WeatherDuino Pro 2 [Solved]

[uncle_bob]

Hi Steve,
As you have bigger fish to fry at this point in time this isn't a biggie at the moment but I thought I let you know any way.

Werk's WeatherDuino Pro 2 system doesn't seem to work with Cumulus MX. It shows no information except the dayfile which I copied over to a new installation, along with the .ini.

I suspect it's possibly due to this station emulating the Davis Pro2/Vue serial protocol, which I read you've changed the handling of these stations.

Here's my sanitised Cumulus MX 2 diags log and ini.
I'm running it on a Windows 8.1 64 bit system with a copy of my Cumulus test installation (which works fine).

Werk isn't available at the moment, but on his return and once he's taken a look, he may be able to throw some light on the problem via diags.

BTW, I like the new modern clean look of the GUI.

Cheers Bob

[mcrossley]

Bob, a guess, but does the WeatherDuino support the LOOP2 command? Try disabling it in Cumulus.ini and see if it works then...

[uncle_bob]

Bob, a guess, but does the WeatherDuino support the LOOP2 command? Try disabling it in Cumulus.ini and see if it works then...

Hi Mark,
There doesn't appear to be any LOOP2 entry in the Cumulus.ini.
Thanks for looking though.

[mcrossley]

Bob, Steve mentions it in the announcement topic...

A note to Davis owners:
I am experimenting with the use of the LOOP2 packet. The current code uses this for two purposes. First, it uses the 'peak 10-minute gust' value, to avoid the problem where a gust might be missed (although hopefully this will not be such an issue with Cumulus MX as it does not use the Davis DLL), and secondly it uses the 'absolute pressure' value to make calculation of 'altimeter pressure' easier and more accurate. This is mainly used if you upload to CWOP.

The LOOP2 packet is supported on the VP2 with firmware version 1.90 or later, and on the Vue. If you have a Vantage Pro (i.e. the original 'VP1'), or a VP2 with pre-1.90 firmware, or if you are using Virtual VP, none of these support the LOOP2 packet. In these cases, you should edit cumulus.ini and add a line to the [Station] section:

UseDavisLoop2=0

With this setting, Cumulus will revert to calculating the 10-minute gust value itself from the individual wind speed readings, but it will not currently attempt to calculate altimeter pressure correctly, it will simply use the sea-level pressure instead. This is likely to be an issue if you are at high altitude and you upload to CWOP using Cumulus MX.

[uncle_bob]

Thanks again Mark.

I did read that part but I overlooked adding the "UseDavisLoop2=0".
I've now added that to the .ini and restarted the engine, but alas, it's still not working.

[Werk_AG]

Hi Steve,
Werk isn't available at the moment, but on his return and once he's taken a look, he may be able to throw some light on the problem via diags.

Thanks uncle_bob for raised this issue.

I tried also adding the parameter UseDavisLoop2 = 0 and did not work.
I have been trying to monitor the communication between the Cumulus MX and the WeatherDuino receiver, but none of the usual commands appears.
For now I suspect that the CumulusMX is trying to detect the data logger, which does not exist. In this new version I do not find the option to do not use the data logger.
In diags file is shown "connected"

Another thing I noticed is that, it is not created any file in the data folder, or in the backup folder.

[steve]

For now I suspect that the CumulusMX is trying to detect the data logger, which does not exist. In this new version I do not find the option to do not use the data logger.

Ah, right, I wasn't aware of that. I haven't implemented that option. I wasn't going to do it all, as people seem to set it for some reason and then wonder why they have gaps in their data. I hadn't realised it was actually needed for your emulation. I'll have a look at putting it in.

[uncle_bob]

I'll have a look at putting it in.

Thanks Steve, it's much appreciated.
Sorry for making extra work.

Cheers Bob

[Werk_AG]

For now I suspect that the CumulusMX is trying to detect the data logger, which does not exist. In this new version I do not find the option to do not use the data logger.

Ah, right, I wasn't aware of that. I haven't implemented that option. I wasn't going to do it all, as people seem to set it for some reason and then wonder why they have gaps in their data. I hadn't realised it was actually needed for your emulation. I'll have a look at putting it in.

Hi Steve,
Thank you.

In the previous version of Cumulus emulation works whether "use data logger" is active or not. So it must be something else ...
Strange thing is that I can't see any data when I try to monitor the communication between the CumulusMX and the WeatherDuino, only an inicial 0A 0A 0A (I'm using Free Device Monitoring Studio)
For now you have a lot of other important things to do... don't loose too much time with this.

I think I found other issue, but maybe it is related to regionalization, when confirmed, I will start a new thread.

Overall CumulusMX look good. Congratulations.

Regards Werk_AG

[uncle_bob]

Hi Steve,

I see you added Davis logger support in 3003 so I've tried running that version up to.
Unfortunately still no improvement (No data displayed anywhere except the settings page in the interface).

I've tested it against server 2008 64bit and windows 8.1 64bit.

The WeatherDuino's Arduino Nano has an LED which usually flashes as it sends (or receives polls?) when running Cumulus 1. This isn't happening now.

Like Werk said, please don't burn time on our very small subset of users, catch the big fish first

Attached is the logs and ini from a fresh installation with no existing data.

Cheers bob

[steve]

It could be that the reason this isn't working is the same reason that third party data loggers aren't working. If someone can tell me what the cause is, and changing the behaviour of Cumulus can be done easily and without breaking it with 'real' hardware, I'd be happy to look into doing that.

[uncle_bob]

It could be that the reason this isn't working is the same reason that third party data loggers aren't working. If someone can tell me what the cause is, and changing the behaviour of Cumulus can be done easily and without breaking it with 'real' hardware, I'd be happy to look into doing that.

Ok, cool. Thanks Steve.
I'll have to leave that up to Werk and his technical brilliance.

[Werk_AG]

Hi Steve
Thank you for your attention in a moment that you have so many other important things to do

This looks correct to me:

<LF><LF><LF><LF>DMPAFT<LF>

The first <LF> characters are presumably the attempts to wake the console. I don't know why they all appear on the same line, perhaps something is buffering them, or perhaps that isn't relevant. Perhaps that is why the clone logger doesn't respond correctly.

... The Cumulus1/Davis DLL sets up the port quite differently and sends <LF><CR>s in place of just <LF>.

I don't want to ask you to do anything that breaks functionality with original devices, but I think that is the lack of <CR> after the <LF> that prevents WeatherDuino emulation to work. With Cumulus 1 it respondes to the wake command, but now after the three <LF> there is no more communications between the WeatherDuino and Cumulus.

I'm just reporting not asking for you to do an immediate action.
And one more time thank you for all your hard work.


Best Regards
Werk_AG

[mcrossley]

Werk, I did a bit of digging this afternoon, all the documents and other implementations of station software I found just send lf with no cr, one did say you can terminate with either lf or cr bit not both.

Could you try another simple reader program that we know just send lf's and trace the serial comms with that?

[steve]

I don't want to ask you to do anything that breaks functionality with original devices, but I think that is the lack of <CR> after the <LF> that prevents WeatherDuino emulation to work.

The protocol spec explicitly warns against this:

Serial commands for Vantage Pro2 must be terminated by a single line feed or a single carriage return character, but not both. Older code that terminates commands with both a line feed and a carriage return will not work or will work intermittently.