WU-UPLOAD(1)          User Contributed Perl Documentation         WU-UPLOAD(1)



wu-upload.pl:  Weather Underground Personal Weather Station Upload Script

For Lacrosse WS23xx weather stations over serial device

       This script communications over a serial connection to a compatible
       LaCrosse Weather Station device, then formats that information and
       reports it to Weather Underground's ( http://www.wunderground.com )
       Personal Weather Station data collection service.

       This script takes 5-10 seconds to run, most of that time is to obtain
       the response from serial port connected LaCrosse weather station. You
       can run this script as a Unix cron command once per minute.  If you are
       using a wireless connection from the LaCrosse base station to the out-
       side devices, the base station will report 'weird' data when the wire-
       less connection is unstable, recent additions will prevent uploading of
       the inappropriate data.

       The perl/c + modules installed on FC7 x86 w/ standard development
       libraries, tested on usb-serial connection, as well as on Mac OS X 10.4
       & 10.5 using the standard Perl install pulling the modules in via CPAN
       with the weather station connected over a KeySpan serial-to-USB con-
       verter.

Unix Cron set-up

       Example cron entries to fire off uploads (expects this script installed
       in /usr/local/bin) with these scripts installed as a Unix service.
       They could also be installed under a user's cron with files located in
       a home directory, etc.

   Every minute:

        * * * * * /usr/local/bin/wu-upload.pl >> /var/log/wu-cron.log

   Every 5 minutes:

        0,5,10,15,20,25,30,35,40,45,50,55 * * * * /usr/local/bin/wu-upload.pl
        >> /var/log/wu-log.log

Control Variables

       Edit the following variables for testing:

       nosend - set to 1 to NOT send data (testing), normally to 0 to send
       data.

       verbose - set to 1 to send more information to standard out

       Edit the following variables for your connection to Weather Under-
       ground:

       rturl - Weather Underground URL for real-time updates

       id - Weather Underground Personal Weather Station Identification String

       passwd - Weather Underground Password for PWS ( NOTE: this is sent over
       HTTP as clear text)

       freq - Frequency of updates to Weather Underground [in seconds]

       Edit the following variables for files or devices on your computer:

       serial - path to the serial port device

       xmlLog - Path to XML encoded output '/var/log/wu.log';

Data Validation for Wireless connections

       The La Crosse 2317 Weather Station Pro has the capability of connecting
       to the outdoor instruments via a wireless connection, advertised as
       working up to 330 feet, however in my experience it can be dodgy at
       distances far less than the advertised maximum.  When this wireless
       connection is not functioning this program receives bogus data from the
       base station over the serial line as there is no valid data from the
       outside instruments.  The following have been observed from the La
       Crosse 2317 base station under these conditions:

           tempF='-22.0'  dewPtF='-22.0' humidity='AA'

       or/and

           winddir='157.5' windspeedmph='114.1'

       I adding checking for those conditions as well as bounds checking
       checking for other values, either based on  accepted values or
       extremes. In the event that the data is determined to be invalid, the
       parameter will not be reported to Weather Underground, however it will
       be logged, as will the detection of it being incorrect.

   Bounds
         wind speed positive number values from 0 to 113 mph, inclusive
         wind direction positive number values from 0 to 360 degrees, inclu-
       sive
         humidity positive number values from 0 to 100 percent, inclusive
         temperature and dew point report if humidity is valid and these do
       not both equal -22F
         dew point should not exceed the current temperature
         barometer allow values from 25-35 inHg, inclusive
         rain fall per hour allow values from 0 to 10"/hour inclusive (maximum
       recorded for my area is 7.5" per hour)

Weather Underground Personal Weather Station Data collection

       Here is the preferred URL used for the real-time uploading of your col-
       lected weather data to Weather Underground (July 2008):

       http://rtupdate.wunderground.com/weatherstation/updateweathersta-
       tion.php

       If you go here without parameters you will get a brief usage):

       Here is the usage (July 2008) displayed with blank parameters:

   RapidFire Server

       usage
          action [action=updateraw]
          ID [ID as registered by wunderground.com]
          PASSWORD [PASSWORD registered with this ID]
          dateutc - [YYYY-MM-DD HH:MM:SS (mysql format)]
          winddir - [0-360]
          windspeedmph - [mph]
          windgustmph - [windgust mph]
          humidity - [%]
          tempf - [temperature F]
          rainin - [rain in]
          dailyrainin - [daily rain in accumulated]
          baromin - [barom in]
          dewptf - [dewpoint F]
          weather - [text] -- metar style (+RA)
          clouds - [text] -- SKC, FEW, SCT, BKN, OVC
          softwaretype - [text] ie: vws or weatherdisplay

   Credits
         Copyright GPL - original code K Brown 11/30/07
         Contributed by Kenneth Brown 12/2007
         Updated Bill Caloccia 20/07/2008
         Device::LaCrosse::WS23xx by 2007 by Eduardo Santiago

perl v5.8.6                       2008-07-20                      WU-UPLOAD(1)