FAQ: Difference between revisions

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Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, Windows Vista, Windows 7, Windows Home Server, and Windows Server 2008. It may also work on Windows 2000, but this is not supported. You will probably not be able to get it to work on Windows 2000 with a Fine Offset station.

 

 

Davis Vantage Pro (VP) and Vantage Pro2 (VP2), Oregon Scientific WM918, WMR918, WMR928 and WMR968, stations which use the Easyweather software such as MyDEL, Nevada, Watson and Fine Offset, with model numbers such as WH1080, WH1081, W8681, 265NC etc, and the La Crosse WS2300 range. You may have problems with corrupt data if you use a WS23xx with a serial/USB adapter; this combination is therefore not supported.

For a complete list see the [[Supported Devices]] page.

 

 

It’s quite hard to support a particular weather station when I don’t have access to one. Also, most companies don’t seem to like third parties writing software for their stations, so don’t make the protocol available. However, if the protocol is available somewhere, and you are prepared to do all of the testing (it will be frustrating, hard work), I may consider adding support for your weather station. Please post a request on the [http://sandaysoft.com/forum/ forum]. Bear in mind that I develop and support Cumulus in my spare time and I am already very busy with Cumulus, so I may not be able to fit in the required work. I certainly can't commit to any time frames.

 

 

Back up your data, and run the new setup. Occasionally, there may be actions you need to perform before or after the upgrade - these will be documented in the readme.txt file.

 

 

Copy the contents of the Cumulus ‘data’ folder. If moving to another computer, you may also want to consider copying your cumulus.ini file, so you keep your settings - you may need to 'tweak' a few things (serial port number etc). If you have a strings.ini file and/or a twitter.txt file, you may want to copy those over too. This article in the wiki gives more details above moving Cumulus: [[Moving cumulus]]

 

 

These are detailed in the [[:Category:Log Files|Log Files]] section of this Wiki and also in the Cumulus help file, in the section “Data log file format”

 

 

For Fine Offset stations, the ‘latest’ value in Cumulus corresponds to the ‘gust’ value on the station. The ‘gust’ value in Cumulus is the highest of the ‘latest’ figures in the last 10 minutes. The ‘average’ value in Cumulus is either the ’speed’ (just called 'wind' on the console) from the station (a 48-second average, apparently) or, if you have Cumulus set to calculate a 10-minute average, it’s the average over the last 10 minutes of the ‘latest’ values. If you also have 'use speed for avg calculation' set, then the Cumulus-calculated average is the average over the last 10 minutes of the 48-second 'speed' values supplied by the station.

 

 

There is no option in Cumulus to set this up automatically as I prefer to leave it under the control of the user: The safest and most reliable method is simply to put a shortcut in your Startup folder. If you are running Vista or Windows 7, you may find that Cumulus gets blocked by UAC if you try to run it from the Startup folder, in which case it is recommended that you use Task Scheduler instead. See here for a good description of how to do this - http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/window-on-windows/?p=616

 

 

As far as the timestamps in the logs (and the graphs) are concerned, Cumulus doesn't do anything in particular for DST. It generates timestamps based on the Windows clock. So basically, at the start of DST (i.e. when the clocks 'go forward') you will get an apparent gap of one hour in your data, and similarly at the end of DST (i.e. when the clocks 'go back') you will get an apparent hour of duplicate timestamps in your logs and graphs. The exact timing of the affected hours depends on the type of station and when Cumulus was running.

 

 

It uses a formula from the Australian BOM - http://www.bom.gov.au/info/thermal_stress/#atapproximation

 

 

It doesn't. It uses a calculation which gives the theoretical height above ground level at which Cumulus clouds might form, based on the current temperature and dew point. It assumes that the difference between temperature and dew point decreases by about 4.4 degrees Fahrenheit per 1000 feet increase in altitude. When the two values coincide, the air is saturated (relative humidity = 100%) and Cumulus clouds may form.

 

 

For stations which supply a rain rate, Cumulus uses that. For stations which don't supply a rain rate (e.g. Fine Offset and La Crosse), Cumulus simply takes the rain total from the last five minutes and calculates a rate based on that; e.g. 0.3mm in 5 minutes is a rate of 3.6mm/hr.

 

 

It adds up the corresponding daily totals in dayfile.txt. If your monthly and/or annual totals are incorrect, then you need to correct the daily totals which make up those figures, with Cumulus stopped.

 

 

Stop Cumulus and delete the contents of the data folder.

 

 

 

 

Click on it, and a window will open describing the error. It may just be a temporary ftp problem.

 

 

Try setting ‘use active FTP mode’.

 

 

Are you absolutely sure you have set the ftp path correctly? Most problems like this are a result of an incorrect path. Try turning on the ftp logging and look in the ftplog.txt and realtimeftplog.txt files. It is best to supply a relative path - i.e. with no leading 'slash'. Please don't ask me what path you need to supply, it is impossible for me to guess how your web space is set up. If you cannot work it out, ask your web space provider for help.

 

 

You’ve edited them with something like Dreamweaver, and it’s changed the angle brackets on the [[Webtags]] to "&amp; lt&nbsp;;" and "&amp; gt&nbsp;;" - you need to change them back to &lt; and &gt;. ''These may look very similar on your screen, but you can only generate the correct ones by using the appropriate keys on your keyboard.''

 

 

The ‘new record’ light only flashes when an all-time record has been broken. It stops flashing if you click on it or restart Cumulus, until another all-time record is broken.

 

 

The supplied web page templates are part of Cumulus and will be over-written on upgrade. If you want to create your own web pages, don’t edit the supplied ones, use the ‘extra files’ facility. From version 1.8.9, the installer offers the option of not over-writing the web templates; it unconditionally also installs them to a sub-folder of the web folder called 'originals', so you can refer to them if required, even if you chose not to over-write those in the web folder.

 

 

You’re probably running Windows Vista or Windows 7 (or one of the corresponding server versions of Windows). Look in C:\Users\[username]\AppData\Local\VirtualStore\Program Files\Cumulus - note that this is a 'hidden' folder. Ideally, to avoid this situation, you would install to somewhere outside the Program Files hierarchy, as recommended in the readme.txt.

 

 

You've almost certainly entered your co-ordinates incorrectly. Make sure to use a 'W' for your longitude if you're West of the Greenwich meridian. One other less likely possibility is that you have set the wrong time zone on your PC.

 

 

The moon doesn’t rise and set every day, the dashes appear when that event doesn’t occur on that particular day. The period between a moon rise and set is approximately 12 hours and 25 minutes, on average. The moon rises (or sets) approximately 50 minutes later, on average, each day. It therefore follows that sometimes the moon will not rise or set on a particular day - i.e. it had risen the previous day, or will set on the following day.

 

 

Drag from lower right to upper left.

 

 

The monthly and annual rainfall totals are calculated from the daily totals in [[Dayfile.txt]]. So you need to stop Cumulus and edit the daily totals until your monthly and annual totals are correct. The format of the dayfile.txt file is in the help file, in the section “Data log file format”, or [[Dayfile.txt|here]]. If you need to, you can specify a year-to-date total to add in for the period up to the point where you started using Cumulus, so that your first year’s total is correct. This is on the Station Configuration screen.

 

 

You probably have Cumulus set to calculate a 10-minute average, and your logger period is 10 minutes or longer, so your gust comes out the same as the average when using data from the logger.

 

 

As above, you probably have Cumulus set to calculate a 10-minute average, and your logger period is 10 minutes or longer, so your gust comes out the same as the average when using data from the logger.

 

 

Cumulus deliberately doesn’t attempt to download any data from before the point when you first run it. If you wish, although this isn't recommended, you can force it to download data from any point by editing the ‘Timestamp’ line in the today.ini file (in the data folder), before starting it (you will need to have run it at least once previously). If you do this, you will probably need to edit your data files as you may have duplicate entries and/or entries out of order. Your rain totals will almost certainly also be wrong - the total for "today" in particular. See the FAQ entry about correcting rainfall data.

 

 

First of all, check that you are comparing the Cumulus display with the ‘relative’ pressure on your console. Cumulus displays pressure corrected to sea level, which the console calls ‘relative pressure’.

where x.y is your pressure offset. Cumulus will then use this instead of reading it from the station.

 

 

If you have a Fine Offset station, and this happened when you started Cumulus, see: "Cumulus doesn’t show the same pressure as my Fine Offset console" above

 

 

The date format on your system has probably changed. Look at the Startdate line in cumulus.ini and check whether this is in the correct format for your system. If not, stop Cumulus and correct the date format.

 

 

Cumulus does sometimes report an error when you close it. This does not appear to cause any problems, you can just close the error message. I don't seem to be able to do anything about this, as the 'crash' is not in code that I have control over. You may be able to avoid this error by avoiding closing Cumulus while it is uploading to the internet. Please don't bother sending me a bug report about this.

 

 

It's in the CSS. Edit stylesheet.css and find lines like: "text-transform: lowercase;" and remove them.

 

 

You can get Cumulus to create a simple forecast by selecting 'Cumulus Forecast' on the Stations Settings screen.

 

 

You probably have incorrect Pressure Extreme settings. Make sure that the values you have supplied match the units you have selected for the extremes. Note that the units for the extremes are not related to the units you have chosen for pressure display in Cumulus. The option of supplying mb/hPa or inHg for the extremes is merely a convenience; you can supply either, but the values and the units must of course match.

 

 

Cumulus can't cope with being suspended, it just carries on as normal after being woken. There is an option in the station settings to 'close on suspend', so Cumulus will close itself as a safety measure, if you forget to do it manually. Don't use the 'close on suspend' option and the 'confirm shutdown' option at the same time; this will cause problems.

But I strongly recommend that you don't have your computer set to go into any form of standby while Cumulus is running - it's continuously gathering real-time data, after all, so it's a rather strange thing to do.

 

 

Wind chill only applies when the wind speed is above 4.8 kph and the temperature is below 10C. (The temperature cutoff is an option in Cumulus, but should really always be set). Heat index only applies when the temperature is above 27C and the humidity is above 40%.

While Humidex does not have any 'cutoff' values, at low temperature and/or humidity it will give the same figure as ambient temperature.

 

 

Cumulus calculates rainfall from a counter supplied by the station which keeps increasing as the rain causes the rain gauge to tip. Cumulus remembers the value of that counter at the start of the meteorological day, so that at any time duing the day it can calculate today's rain by subtracting that figure from the current value of the counter. The start of day figure is stored in today.ini as the "Start=" figure, and the current value of the counter is stored in the monthly log files (e.g. jan10log.txt) as the 'total rainfall counter'. See the [[:Category:Log Files|Log Files]] section of this Wiki for the formats of the files.

If the erroneous rainfall didn't occur today, you just need to edit the total for the relevant day in dayfile.txt (and optionally edit the entries in the monthly log file). If it was yesterday, you can also optionally edit yesterday's total in today.ini.

 

 

You're probably comparing gusts and average speeds. If you have a Fine Offset station, see [[#What_do_the_various_wind_speeds_in_Cumulus_correspond_to.2C_with_Fine_Offset_stations.3F]]

Note that you can't compare the graphs drawn by Easyweather and Cumulus unless you are certain that they are plotting the same data. They can't both be running at the same time, so one would normally be plotting 'live' data at a given interval, and the other will be plotting data downloaded from the station's logger. The wind speed will hence not normally be the same for a particular time on the graph as it may well have changed at the point that it is saved to the logger. The only situation where it ''would'' be valid to compare the graphs would be if neither were running at the times you are comparing, and both subsequently downloaded the same data from the logger.

 

 

The USB support in the Davis DLL which Cumulus uses doesn't seem to work. You need to use the CP210X USB/serial software which Davis supply, and use the station in serial mode. If you have previously been using your station with Weatherlink in USB mode, you will need to change to serial mode in Weatherlink before you can use the station with Cumulus. You can do this using [http://www.davisnet.com/support/weather/download/CP210X_USB_Serial_Converter_ver2.exe this utility from Davis].

 

 

You probably have an error in one or more data files. Look near the beginning of the latest file in the Diags folder for an error message which will tell you which file is in error and which line is causing the problem. It may simply be a blank line. Edit the file with Cumulus stopped. Note that you may need to repeat this process; only the first error is shown.

 

 

The Davis DLL which Cumulus uses to read data from the station can sometimes miss readings. You can try to minimise the effect of this by editing cumulus.ini (with Cumulus stopped) and add a line to the [Station] section, thus:

This sets the interval between reads to zero (the default is 500 ms).

 

 

If you have one of the Fine Offset clones, make sure you have configured your relative pressure correctly. If Cumulus finds an 'impossible' value, it will ignore all data from your station.

 

 

The graphs are snapshots of the data, taken once a minute while Cumulus is running. If the extreme value did not coincide exactly with the point at which the data was added to the graph, then it will not appear on the graph. This is most noticeable with wind gusts, the value of which can change rapidly, even over a period of a minute.

 

 

The data logs are snapshots of the data, taken at the configured interval while Cumulus is running (or at the station's configured interval when data is read from the station's logger). If the extreme value did not coincide exactly with the point at which the data was logged, then it will not appear in the log. This is most noticeable with wind gusts, the value of which can change rapidly between log entries.

 

 

When Cumulus starts, it asks the station for all the data from the logger since the last time it was running. If the timestamp that it supplies does not exactly match the timestamp of an entry in the Davis logger, the station has a strange 'feature' where it decides to send the entire contents of the logger. This will take some time to download, during which the Davis console display will appear freeze.

It is recommended that you set the logging interval in Cumulus to the same interval as the station, then Cumulus will be able to make sure it uses a timestamp that matches an entry in the logger.

 

 

The routines I use to calculate the length of the day aren't really suitable for this level of accuracy.

 

 

Cumulus uses a forecast based on the Zambretti Forecaster (see Google). Note that this is a 'forecast' for the following 12 hours or so; it is not a 'nowcast' (what the weather is doing now). Please regard the forecast as 'for entertainment purposes only'. Do not base any decisions on it, and bear in mind that it is a very simple calculation based on only a few basic parameters. Some people get reasonable results, others do not. You can try tweaking the pressure extreme settings, but don't expect the forecast to be as good as that provided by the agencies which have invested millions in their forecasting systems.

 

 

This always happens just after you restart Cumulus, as there is only one set of data available to be plotted.

 

 

When running live, Cumulus plots data at 1-minute intervals. When it starts up, it pre-fills the graphs with data from the log files, which generally (depending on how you have Cumulus and your station configured) will be at less frequent intervals.

 

 

If you've closed Cumulus shortly after it has downloaded a lot of data from the logger, it can take a while for the logging thread to get everything written away to disk, and Cumulus won't close until this has completed. However, in some circumstances, there seems to be a situation where Cumulus will never close, so you will need to close it with task manager. If you think you know what conditions cause this to happen, please let me know.

 

 

It logs data at the interval you have configured, while it is running. If there is data to read from the station logger at start up, each logger entry is logged to the Cumulus log files, so those entries will be at the logger interval that you have configured in your station.