Instromet Data Logger, CumulusMX and Raspberry Pi

[BigJeffIE]

Hi folks,

I've CumulusMX running on a Raspberry Pi 3 which is connected to an Instromet data logger via a USBtoSerial cable.

I can see that cable has been recognised on /dev/ttyUSB0 and that is what's been put into the Serial Port field of CumulusMX, but if I tail -f /dev/ttyUSB0 I don't see any traffic.

There are only 2 files in cumulusmx\data and they're cumulusmx.db & diary.db so no .txt files are being generated.

I'm not quite sure how to proceed. I've restarted CumulusMX and rebooted the Pi numerous times with the datalogger connected and ready to go.

Any pointers to where to start looking would be most appreciated.

Thanks,

CJ

[steve]

If you zip up the MX diags folder and attach it, I'll take a look.

One thing you can try is to connect a terminal program to the port (without Cumulus running), set to 115200 bps, 8-N-1, and type RDTM and enter. The logger should respond with its internal clock date and time.

[BigJeffIE]

Hi Steve,

I believe you've been chatting to Instromet and have done some work with them so I've download version 3040, and set the line

ImetBaudRate=115200

into the Cumulus.ini file.

and restarted Cumulus.

I can see the date and time you mentioned in your reply above so hopefully that's a good start but I'm not seeing any .ini files in data/ and the MXDiags shows

Invalid checksum:

I've attached the log file as requested.

2 things I don't understand.

I renamed Cumulus.ini and installed version 3040. It didn't seem to create a new Cumulus.ini so I copied the original back again. Could this be the problem?

The 2nd is I see in the log "Data logging is disabled"

Is there something in the settings I'm not enabling?

Thanks for your work with Instromet so far. It's most appreciated.

Regards,

Chris

[BigJeffIE]

Actually Steve, scrub that... I think it's working

[steve]

The slightly confusing "Data logging is disabled" message means that diagnostic logging of the data transfers from the station in the diags files is not turned on.

If you continue to have problems, it would be worth getting in touch with Instromet and arranging to have your logger swapped for one of the new ones which runs at 19200.

[BigJeffIE]

Hi Steve,

Thanks for the reply. I actually think it is one of the new ones so I'll change the baud down and see what happens.

I think it's working but the ftp part isn't right so I'll try to figure that out. I don't actually need it running as the webserver is also on the raspberry pi but it and me are in different countries so I'm trying to configure it remotely. I can't get to the set up screens in html so I'm configuring the Cumulus.ini file directly.

One strange thing, I've made some changes to it but when I go and look at it again they've been put back to how they were. As though they're getting overwritten with another copy from somewhere.

So close, it'll be great to get it up and running.

Regards,

Chris

[steve]

If it's a new logger, you would have had to have received it in the last couple of weeks. The logger will only work at one baud rate, so if it's working at 115200, it's not a new one, and won't work at 19200.

If you are editing Cumulus.ini and the changes are being lost, it sounds like you are editing it with Cumulus running.

[BigJeffIE]

Hi Steve,

Yes it was sent as a replacement for one that we couldn't get working. I'll try the baud rate and see what happens.

And yes, you're probably right, I keep forgetting to shut it down so I'll make sure I do that in the future.

Thanks,

Chris

[BigJeffIE]

Hi Steve,

Just a quick note to say it was the baud rate.

I've changed it down to 19200 and with the new Instromet logger it's working.

The only problem I have left is the gauges are displaying but it says error and starts counting down from 0 into negative figures.

Thanks for the help.

Regards,

Chris

[steve]

The only problem I have left is the gauges are displaying but it says error and starts counting down from 0 into negative figures.

Is this locally, in the Cumulus UI, or on a web site? If the latter, have you configured Cumulus to upload the realtimegauges.txt file?

[BigJeffIE]

Hi Steve,

No, that's what must be wrong.

Can I do that through editing the Cumulus.ini file?

Unfortunately the pi is in another country to me so I'm having to do everything through a terminal session and don't have access to the 8998 settings page.

I'm using ftp, I'd like to disable it and just use the inbuilt copy but again, I'd have to manually edit the ini file. I don't think the person who has access to 8998 page would know enough to configure it and as I've never seen the page I'd struggle to talk them through it.

There's nothing like a challenge

Thanks for your help

Regards,

Chris

[steve]

The entries in Cumulus.ini that correspond to the supplied instructions for uploading realtimegauges.txt are in the [FTP site] section:

ExtraLocal0=
ExtraRemote0=
ExtraProcess0=0
ExtraBinary0=0
ExtraRealtime0=0
ExtraFTP0=1
ExtraUTF0=0

[BigJeffIE]

I'm still struggling with the gauges, I must be missing something simple.

I've configured the following in the Cumulus.ini file...

EnableRealtime=1
RealtimeFTPEnabled=1
RealtimeTxtFTP=1
RealtimeInterval=60
UpdateInterval=1

My gauges file in my /var/www/html looks like this

rw-r--r-- 1 pi pi 10907 Aug 12 16:04 gauges.htm

my realtime file like this

rw-r--r-- 1 pi pi 262 Aug 12 16:04 realtime.txt

So I believe they're both being updated.

But if I look at my /gauges.htm webpage I get

"error: Not Found" in the LCD bar and none of the gauges are populated.

My realtime.txt file looks like this...

12/08/16 16:09:45 26.3 38 10.8 13.1 6.3 251 0.0 0.0 1022.3 WSW 4 mph C mb mm 62.1 -0.1 0.4 0.4 0.0 0.0 0 26.3 +0.4 26.9 15:30 19.7 09:02 14.4 16:07 26.8 15:58 1023.9 09:00 1022.2 15:54 3.0.0 3040 23.5 26.3 28.0 0.0 0.00 0 264 0.0 15 1 0 W 6322 ft 22.5 9.7 548 0

Could anyone see what I'm missing?

Thanks,

Chris

[Hobbyist]

Hi Chris well I am running exactly the same gear/software and I too had trouble setting it all up.

The bit that messed me up was updating the realtimegauges file to my web server.

On the panel on the your-ip:8998 screen there is a settings tab/extra web files page.

Have you set that up to upload your realtime gauges page from your Pi to your web server?

These are mine as a reference:-

Local file name ----- home/pi/CumulusMX/web/realtimegaugesT.txt the path here all depends on where you have the realtimegaugesT.txt file YOUR PI.

Remote file name -----/public_html/realtimegauges.txt --------- the path here is where on your server your web files are located.

Hope that helps.

Dave

[steve]

My realtime.txt file looks like this...

The gauges don't use realtime.txt, they use realtimegauges.txt as I said earlier. You need to configure Cumulus to upload it, as in the instructions, and as Dave has said. To configure it by editing Cumulus.ini, you need to use those entries that I mentioned earlier.