EasyWeather Format

Many of the entry level weather stations can be classified as "EasyWeather" or "FineOffset"; they are rebadged or generic models of the device produced by FineOffSet Electronics

The software shipped with the device is EasyWeather (or EasyWeatherPlus for some models) and while it peforms its role of reading and storing data from the weather station, it is quite limiting and inflexible. Of course, if you are reading this you have probably switched to Cumulus and stopped using EasyWeather.

Simply for reference, below are some useful technical links on the EasyWeather format

Note on Models

Fine Offset manuafactured models are sold under various rebadged names and the specification of models may vary, but their website suggests the following models have PC interfaces:

• WH1080 - Landscape shaped console, solar powered remote unit with 4 outdoor sensors: thermo-hydro transmitter, wind speed sensor, wind direction sensor and rain sensor
• WH1081 - Landscape shaped console, battery powered remote unit with 4 outdoor sensors: thermo-hydro transmitter, wind speed sensor, wind direction sensor and rain sensor
• WH1090 - Portrait shaped console, battery powered remote unit with 4 outdoor sensors: thermo-hydro transmitter, wind speed sensor, wind direction sensor and rain sensor
• WH2080 - Portrait shaped console, radio controlled clock, but otherwise similar to WH1090
• WA2081 - Portrait shaped console, similar to WH1080 with solar power and manual clock
• WH2081 - Portrait shaped console, radio controlled clock, but otherwise similar to WH1080 with solar power
• WH3080 - Monitor like console, UV index and solar illuminance, added to WH2081 features (radio controlled clock)
• WH3081 - Monitor like console, UV index and solar illuminance, added to WA2081 features (manual clock)

Note that transmission frequencies, and protocols may vary between models and by date of manuafacture. Although wind measuring and rain measuring sensors may be interchangable between models, the thermonmeter/hygrometer/transmitter unit and console for an old unit may not work with those currently on sale. Also note that WH108x series display rolling 24 hour rainfall on console, WH308x series show rainfall since midnight on console.

The File Format

Easy weather stores all its observations in easyweather.dat. The file format for this has been described in detail here.

NOTE: It seems that the newer EasyWeatherPlus.dat file, has the same fields as easyweather.dat (in a completely diferent order), plus two extra fields for Solar and UV data at the end - perhaps someone with knowledge of that format and its associated program can confirm that past observations could still be input as described below.

Transferring past observations from EasyWeather to Cumulus

Cumulus will read via the USB link, observations from a Fine Offset, whether it has solar sensors or not. The following notes are based on experience of a Fine Offset without solar sensor.

If you were archiving your Fine Offset Easyweather.dat files, you probably need to rename the latest one,and restore the relevant old one before you run the EasyWeather program. Now to import EasyWeather data from a period before you started using Cumulus, close Cumulus and run EasyWeather. It is best if you make a backup copy of your EasyWeather directory before you do any more.

• In the EasyWeather program use the History option on the Record menu.
• Select 'user defined' in Search Conditions box. Select a start time before you got your weather station, leave end time at default of today.
• Click Export button, tick Header, choose as Separator: the symbol that is used to separate fields in your Monthly log files.
• Click Export button below the separator, complete the 'Save as ...' for a text file, and wait a couple of minutes (depending on size of file).
• Open resulting file in a text editor and see hints in Monthly log files on how to convert between formats.
• For dayfile.txt, you can create missing data from the newly created monthly log files, but you still may wish to insert breaks at rollover time in your raw EasyWeather table, possibly adding calculation of maximua or minima to such meteorological day groups, so you can scan though each day to check what has been created in dayfile.txt and edit as required.

If you were archiving your Easyweather.dat files, you may need to repeat the whole above process for futher source files, until you have the whole period you want. When I did this, I tried to merge the exported files before creating the Cumulus logs, but dealing with 2 full years of frequent pre-Cumulus observations meant I had a massive spreadsheet with almost a million cells, and it made separation into day by day or month by month for feeding into the Cumulus logs more difficult.

Using 'EasyWeather.dat' file as current input

As an alternative to above (that was for transfer of historic observations), Cumulus has the option to read the latest observations (the last line only) directly from an easyweather.dat file (see Cumulus help for how to fill in the station configuration screen) and process these. You might want to do this, perhaps for testing purposes, on a short term basis, but it is better to select the 'Fine Offset' input (this is via USB) for normal operational purposes (again see Cumulus help for station configuration screen). As at version 1.9.3, Cumulus is not able to accept 'easyWeatherPlus.dat' as an input.

(You can view easyweather.dat like any text file either using a text file editor like Notepad or by using a database file viewer).

That short introduction above was contributed by Sfws 12:17, 17 January 2013 (UTC) on basis of information in help and support forum.

Steve Loft has contributed the following (in case people with non Fine Offset stations wish to create data in this format for input to Cumulus) to the forum (http://sandaysoft.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=4344) see that forum thread for more details:

Whilst Cumulus does not use the station date and time fields when reading a Fine Offset weather station via USB; when reading easyweather.dat (or equivalent format input), Cumulus does read the date and time fields, and checks that they have changed before using new data from the file. Here's the format of the 'easyweather.dat' file, with the fields Cumulus uses in bold:

easyweather.dat fields:

0 - Record no; 1 - Transfer date; 2 - Transfer time; 3 - Reading date; 4 - Reading time; 5 - Interval;

6 - Indoor Hum; 7 - Indoor Temp; 8 - Outdoor Hum; 9 - Outdoor Temp; 10 - dew point; 11 - wind chill;

12 - absolute pressure; 13 - rel pressure; 14 - wind average; 15 - wind average bft; 16 - wind gust; 17 - wind gust bft;

18 - wind direction number; 19 - wind direction text (N, ENE etc, converted to a bearing as an integer);

20 - rain counter ticks; 21 - rain total; 22 - rain since last reading; 23 - rain in last hour (used as rain rate)

24 - rain last 24 hours; 25 - rain last 7 days; 26 - rain last 30 days; 27 - rain last year (used as rain 'counter' to determine other totals)

Memory Map

This page describes in some detail the data records produced by the various Fine Offset devices (WH1080, WH1081, W-8681, WH3080, WH3081 etc.). The weather station's history is stored in 4080 times 16-byte records for models without solar detectors and 3264 times 20-byte records in the 3080 model with the solar detector.

Thanks to Jim Easterbrook for all his work on pulling this data together http://www.jim-easterbrook.me.uk/