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Reinstated Cumulus 1 information, as in some places MX information had replaced it - page back to purely legacy software as originally
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{{Version badge 1}}Reminder, this FAQ answer is ONLY for Cumulus 1
As of 2017, development of Cumulus 1 was stopped by Steve Loft and a new version called '''Cumulus MX beta''' replaced it. Although there have been a couple of patches to change the years listed in drop downs with Cumulus 1, its code is frozen as the relevant development environment is no longer available.
Consequently, there is no possibility of any new features for Cumulus 1.
== What are the formats of the Cumulus data files? ==
These are detailed in the [[:Category:Log Files|Log Files]] section of this Wiki, see that category page for key information about log files and the
Format information is also in the Cumulus 1 help file, in the section “Data log file format”
**Don't forget that Cumulus uses binary arithmetic to base 2, that does not correctly represent what in base 10 are decimal places, so you may see slight errors for those using inches and expecting correctness to two decimal places (read up this on internet if you don't understand binary arithmetic).
** The rainfall totals shown on the ''This period'', ''This month'', and ''This year'' screens within the '''View''' menu in Cumulus 1 are generated by adding up the daily rainfall totals found in [[dayfile.txt]] for the selected period. Using default settings via '''View''' menu in Cumulus 1, ''This month'' screen for this month excluding today, ''This year'' screen for this calendar year (this does always start on 1 January, unless you only started using Cumulus after that) excluding today. ''Note any rainfall for the current (meteorological) day is excluded as the latest dayfile.txt row is for yesterday.'' Totals can be shown for any past period, by selecting the required dates, the figures are recalculated when you press the ''Update display'' button and will include all days available in dayfile.txt for the chosen period. ''Important note: The view menu 'This year' screen always calculates the total for a selected calendar year starting in January.''
* Each time Cumulus
**As you will see if you look in [[diags_folder]], Cumulus stores the 'total rain count' figure at rollover, so by maintaining the current figure it can subtract off the start of day figure to deduce the rainfall today and this is shown on the front screen in Cumulus 1, labelled ''Today''. In Cumulus 1 the '''Edit''' menu gives access to the ''Today's rain'' screen and that provides the ability to edit the start of day figure so that the figure shown for today is correct
** If there is no rain in a day, the start of day count will be the same at the start of the next day.
**Today's rain is added to the figures (as described above) derived from dayfile.txt for what the front screen in Cumulus 1, labels '''This month''', and ''This year'' (this last figure is the seasonal total, you can choose for it to start on 1 January or any other month). Thus these figures are updated each time Cumulus receives a rain reading from the station (they all include today-so-far), and these figures will not be displayed if Cumulus is unable to read rain information from your station.
** The today's total so far at each reading time is also added to the 'recent tag' array allowing total values for the day-so-far at one minute intervals for up to a week ago to be added as web tags to a web template.
* For the web tags, Cumulus
**Important, for the <#ryear> web tag, and for the 'This year' display on the ''main'' Cumulus screen, the processing reads the ''dayfile.txt'' for the rainfall season starting with the month set on the station settings screen and stored as the value for attribute ''RainSeasonStart'' in [[Cumulus.ini_(Cumulus_1)#Section:_Station]] (its default is January).
**If you have set a 'year to date' value and Cumulus is being re-started when the year specified beside that figure matches the current calendar year, your year-to-date amount is also added into this year's total. This should normally only be relevant in your first rain season of operating Cumulus, but could be used if in any season you needed to add an extra amount because for some reason you had a gap in your recording period. ''Do be aware that if you select a rain season starting in a month other than January, the year to date figure will stop being added on 1 January because the year specified next to the figure to add on will then be the previous calendar year!''
*Note that you need to stop and then restart Cumulus to update these initial values that are stored in memory and get any corrections you made to rogue values in the daily summary log (or year-to-date) reflected on the main Cumulus screen and in web tags.
The built-in dayfile.txt editor is used if it is necessary to amend the daily totals (to correct any monthly, rain season, or calendar year, totals); the built-in all-time (or monthly records) editor(s)
== How do I reset all my data to start again from scratch? ==
can all be customised by using the [[strings.ini]] file.
'''This wiki page [[:Category:Other_Languages|Other Languages]] has some obsolete (valid in 2009-2010) information about customising what were the standard web pages in versions of Cumulus 1 up to 1.8.x. The translations there are NOT compatible with later
On the downloads page you can find third-party alternative web pages, these typically include some language translation modules, but beware that these may not be maintained to work with latest versions of Cumulus.
3 options:
*You can install Cumulus 1
*You can install 2 copies of Cumulus 1 in different paths on a single PC, ''if you have two weather stations'' and Cumulus is able to distinguish between them, e.g. they are from different manufacturers, or both are serial port stations (different ports), or one is USB and one is serial, or one is a Weatherlink IP. In other words the combination that does not work on a single PC is two USB stations (including clones from different suppliers) from the same manufacturer. Note that Davis stations with USB loggers are serial port stations as far as Cumulus is concerned, so there are no problems using multiple copies of Cumulus with multiple Davis stations on the same PC.
*It is possible to back up the Cumulus files from one installation running off a weather station, and briefly have another reduced functionality copy just looking at historic data without ever any updating (the second Cumulus is set up as if reading from an EasyWeather.dat file, but not given a path/file name) - see [[Cumulus.ini_(Cumulus_1)#Introduced_for_problems_with_Fine_Offset_family:|Easyweather.dat section here]].
*Do make sure you have exited out of the built-in viewer or editor before rollover is due.
**If you inadvertently forget this, the cure of overwriting files mentioned above is applicable if your weather station has an internal log and it is around 2 logging intervals (see [[#Cumulus_takes_a_long_time_to_download_the_data_from_my_Davis_station_at_start_up]]) after rollover.
*When using an external editor, close Cumulus
== Why do I have some unexpected zero figures? ==
== How to restore a corrupted log file ==
Full information about all the log files is elsewhere [[:Category:Log_Files]], so you can study the notes linked from there, but here is a very quick summary.
You may want to read [[Calculate_Missing_Values]] for more information.
Cumulus will create a copy of each of the logs (.ini and .txt) in the [[backup folder]], both at end of day rollover, and when the software is (re-)started.
If the corrupted file in [[Data folder|'data']] folder is a log file holding extremes (not the detailed log created for each month nor 'today.ini'), then the easiest way to remove false extremes recorded recently is to to overwrite the current file with the one from the most recent back-up.
If you were to use the backup folder copy of the detailed log, you would lose all of the stored values since the backup, so again only do that in a rewind context where all the files from the backup are overwriting those in data folder, and you simply want to copy in what is still in any station logging memory.
{{Version badge 1}}Cumulus 1 provides editors - go to Edit menu and pick the relevant extremes file, the either type over the figures that you want to change or use the buttons that load the more detailed log files and then figures from them can be copied into extreme file. There is an option (in the view menu) to read the latest detailed log for the current (or past) month, but there is no built in editor for those files.▼
▲
You may want to read [[Correcting_Extremes]] for more information, but here is a summary.
* Remember 'alltimelog.txt' logs each change made to 'alltime.ini' so you don't need to correct the former, but it can help you know how to regress the latter.
* "speciallog.txt" (if used) holds internal temperature and internal humidity, it does not get copied to backup folder, so you need to back it up yourself.
* 'yesterday.ini' will get overwritten at end of day, so it is rare to edit that.
* "dayfile.txt" has a new line appended to it at the end of each day, if you go back to the backup copy and you lose the latest line, then most of the information can be extracted from the 'today.ini' in the same backup folder, but you need to understand the process and content differences as explained in the Wiki for the two files.
* 'year.ini' and 'month.ini' record extremes shown for this year and this month, the diagnostics logs created in the sub-folder
* "monthlyalltime.ini" is
* 'log.xml' is another file that Cumulus does not copy to the backup folder, so you should back it up periodically. It is only found in Cumulus 1 and is edited using the 'Weather Diary' screen in the 'View' menu. Although it can be edited by a 'XML' editor, I advise against it, as the way that the field 'RowState' is calculated is complex, and if you corrupt the file, Cumulus 1 will crash.
* "mmmyy.txt" (naming varies depending on computer settings) is the detailed log mentioned above
Because many positive values are realistic, Cumulus generally will accept those odd increases as a result of accidental knocking of a tipping bucket gauge, due to wind effects on the gauge, or even due to the station electronics generating a rogue reading. The sub-answers below explain how to correct such errors.
=== (Invented rain) Error in today's total ===
Easy - correct today's total using the [[Today.ini#Editing_rainfall_in_today.ini_within_Cumulus | 'today's rain']] editor on the edit menu
=== (Invented rain) Error in date/time of 'Last Tip' ===
=== (Invented rain) Error in total or high rainfall rate for any day before today ===
Just edit the total or rate for the relevant day in [[Dayfile.txt#Editing_the_file_or_other_Manipulation_outside_Cumulus|dayfile.txt]], using the [[Cumulus_Screenshots#File.2FEdit.2FHelp_Menu|the daily summary log file - dayfile.txt]] editor on the Cumulus 1 edit menu
=== (Invented rain) Error in total, or extremes, for this month and/or this year ===
*Longest dry period
*Longest wet period
The correction procedure for all these is as briefly described in [[#How_do_I_correct_my_all-time_.28or_monthly_all-time.29_records.3F |this FAQ]] and more fully described in [[Correcting_Extremes]].
To see the previous value for all-time records see [[Alltimelog.txt]]. If your all-time records, or month-by-month all-time records have been affected, in Cumulus 1 you can use the built-in editors
=== (Invented rain and) Rain Counter ===
=== (Invented rain) More information ===
There is more information about correcting rogue data elsewhere in the Wiki,
== My monthly and/or annual rainfall totals are wrong ==
Cumulus calculates these when it is restarted, holds the values within memory, and increments them as required while it is running. This FAQ in the previous section [[#Where_does_Cumulus_get_its_this_month_and_this_year_rainfall_totals_from.3F]] has a concise description of how Cumulus calculates these figures.
*
**The rainfall total for today so far is added for the web tag ''<#rmonth>''. If too small a figure is shown, then the most likely issue is that your dayfile.txt is corrupted and Cumulus cannot read one or more lines. Such corruption might be introduced if you have had a power blip while Cumulus was writing to the file, or if you have viewed the file in a Microsoft tool that might have introduced unwanted characters.
**The Cumulus editor for [[Amending dayfile|amending dayfile.txt]] arranges the fields in columns and you should be able to spot when the fields in one line don't match others. The editors for monthly records (and others) have a facility to read dayfile.txt that can pick up some errors in this file and tell you the line number of the first error.
*
**Note that for Cumulus 1 the value labelled "This year" in the rainfall frame may not be the total for this calendar year, as you can choose it to start in any month (see next point).
* The rainfall total reported by the ''<#ryear>'' web tag is for the rainfall season to date, it is calculated from taking today's rain and then adding the sum of the totals in dayfile.txt starting with the first (meteorological) day of the month specified in the 'rainfall season' frame on the ''station settings'' screen within the '''Configuration''' menu, until the end of dayfile.txt is reached. So check you have specified the right starting month there before deciding the rainfall total shown is wrong. This is the same figure as is shown on the main screen of Cumulus 1 for "This year" in the rainfall frame.
See immediately preceding FAQ [[#My_station_invented_some_rain_that_didn.27t_really_occur.2C_and_I_want_to_set_it_to_zero_.28or_some_other_figure.29 |correcting rainfall]] for how to correct errors in total for particular days and how to correct the high extremes for the various periods.
CurrentDay=10
</pre>
For more information see '[[today.ini]]'.
Change the dates and time to match the point from which you want Cumulus to start downloading data. If the station has already sent the data, this may not work, unfortunately.
Probably some of your inserts used the wrong format (blank rows, fields with real numbers where integers expected, alternatively missing or duplicated fields). See [[:Category:Log_Files]]. Note that Cumulus will only flag errors in the log files that it reads (e.g. those relating to the period for which it displays trends graphs). Check all the log files you have amended.
== I have inserted pre-Cumulus data making ''''Records began on'
There might be confusion about the terminology ''Records'', in the Cumulus usage it does not mean when was your earliest data, it means when did Cumulus start tracking extremes (see [[Correcting_Extremes#Introduction]] (it does not say '''Data recording began on'''). You should update the extreme records for the inserted data, as advised in [[Correcting_Extremes]] before you make the changes suggested below.
''''Records began on' this_date''' appears in TWO places in the example [[Cumulus_template_file|template file]] called [[Customised_templates#The_Standard_Templates_for_Cumulus_1|recordT.htm]]:
There are alternative ways to correct this (do any one or any combination):
*You can manually replace the '''<#recordsbegandate>''', with any date as ordinary text, in either or both of those places.
*You can manually replace either ''Records began on'' or ''Records Since'' with '''Cumulus began on''' leaving the web tag unchanged.
**You can change the other one, not changed above, to read '''Imported data starts''' and replace the web tag with the new date.
*You can stop Cumulus, and manually edit [[Cumulus.ini_(Cumulus_1)#Section:_Station |'''station''' section of cumulus.ini]] within the main Cumulus folder.
**Change the "StartDate=" line so the value for that property has the date you want. Be sure to use the same format for the date.
▲*after the h2 heading is ''<p>Records began on <#recordsbegandate>. Here are the extremes recorded since then.</p>''; you can replace '<#recordsbegandate>' with the new earliest date typed in as text; and
▲*at the start of the table is the ''<caption>Records Since <#recordsbegandate></caption>''; replace the label "Records since" with "Cumulus began on" leaving the web tag unchanged.
== Cumulus doesn’t show the same pressure as my Fine Offset console ==
Normally when Cumulus starts, it reads in [http://www.jim-easterbrook.me.uk/weather/mm/ the fixed block] in the console a pair of absolute/station pressure and relative/sea level pressure readings and uses the difference between these as the ‘offset’ in millibar for the station; Cumulus uses this offset subsequently to calculate the sea level pressure (each time when reading the absolute pressure in the weather memory locations of the station), but it is possible to define the offset in '''Cumulus.ini_(Cumulus_1)''' instead.
Make sure that you have set your console's relative pressure correctly:
EWpressureoffset=x.y
where x.y is your pressure offset. '''Cumulus will then use this instead of reading the fixed block offset from the station'''.
'''Note''' that ''you must supply the offset in hPa'' (i.e. the millibar units that the station works with) and that this circumvention generally stops Cumulus from agreeing with the relative pressure displayed on the console.
''If you swap from Cumulus 1 to Cumulus MX, remove this pressure offset'', the latest release of MX is much better at communicating with a Fine Offset weather station and rarely needs use of this offset.
== My pressure suddenly dropped! Or suddenly increased! ==
== I get an error when I try to view my all-time records. Also, they don’t appear on my web site ==
The date format on your system has probably changed. If you look at [[Alltime.ini|alltime.ini]], you may spot the date format differences and work out what was date of change. Otherwise, go into '''Control Panel''' on your PC (not "Settings" as is normal for Windows 10 Operating system) and open the '''Clock and Region''' section. Next choose '''Region''' option. On the "Region pop-up-screen" you should check what is shown in the ''Format'' box, and what is shown in ''Short date'' and ''Long date'' drop downs.
Please see [[Correcting_Extremes]] page for further advice.
== I get an error when I close Cumulus ==
Cumulus 1 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.
== My forecast says "Not available" ==
# start Cumulus up again.
'''Today's''' totals, highs and lows (and '''yesterday's rain''' total) are held in [[today.ini]] in the Cumulus data folder. Follow the cross-references if you are unsure which parameter is what. To change any values, stop Cumulus and edit the file(s) in a text editor. Be sure to keep any date and time formats the same
If you are editing '''yesterday's highs and lows''', the totals (including RG11 rain but not standard rain), highs, and lows are held in [[yesterday.ini]]. However, you probably also need to
If your all-time and/or monthly all-time records have been affected, see the next [[#How_do_I_correct_my_all-time_.28or_monthly_all-time.29_records.3F|FAQ entry]].
== How do I correct my all-time (or monthly all-time) records? ==
Cumulus works by whenever the reading it is currently processing exceeds a particular extreme record, that record is updated. It cannot make any adjustments retrospectively.
# Correct the all-time extremes held in [[alltime.ini]] and monthly all-time extremes held in [[monthlyalltime.ini]]. Using the Cumulus 1 [[Cumulus_Screenshots#File.2FEdit.2FHelp_Menu|built-in appropriate editor]] from the first couple of commands in the Edit menu (and now also in CumulusMX) allows you to see, and copy across, suggested extremes based on contents of the monthly [[Standard_log_files]] or contents of the [[dayfile.txt|daily summary log]].▼
or 2) If you know the correct figures, you can alternatively enter them manually directly into the .ini files and not bother to update the detailed log or the daily summary log. (It is pointless to edit the .ini files directly and then afterwards edit the log files):▼
*You can look at the [[Alltimelog.txt]] file to find the previous values for the [[alltime.ini|all-time records]].▼
*Similar entries are logged to the [[diags]] files for any updates to the monthly highs and lows in [[monthlyalltime.ini|month-by-month records]]. ▼
▲
▲
▲or 3) Cumulus takes a backup of most of the active data files when it starts up, and also at the start of the meteorological day (just after midnight for a lot of users). The backups are kept in folders within the backup sub-folder in the Cumulus installation. So yet another alternative method would be to find the latest backup from before the error occurred, and copy the ''alltime.txt'' and/or ''monthlyalltime.txt'' file from the backup to the Cumulus data folder. Do this with Cumulus stopped. There is more information in [[:Category:Log_Files]], for all of the types of file.
▲*You can look at the [[Alltimelog.txt]] file to find the previous values for the [[alltime.ini|all-time records]].
▲*Similar entries are logged to the [[Diags_folder|sub-folder called 'diags']] files for any updates to the monthly highs and lows in [[monthlyalltime.ini|month-by-month records]].
== It's January 1st and my 'rain since midnight' and/or 'last 24 hours rain' and/or Evapotranspiration are wrong/negative ==
{{Version badge 1}}See this forum post - https://cumulus.hosiene.co.uk/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=14148
== How do I enable debug logging in
This depends on your build:
* The only way to turn on the logging of debugging messages in all builds of Cumulus 1, is to stop Cumulus 1, edit the [[Cumulus.ini_(Cumulus_1)#Section:_Station|Cumulus.ini_(Cumulus_1) configuration file]], and add a line in the [Station] section: <tt>Logging = 1</tt>, then restart Cumulus 1.
* From build 1003 onwards, you can also turn it on/off using the '''Configuration''' menu (debug option is included in drop down of that menu).
Please see all these pages: [[Bugreport.txt]], [[Debug.log]], and [[Diags_folder]].
= Website =
Cumulus 1 doesn't support Secure FTP. You can configure Cumulus to invoke an external program like WinSCP, as described here: [[SFTP | SFTP article]]
== Directory related problems in FTP ==
*
* Any ''files you specify'' for uploading at standard update frequency are uploaded between standard pages (if 'Include Standard Files' selected) and (applies only to Cumulus 1) standard images (if 'Include Standard Images' selected). You should specify the path (including any web site directory) in 'remote filenames', as there is no call to 'change directory'. In this case, if that path is invalid, the upload fails.
*
* If you have enabled ''Realtime'', the realtime.txt file is uploaded without doing a change directory, (by appending "/realtime.txt" to the directory on the ''Internet settings'' screen in '''Sites/Options'''). In this case, if the web site directory in your settings is invalid, the upload of the real time file fails.
* On the ''NOAA Setup'' screen the optional '''Directory''' parameter required is the relative path; from your FTP root, to where the NOAA report pages are to be stored. (It is totally independent of the directory on the ''Internet settings'' screen in '''Sites/Options'''). Click the '''Help''' button for full explanation. Like realtime.txt, the upload destination is determined by appending the file-name for the report to any NOAA directory, and will fail if that directory is specified wrongly.
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