Cumulus Support

Hi all

I want to share my experience installing Cumulus MX on a Raspberry Pi2 with German locales with you.
Most of this was already mentioned by Steve, but I want to summarize my experience.

This is a step by step manual. If you want to add or change something, please let me know
The commands you should insert on the Raspberry Pi are in Blue-Bold

1. Install Mono on a Raspberry Pi 2 - Do not attempt this on an earlier Raspberry Pi, only on a Pi 2!

If mono is already installed, please uninstall mono first (https://cumulus.hosiene.co.uk/viewtopic.php?f=27&t=13587)
sudo apt-get remove mono-complete

Now install new MONO Version
sudo apt-key adv --keyserver keyserver.ubuntu.com --recv-keys 3FA7E0328081BFF6A14DA29AA6A19B38D3D831EF
echo "deb http://download.mono-project.com/repo/debian wheezy main" | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/mono-xamarin.list
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get upgrade
sudo apt-get install mono-complete

Check mono Version
sudo mono --version |grep version
The Version should be 4.x or higher

Reboot the Raspbeery Pi 2
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get upgrade (you should get an update for Mono)

2. Install CumulusMX

Create a Folder on root
sudo mkdir /CumulusMX (or install it wherever you want -> /home/pi/CumulusMX

Download CumulusMX and use WINSCP to copy it into your CumulusMX Folder on the Raspberry Pi
Extract the file:
cd /CumulusMX
sudo unzip CumulusMXDist30xx.zip

3. Converting Old Data Files
If you already used an older version of Cumulus and want to use the old data files, please proceed with Step 3, otherwise goto step 4
If you want to use your Cumulus 1 data with MX, and you use decimal commas, you will need to edit the .ini files to change the decimal commas into periods/full stops.
The other data files will be OK.

(Periods/full stops = In punctuation, the full stop (in British English) or period (in American English) is the punctuation mark placed at the end of a sentence. The full stop glyph is sometimes called a baseline dot because, typographically, it is a dot on the baseline. This term distinguishes the baseline dot from the interpunct (a raised dot).)

Copy all files in your old /data/ folder to the Raspberry Pi 2 /CumulusMX/data by using WINSCP

Check, if your *.ini files contain comma's which need to be converted into Full Stops (dot)

cd /Cumulus/MX/data
grep "," /Cumulus/MX/data/*.ini |wc -l

as a result, you should see the amount of comma's found in the ini files (grep "," /CumulusMX/data/*.ini to simply list all lines, containing comma's)

To replace all comma's with dots use htis command
sed -i 's/,/./g' /CumulusMX/data/*.ini

To verify if the command converted all comma's to dot's count the lines again
grep "," /CumulusMX/data/*.ini |wc -l
The result should now be 0

4. Run CumulusMX
by using this command
cd /CumulusMX
sudo mono CumulusMX.exe -port 9999 (or without -port 9999 Option) to sue the default TCP Port 8998.
Point your webbrowser to http:IP_OF_RASPBERRYPI:9999

5. Setup CumulusMX
Connect your Weatherstation to the Raspberry Pi 2 using USB Port.

WeatherStations with Serial Connector like LaCrosse WS23xx
In case you have a Weatherstation with Serial Port, you should use a Serial2USB Adapter.
For example the Station Settings (on the stationsettings.html) for a LaCrosse WS23xx - the settings should be:

Serial port name: /dev/ttyUSB0

Finding out, if your Serial2USB Adapter successfully was identified by your Raspberry use this Command: dmesg |grep ttyUSB0
As a result your hsould see the Serial2USB Adapter as

usb 1-1.4: FTDI USB Serial Device converter now attached to ttyUSB0

Steve, in another Forum post, some weeks ago, you asked for people using "Non english Settings" on a RaspberryPi2 and I replied, that I am still using a RaspbberyPi 1.
Now I am ready to go to make tests on my brand new Raspberry Pi 2 since it arrived yesterday.

How can I help you, doing tests and checks?

I am using German Locales and I had Comma's in my *.ini files.
regards
Jan

I'm not sure where we are at with non-English settings, some of the issues I have been able to fix myself, but others are out of my control. The version of mono in the latest Raspbian apparently does not parse numbers containing decimal commas correctly, so anywhere that Cumulus reads values out of log files and wants to treat them as numbers will fail. I don't think there are actually many places where it does that - in the NOAA reports and calculating the monthly and annual rainfall totals at start up are two places.

So in theory, with default Raspbian, you should see an error message starting like this near the beginning of the diags files - "GetRainfallTotals: Error on line " - perhaps you could confirm that?

It is possible to install a fixed version of Mono, on the Pi 2 only. Instructions are in this post - https://cumulus.hosiene.co.uk/viewtopic.php?f=27&t=13587

I'm using my Pi 2 for my 'live' system, so it's not easy for me to experiment with this. Perhaps you could first confirm that you do have the problem noted above with the rainfall total calculation, and then if you are willing, try installing the newer version of mono to see if that fixes it?

If you could report any other issues that you still see with your German settings, that would be very helpful.

Thanks.

Hi Steve

sorry, when you read my instructions in Post 1, you can see, that I am using a Raspberry Pi2 and already followed your instruction installing the most current version of Mono for ARMv7. When I am not wrong, I saw yesterday evening, when I prepared my Raspberry Pi2, that already an update of your recommended MONO installaiton was hsipped via apr-get. but it was late yesterday...so maybe I am wrong.

What I did so far, is being mentioned in Post 1.
I converted all my data - ini files from comma to dot's and all my historical data is being displayed well.
I can not find the error you mentioned: GetRainfallTotals: Error on line " - perhaps you could confirm that? in my MXDiags log.
the only things I can see regarding RAIN is always positive.

pi@cumulus /CumulusMX/MXdiags $ grep Rain 20150429-103409.txt
2015-04-29 10:34:10.513 WindUnit=km/h RainUnit=mm TempUnit=°C PressureUnit=hPa
2015-04-29 10:34:10.516 YTDRain=0,000 Year=0
2015-04-29 10:34:10.517 RainDayThreshold=-1,000
2015-04-29 10:34:18.563 Rainthismonth from dayfile.txt: 22,7
2015-04-29 10:34:18.564 Rainthisyear from dayfile.txt: 146,7


for me it looks good, Cumulus is able to deal with the comman's in my existing Logfiles.
the only errors I can find are

2015-04-29 10:34:50.548 Error at line 39605 of data/Apr15log.txt : Constraint
2015-04-29 10:34:50.548 Please edit the file to correct the error
Failed to read history data

...and this is something I can not explain to myself.....what does it mean (Failed to read history data)


aynway, I still have a RaspbereryPI B , the old one....if you like, I can look at the difference regarding the Local Settings and possible error messages

Btw: Regarding the errors above, the Weatherstation is currently not connected to the Raspberry, so the error - Failed to read history data - is based on the misssing device ?
Jan

slashmusic wrote: the only errors I can find are

2015-04-29 10:34:50.548 Error at line 39605 of data/Apr15log.txt : Constraint
2015-04-29 10:34:50.548 Please edit the file to correct the error
Failed to read history data

...and this is something I can not explain to myself.....what does it mean (Failed to read history data)

Jan, when I have seen that error it was a duplicated data, i.e. one or more lines have a date/time that has already been recorded higher up the file.

mcrossley wrote: Jan, when I have seen that error it was a duplicated data, i.e. one or more lines have a date/time that has already been recorded higher up the file.

Hi Marc
I am not concerned about the upper 2 lines (I am sure, I saw this error also on Cumulus 1.x.)
I am more concerned about:

2015-04-29 10:34:51.318 624 web tags initialised
2015-04-29 10:34:51.331 HTML root path = /CumulusMX/interface
2015-04-29 10:34:51.668 Starting web socket server on port 8002
Failed to read history data
2015-04-29 11:37:38.736 Start Timers
2015-04-29 11:37:38.737 Starting 1-minute timer
2015-04-29 11:37:38.750 Attempting realtime FTP connect
2015-04-29 11:37:39.099 Starting Realtime timer, interval = 30000ms

which is without a timestamp in my Diags File.
but maybe it was caused by a missing connected Weatherstation so it was not able to read the logged data.
Am I wrong ?

Yes, the 'constraint' error is caused by entries in the log file with the same timestamp; this can happen sometimes when switching between live and archive data, and is not necessarily an indication of a problem. I should probably suppress that message.

The 'failed to read history data' message is because the station isn't connected.

steve wrote:The 'failed to read history data' message is because the station isn't connected.

Thanks so much Steve. In this case, I am very sorry that there are no more errors in your software

but to answer a former question: this evening or tomorrow, I willl copy the complete CumulusMX Folder fomr my RaspberryPi2 to my RaspberryPi1 searching for these Errors when using old Version of Mono.
a mono --version will give me this version on my Raspberry PI2

Mono JIT compiler version 4.0.1

Unfortunately, the Raspberry Pi1 with the old Mono is currently off so I can not compare the Version of Mono between Pi1 and Pi2
regading the NOAA Output un the PI2 (and you warnings about problems when using German Locale) is not configured yet....I will check it as soon as possible.

#########################
When I am trying to stop CumulusMX with Ctrl-C Mono seem not able to shut down.


I am seeing this not for 5 Minutes.
PID USER PR NI VIRT RES SHR S %CPU %MEM TIME+ COMMAND
2981 root 20 0 69096 45m 16m R 112,0 4,9 5:10.45 mono

I will wait for some additional minutes to see, if Mono is shutting down successfully. Otherwise I need to "kill" the process.

finally, also waiting for 10 Minutes, mono is not terminating on my Raspi2.
Only kill -9 signal was able to stop mono. this is reproducable on my Pi.

Ahh...I probably also solved by myself.
Deleting the Cumulus.ini - restrating cumulusMX will create a new ini. When stoping CumulusMX is will be succesful.
It looks like CumlusMX or Mono will tryo to find the configued eatherstation before shutting down.
Since my Weatherstation isn ot connected, it will not stop properly

Hello Steve, sorry for writing so much Info today but I think something is not working as expected and I was aware of this only right now, after some further testing.

Hardware is a Raspberry Pi2.
The installed Mono Version is the one you mentioned for Raspberry Pi 2
The Local settings of my PI2 are German (sudo raspi-config used to configure)
A fresh installed CumulusMX Version which is being started by this Parameter: sudo mono CumulusMX.exe -port 9999

Current culture: German (Germany)
Serial: D3708DFF9D118932285CF4F9CC761334
Cumulus MX v.3.0.0 build 3024

when going into the configuration Station Settings and making any change on it will give me one time a Box which tells me Settings Saved but when I am trsying to make further changes on this page, everyhting is RED.
when starting with: sudo mono CumulusMX.exe -port 9999 -lang en-GB
same problem again when using the same ini.
when strating with non ini file and sudo mono CumulusMX.exe -port 9999 -lang en-GB
Everything is okay and I can to muliple changes to the Settings file.

So only starting with english settings will work.Isn't this what should be fixed with the new Mono Version?

I believe all settings red is the sign of a fault on that settings page and you need to check all settings on the page (even those that you may not have changed) before Saving. Once the page is all black they have saved correctly.

FAQ note

•If a settings screen shows red contents (red text and red boxes), invalid data is present which must be corrected before the form can be sent. One or more items on the page will have an error message.

Hi David

thank you for the answer but I am doing this:
First, I delete the Cumulus.ini file from the Folder and I am starting Cumulus with:
sudo mono CumulusMX.exe -port 9999 -lang en-GB

the only change I am adding is inserting the Weatherstation Name -> Saving the config - reload config, everyhting is fine.

In the next step I delete the Cumulus.ini file from the Folder and I am starting Cumulus with:
sudo mono CumulusMX.exe -port 9999
I am only adding the Station Name - saving the config, reload the config and all is red

the difference between both situations is:
In the first attempt, I am starting with en-GB Settings and all is well
In the second attempt I am starting with the System default locale which is German and this seem to destroy the config.

As David pointed out -

If a settings screen shows red contents (red text and red boxes), invalid data is present which must be corrected before the form can be sent. One or more items on the page will have an error message.

So which item has an error message, and what is the error message?

steve wrote:As David pointed out - So which item has an error message, and what is the error message?

All items are red.....on this Station Settings page.

I will do a diff on the Cumulus.ini file(s) once started with german settings and once started with English setitngs

Here is the scenario:
Starting fresh CumulusMX with
sudo mono CumulusMX.exe -port 9999 -lang en-GB
Current culture: English (United Kingdom)
Serial: D3708DFF9D118932285CF4F9CC761334
Cumulus MX v.3.0.0 build 3024[/color][/b]
Inserting a Station Name into stationsettings.html -> Location - Name: Bebra -> Saving config - Software is confirming config is saved. All is good

Next step
Starting fresh CumulusMX with
sudo mono CumulusMX.exe -port 9999
Current culture: German (Germany)
Serial: D3708DFF9D118932285CF4F9CC761334
Cumulus MX v.3.0.0 build 3024

Inserting a Station Name into stationsettings.html -> Location - Name: Bebra -> Saving config - Software is confirming config is saved. Reloading Station Settings Page and all items are RED

I will compare the ini file form both scenarios now

slashmusic wrote:All items are red.....on this Station Settings page.

Yes, but there will be an error message somewhere (in red) next to one item (or more than one item) which says why the items are all red.

steve wrote:

slashmusic wrote:All items are red.....on this Station Settings page.

Yes, but there will be an error message somewhere (in red) next to one item (or more than one item) which says why the items are all red.

I will come back to your question later
OKay, I compared the 2 ini files one created with German Settings, one created with English Settings
2 differences found in the ini files

German Cumulus.ini ------- English Cumulus.ini
StartDate=Mittwoch, 29. April 2015 ----- StartDate=29 April 2015
RStransfactor=8 ----- RStransfactor=0.8

did you see, German mono is adding the Day seperated by a comma into the ini
and the RStransfactor is different...whatever it is

A Screenshot from my Station Settings screen is here: http://jankreutzer.de/cumulus.jpg