Cumulus Support

Hi there,
Really hope you can help!
Our cumulus v1.9.3 (1059) data feed to wunderground http://www.wunderground.com/weatherstat ... =ISURREYR6 mysteriously stopped on 27 Aug after months of flawless uploads. I have been told there have been no changes to our (school) servers or ports or virus or firewalls etc so our own IT support have drawn a blank.
The configuration of the Weatherunderground site has remained identical and a BUG report suggested that uploads to WU are successful, certainly it regularly reports on the cumulus display that this is the case.
Wunderground support have not been able to help solve this issue and have gone quiet on me after issuing me with this website http://wiki.wunderground.com/index.php/ ... d_Protocol saying they changed their servers on 27 Aug and this may have been the problem along with the comment that "

it's less forgiving on calls that aren't escaped and don't follow the exact protocol"

which I do not undertsand. They have not explained what I should do to get the feed back up and running and, to be honest, I have no idea what the protocol wunderground page means.
FTP and WOW uploads are all perfect.
Any assistance v gratefully received,
thanks
Simon

cumulus v1.9.3 (1059)
http://www.rgsweather.com

response from Wunderground
We think we figured out the problem. We recently made a change to our server, and now it's less forgiving on calls that aren't escaped and don't follow the exact protocol.

We also updated the upload protocol document to be a bit more clear.

http://wiki.wunderground.com/index.php/ ... d_Protocol

,


bug report
3512.30984 : 11:33:38 WU Response Code: 404 Response =
3512.35984 : 11:33:43 Updating Wunderground
3512.35984 : http://rtupdate.wunderground.com/weathe ... 1&rtfreq=5
3512.52593 : 11:34:00.219 Sending wakeup, attempt 1
3512.52797 : 10/09/2013 11:34:00 Minute timer 34
3512.52797 : Adding LH entry, ts = 11:34:00 raintot = 367.399993896484
3512.52797 : 11:34:00 Creating WXNow File
3512.52843 : 11:34:00.469 Received 0A
3512.52843 : 11:34:00.469 Received 0D
3512.52843 : 11:34:00.469 Station woken
3512.52843 : 11:34:00.469 Sending BARDATA
3512.54953 : 11:34:02.579 Bardata = 0A 0D 4F 4B 0A 0D 42 41 52 20 33 30 31 32 32 0A 0D 45 4C 45 56 41 54 49 4F 4E 20 33 31 35 0A 0D 44 45 57 20 50 4F 49 4E 54 20 35 33 0A 0D 56 49 52 54 55 41 4C 20 54 45 4D 50 20 35 32 0A 0D 43 20 32 38 0A 0D 52 20 31 30 31 32 0A 0D 42 41 52 43 41 4C 20 2D 34 0A 0D 47 41 49 4E 20 30 0A 0D 4F 46 46 53 45 54 20 2D 33 39 0A 0D FFFFFFFF
3512.54953 : MSLP=1020.05139160156 SP=29.7789249420166 AP=1019.66827392578 pIn=30.1219997406006 eFt=315 mtF=52 C=2.79999995231628
3512.56906 : 11:34:04 WU Response Code: 404 Response =
3512.61906 : 11:34:09 Updating Wunderground

Their diagnosis doesn't make sense. If it was anything to do with a change they made, and Cumulus not following the protocol, then it would be broken for everyone, and it isn't. Cumulus does do the URL encoding and always has. I would have thought that they would have been able to determine that from the data that Cumulus is sending, assuming they're actually seeing the uploads.

You are getting a 404 - "not found" - from the update:

3512.56906 : 11:34:04 WU Response Code: 404 Response =

If the problem really was as WU claim, then 404 is a pretty poor error code to be returning for a badly-formed update string.

Unfortunately it's not possible for me to say where the 404 is coming from; it could be from WU, or it could be from something between you and WU, e.g. your firewall. You could try turning off rapid fire, then the uploads go to a different server at WU. Perhaps for some reason you are unable to connect to the rapid fire server.

Thank you, I shall try switching off rapid fire. I'll also copy in WU with your reply and see what they say. Doubtless I'll get back to you with the result!
Simon

You could also try pasting the update URL into a browser:

http://rtupdate.wunderground.com/weathe ... 1&rtfreq=5

You can put your password in where the asterisks are.

Many thanks Steve, this is most helpful of you.
Would I be right in understanding that, if I were to paste this into the browser and it popped back with an "ACCESS DENIED" message that this would indicate an internal problem local to our own network such as a permissions issue or firewall blocking outgoing data traffic to weather underground? Should this be the case, in theory of course, would I be right in going back to my IT Support team and suggesting, again, that they pursue our network providers to resolve this?
All in theory of course, as I would be most embarrassed to have wasted your time if it was actually the case that it was our own internal network at fault!!

I do hope I can post back a success story in due course, thanks to your help.
Simon

sacmac wrote:Would I be right in understanding that, if I were to paste this into the browser and it popped back with an "ACCESS DENIED" message that this would indicate an internal problem local to our own network such as a permissions issue or firewall blocking outgoing data traffic to weather underground?

I would think so, yes. It's possible that WU is returning that, but it sounds more likely to be your network.

If I click on the link as it is, without a valid password, I get

INVALIDPASSWORDID|Password and/or id are incorrect

Which is obviously coming from WU. What do you get if you do the same (from the school network)?

Hi Steve
With the correct password I get an ACCESS DENIED error due to some network filtering issue which I have passed onto our IT support. If I do this from here at home it just returns "success" in the top left of a blank screen. I think your help should move things forward now because it seems to show that it is an internal network problem and not something to do with cumulus (as if!) or indeed WU.
I'll post back once IT support have found the solution.
thanks so much again
Simon

Probably not the solution to your problem, but when I've found my WU isn't updating, a restart of Cumulus seems to fix the issue.

thanks, I'll try that too.
Simon

Given the fact you can't seem to access it through the browser either I'd say it's a school firewall problem, not Cumulus, so restarting won't do much.

I am delighted to say that, with all your help, we have got the data back up and feeding thru to weather underground. Apparently, Weather Underground servers had changed their server address and it was simply that our permitted target hadn't changed with it... so the new server address was blocked by the filters (or something like that). Easy to change by IT support, shame it took a while
The only snag now is the gaping hole of data from Aug 27 through to today... and the Hilltop explanation and the http://wiki.wunderground.com/index.php/ ... d_Protocol on the thread here https://cumulus.hosiene.co.uk/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=9624 all seem way too tricky and time consuming for me to consider.
So... has there, by any chance, been any progress on a quick and simple to use bulk uploading facility for large gaps in WOW and WU data?
A big ask, but worth asking!
sincere thanks again, what a great forum this is!
Simon

sacmac wrote:So... has there, by any chance, been any progress on a quick and simple to use bulk uploading facility for large gaps in WOW and WU data?
A big ask, but worth asking!

Not that I'm aware of. Mark Crossley sent me a script to try some time ago, but I had some problems getting it to work and I have been too busy to do any investigating.

'Interesting thread. My issue with WU the last few weeks is a failure to update the webcam photo that is part of my weather station "page" in a timely manner.

Has anyone else had this issue? One of their FAQ's talks about their servers getting overloaded and this delaying the posting, but we're talking delays of 8-12 hours, making the photo pretty much useless

Coyotefred wrote:'Interesting thread. My issue with WU the last few weeks is a failure to update the webcam photo that is part of my weather station "page" in a timely manner.

Has anyone else had this issue? One of their FAQ's talks about their servers getting overloaded and this delaying the posting, but we're talking delays of 8-12 hours, making the photo pretty much useless

Yep, I've had that problem on and off now for about 10 days. Seems to be ok today sofar.

I have had similar problem for quite some time as well as others http://www.wxforum.net/index.php?topic=20229.0. I have had some contact with them and they had been good in acknowledging the issue, but to my most recent follow up a few days ago they have not yet responded.

Paul