command is given and data is not returned instantly which is normal. If the same message appears 60 seconds later then the debug shows that no data was returned. It looks to me from your debug that data was returned from the Weather.com site.

[ka7gzr]

Michael,

Thanks, I now understand how LastWeather and LastForcast work. I did find up-to-date Weather info in the folder mcsSprinkler\data. However, the data Forecast Min, Max and Rain Percentage does not agree with the weather.com information. Under the cooresponding column "Changed" is the date of 3/2/2006- about a month ago. Is that the date of the last update?
I will try changing to MSNBC.com.
Jim

[ka7gzr]

It updated within a minute when switched from weather.com to MSNBC.com.

Jim

[Michael McSharry]

If I understand, the General Status shows a very old forecasted min/max and the last change date is also old. The file in the \data\mcsSprinklers shows the current data. The implication is that mcsSprinlklers did download the data, but did not update the devices. Is this correct?

[ka7gzr]

Correct!

[ka7gzr]

Michael,

I have confirmed that the Forecasts are updated with MNBC correctly. The Forecasts are not updated with weather.com. However they are downloaded (I see the file updated in data\mcssplinkers) but the data is not changed on the "General Status" page. I do see the "Last Forecast Received" time updating with the current weather.com file.
Jim

[Michael McSharry]

Thank you for the investigation. I use Weather.com, but it is received via xAp messages so the logic path is a little different.

[Cecil]

I have the same issue with Weather.com. Updates once when I switch the setting to it and then doesn't seem to ever update again. MSNBC updates regularly.


Cecil

[Michael McSharry]

I changed to use IE rather than the Windows API for data download. It turns out that IE adds a few characters to the front of each line in xml files. I striipped these characters and now it works again. Posted as V2.5.76.

Thank you for the investigative work.

[ka7gzr]

Michael,
Loaded v2.5.76 and weather.com is working great!
Thanks,
Jim