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DonationCoder.com Software => Older DC Contests and Challenges => N.A.N.Y. 2014 => Topic started by: hamradio on December 08, 2013, 09:21 PM

Title: NANY 2014 RELEASE: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: hamradio on December 08, 2013, 09:21 PM
NANY 2014 (https://www.donationcoder.com/forum/index.php?board=318.0) Entry Information

Application NameWeather Station Warlock
Version1.0.0 build 1
Short DescriptionRetrieves the current weather conditions for about 1,800 to 2,500 locations across the United States and US Territories...
Supported OSesWindows XP, Windows VISTA, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows 10
Web PageWeather Station Warlock (http://www.dcmembers.com/hamradio/download/weather-station-warlock/)
Download LinkWeather Station Warlock (http://www.dcmembers.com/hamradio/download/weather-station-warlock/?wpdmdl=72&masterkey=5a332264d1d47)
System Requirements
  • .NET Framework 4.0
  • Obviously a computer...
Version History
"1.0.x Version History"
  • 1.0.0 build 1 - Current Version

"0.9.x Version History"
  • 0.9.5 build 1
  • 0.9.0 build 1

"0.8.x Version History"
  • 0.8.5 build 21
  • 0.8.5 build 20
  • 0.8.5 build 1
  • 0.8.0 build 1 - This was last alpha version.

"0.6.x ALPHA Version History"
  • 0.6.2 build 7
  • 0.6.2 build 1
  • 0.6.1 build 1
  • 0.6.0 build 2
  • 0.6.0 build 1 - First Public Release

Authorhamradio (https://www.donationcoder.com/forum/index.php?action=profile;u=18911)

Description
Retrieves the current weather conditions for about 2,500 locations across the United States and US Territories...

Features

Screenshots

The main screen...
[ You are not allowed to view attachments ]

The station finder...
[ You are not allowed to view attachments ]

Usage
Installation
Extract to any portable directory location and run.

Using the Application
Use built-in station finder to find your weather station, then select the ones you want, then click the add button.

Uninstallation
Delete the Weather Station Warlock directory.

Known Issues
None at this time. Let me know of any please...

Bonus Download*
wx_example_source_vs2012_csharp.zip (http://carrolld.dcmembers.com/wsw/wx_example_source_vs2012_csharp.zip)
* This is the bonus download and not the main program.
* The main program download link is near the start of this post.
* The bonus download is just the source code of a very early and basic version of Weather Station Warlock.
Title: Re: NANY 2014 Pledge + Alpha: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: skwire on December 08, 2013, 09:32 PM
Worked well in the testing that I gave it.  Plus, I always like your application's interfaces.  Kudos.   :D
Title: Re: NANY 2014 Pledge + Alpha: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: wraith808 on December 08, 2013, 11:44 PM
Very nicely done!   :Thmbsup:
Title: Re: NANY 2014 Pledge + Alpha: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: hamradio on December 09, 2013, 12:17 AM
Thank you and I had to fix a few bugs and the fetch button added back in as well so an update has been uploaded. :)

Note: By the way...mouser did in fact help me figure out the final name...
Title: Re: NANY 2014 Pledge + Alpha: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: TaoPhoenix on December 09, 2013, 10:29 AM
Everyone likes a warlock! : )
Title: Re: NANY 2014 Pledge + Alpha: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: kyrathaba on December 10, 2013, 06:42 AM
Awesome, hamradio!  :Thmbsup:
Title: Re: NANY 2014 Pledge + Alpha: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: hamradio on December 11, 2013, 10:59 PM
Updated to version 0.8.0.1 with new interface, improved station finder, and also now gets the current conditions for all stations added.  :)

Note 1: This version could break some data from old version.

Note 2: See first post for details/screenshots/download.
Title: Re: NANY 2014 Pledge + Alpha: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: mouser on December 11, 2013, 11:09 PM
Beautiful.  :up:
Title: Re: NANY 2014 RELEASE: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: hamradio on December 25, 2013, 12:08 PM
Released final version of 2013 unless any major show stopping bugs found. :)
Title: Re: NANY 2014 RELEASE: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: hamradio on January 05, 2014, 06:55 PM
Released a bugfix update. (Thanks silat for finding the bug.) :)

Also the bonus download should now be active...

RECOMMENDED UPDATE:

A unhandled exception which might occur on the downloading of data for some stations should be fixed now.
Title: Re: NANY 2014 RELEASE: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: kyrathaba on January 06, 2014, 08:30 AM
It's nice to see the above. Some people release a program and forget it. I like the dedication of people who care enough to release bug-fixes.
Title: Re: NANY 2014 RELEASE: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: mouser on January 06, 2014, 10:03 AM
One thing that's really nice about wsw is the ability to have multiple stations on screen at the same time -- great if you are interested in monitoring the weather in many places at once.
Title: Re: NANY 2014 RELEASE: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: kyrathaba on January 06, 2014, 11:13 AM
Temperatures within a 100 miles radius of my location are varying, this morning, from 0 to 9 degrees F.
Title: Re: NANY 2014 RELEASE: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: TaoPhoenix on January 06, 2014, 04:29 PM
Hi Ham Radio,

Some thoughts:

- Currently when I close it, the stations are lost. What if you made some feature where your stations are saved?
- Maybe you could make the text copyable because then you can make notes, send it in an email, and the whole shebang.
- Add a Minimize to the Tray
- This could be the counterpart to Skwire's sWeather. A buddy of mine is a Flight Attendant, so he always wants to know the weather here. So between the two, I can do a quick forecast and give your detailed warlock data of "current conditions".

Title: Re: NANY 2014 RELEASE: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: mouser on January 06, 2014, 04:31 PM
Stations are saved for me -- maybe yours is running someplace where it can't save settings? I think it tries to save settings in the directory it runs from.
Title: Re: NANY 2014 RELEASE: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: hamradio on January 07, 2014, 11:28 AM
Hi Ham Radio,

Some thoughts:

- Currently when I close it, the stations are lost. What if you made some feature where your stations are saved?
- Maybe you could make the text copyable because then you can make notes, send it in an email, and the whole shebang.
- Add a Minimize to the Tray
- This could be the counterpart to Skwire's sWeather. A buddy of mine is a Flight Attendant, so he always wants to know the weather here. So between the two, I can do a quick forecast and give your detailed warlock data of "current conditions".


-TaoPhoenix (January 06, 2014, 04:29 PM)

1. It does as mouser said in his post for saving as soon as the find stations dialog is closed with the finished button it should save the stations list and refresh all data as well.
2+3. Perhaps soon.
Title: Re: NANY 2014 RELEASE: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: TaoPhoenix on January 07, 2014, 12:59 PM
Stations are saved for me -- maybe yours is running someplace where it can't save settings? I think it tries to save settings in the directory it runs from.
-mouser (January 06, 2014, 04:31 PM)

Oh, I think I figured it out. For a lot of these little apps I tend to extract them to my desktop and play with them, then move them to my "resources" folder (aka utilities). So I must have moved the app and it lost contact with its settings.

The second time I tried it and moved the whole self contained subfolder over, it looks like it's staying put now.

Title: Re: NANY 2014 RELEASE: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: gemini06720 on January 15, 2014, 02:11 AM
Just curious...  ;)

Why are you presenting us with a choice of 'State/Province' when there is no province in the list of options - I am in Canada, more precisely in beautiful British Columbia...  8)

From where exactly are your getting the weather information (it appears you might be getting some of the information from the local METAR stations)?

Ray.
Title: Re: NANY 2014 RELEASE: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: hamradio on January 15, 2014, 10:41 AM
Just curious...  ;)

Why are you presenting us with a choice of 'State/Province' when there is no province in the list of options - I am in Canada, more precisely in beautiful British Columbia...  8)

From where exactly are your getting the weather information (it appears you might be getting some of the information from the local METAR stations)?

Ray.
-gemini06720 (January 15, 2014, 02:11 AM)

The National Weather Service which states...

"...across the United States and US Territories..."

and I am unsure if those territories use state or province so I just did State/Province.

That's my logic to it.  If you can clarify for sure if they do not use province I will change it.
Title: Re: NANY 2014 RELEASE: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: doglady1 on January 15, 2014, 11:36 AM
My husband is going to love this!  He's a weather nut and loves to see what's going on everywhere.  Thank you!
Title: Re: NANY 2014 RELEASE: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: gemini06720 on January 15, 2014, 05:06 PM
The National Weather Service which states...
"...across the United States and US Territories..."
and I am unsure if those territories use state or province so I just did State/Province.
-hamradio (January 15, 2014, 10:41 AM)
I do not think there are such things as 'provinces' within the United States of America or its Territories - the only 'provinces' I know of, within North America, are those of the country Canada ... I am sure none of the canadian 'provinces' would like to be considered 'US Territories'.  :-[

But, you have not answered my second question "From where are your getting the weather data (it appears you might be getting some of the information from the local METAR stations)?"

If you are using the data provided by the local METAR stations (through the National Weather Service), then, you could possibly add the of 10 canadian provinces and 3 territories to the list of USA states and territories ... to make the Weather Station Warlock a truly north american weather information utility.  ;)

Ray.
Title: Re: NANY 2014 RELEASE: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: hamradio on January 15, 2014, 05:51 PM
My husband is going to love this!  He's a weather nut and loves to see what's going on everywhere.  Thank you!
-doglady1 (January 15, 2014, 11:36 AM)

Your very welcome! :)

The National Weather Service which states...
"...across the United States and US Territories..."
and I am unsure if those territories use state or province so I just did State/Province.
-hamradio (January 15, 2014, 10:41 AM)
I do not think there are such things as 'provinces' within the United States of America or its Territories - the only 'provinces' I know of, within North America, are those of the country Canada ... I am sure none of the canadian 'provinces' would like to be considered 'US Territories'.  :-[

But, you have not answered my second question "From where are your getting the weather data (it appears you might be getting some of the information from the local METAR stations)?"

If you are using the data provided by the local METAR stations (through the National Weather Service), then, you could possibly add the of 10 canadian provinces and 3 territories to the list of USA states and territories ... to make the Weather Station Warlock a truly north american weather information utility.  ;)

Ray.
-gemini06720 (January 15, 2014, 05:06 PM)

It is using xml from the nws @ http://w1.weather.gov/xml/current_obs/seek.php which does stuff a little different than what I have been able to find on the Canada weather service pages.  

However I may look into it more in the future as time permits.

Note: Slight version increase to fix the wording of a couple controls in the find stations dialog.
Title: Re: NANY 2014 RELEASE: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: mouser on January 15, 2014, 07:51 PM
Featured on ILoveFreeSoftware.com today: http://www.ilovefreesoftware.com/15/windows/weather-station-warlock.html
Title: Re: NANY 2014 RELEASE: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: hamradio on January 15, 2014, 10:56 PM
Featured on ILoveFreeSoftware.com today: http://www.ilovefreesoftware.com/15/windows/weather-station-warlock.html
-mouser (January 15, 2014, 07:51 PM)

Nice to see it is getting some use by several other people than just me using it. :)
Title: Re: NANY 2014 RELEASE: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: hamradio on January 16, 2014, 01:43 PM
- Maybe you could make the text copyable because then you can make notes, send it in an email, and the whole shebang.
- Add a Minimize to the Tray
-TaoPhoenix (January 06, 2014, 04:29 PM)

I can confirm that both of those will be in a release that should happen in the next week or so. :)
Title: Re: NANY 2014 RELEASE: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: hamradio on January 17, 2014, 12:49 PM
Well since everything I have did so far seems stable for me on my system here the release is a few days earlier than planned...

Release Notes:

Minimize to tray and copy data to the clipboard has been added. Finally, a few tweaks were made and a couple minor bugs fixed.

Let me know of any bugs you might find and such... :)

Click here (https://www.donationcoder.com/forum/index.php?topic=36717.msg343746#msg343746) for the download link in the initial posting on the 1st page.
Title: Re: NANY 2014 RELEASE: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: hamradio on March 10, 2014, 10:48 AM
Version 0.9.5.1 Released!

Release Notes:

1. Added a different view mode.
2. Hopefully fixed timezone data for last queried to show correct daylight savings time setting.
3. A few other tweaks and fixes.

Use Download link from the first post (https://www.donationcoder.com/forum/index.php?topic=36717.msg343746#msg343746) of the topic.
Enjoy! :)
Title: Re: NANY 2014 RELEASE: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: tomos on March 10, 2014, 01:26 PM
^that's funny,
I just coincidentally downloaded the most recent version, without having seen your post :-)

Many thanks :up:
Title: Re: NANY 2014 RELEASE: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: RichTWebGuy on December 17, 2014, 11:08 AM
Is WSW still working OK?  Mine can't download any station info.
Title: Re: NANY 2014 RELEASE: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: hamradio on December 17, 2014, 01:43 PM
Is WSW still working OK?  Mine can't download any station info.
-RichTWebGuy (December 17, 2014, 11:08 AM)

Is it with individual station's? If so...
Which station's are you trying if it is certain stations? I did notice where some station's doesn't have the correct data if any data at all for them.

As its still working for my stations which includes...

KTRI  BRISTOL / JOHNSON / KINGSPORT, TRI-CITY REGIONAL AIRPORT, TN
KCRP  CORPUS CHRISTI, CORPUS CHRISTI INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT, TX
KCMI UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS - WILLARD, IL
KBKF  BUCKLEY AIR FORCE BASE AIRPORT, CO

If other then what do I need to look at...
Title: Re: NANY 2014 RELEASE: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: RichTWebGuy on December 17, 2014, 01:52 PM
Sorry, I mean it won't download the list of stations at all.  I have it marked in firewall to allow.  It puts "An error occu" in the State dropdown.
Title: Re: NANY 2014 RELEASE: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: hamradio on December 17, 2014, 02:01 PM
Seem's like its a problem with the NWS Station List ATM which is out of my control unless I can figure out a workaround to make the xml parser skip errors.

Code: Text [Select]
  1. XML Parsing Error: not well-formed
  2. Line Number 13534, Column 61:
  3.                 <station_name>ALABAMA RIVER AT CLAIBORNE LOCK & DAM NEAR MONROEVILLE</station_name>
  4. --------------------------------------------------------------^

You may need to delete states.txt in the cache folder before you check to see if it is fixed.

Meanwhile...if you know the station id...

You can create a file in the main directory of WSW called stations.xml.

And inside it here is what mine looks like...

Code: Text [Select]
  1. <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
  2. <WeatherStationWarlock>
  3.   <FileFormatVersion>1</FileFormatVersion>
  4.   <Stations>
  5.     <Station id="KTRI" name="Tri-Cities Airport" />
  6.     <Station id="KCRP" name="Corpus Christi International Airport" />
  7.     <Station id="KCMI" name="Champaign / Urbana, University of Illinois-Willard" />
  8.     <Station id="KBKF" name="Buckley AFB/Aurora" />
  9.   </Stations>
  10. </WeatherStationWarlock>

Change station id to the id of yours...

One workaround to find the station id atm is...

Goto weather.gov enter your location to find your local forecast...then on the page that comes up look under Current Conditions at and find the id...
[ You are not allowed to view attachments ] The station id is inside the ().
Title: Re: NANY 2014 RELEASE: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: RichTWebGuy on December 17, 2014, 02:06 PM
If I know a station name or ID or URL of RSS or XML, is there any way to bypass this list?
Title: Re: NANY 2014 RELEASE: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: hamradio on December 17, 2014, 02:10 PM
Added to previous post and also sent a message to the NWS and will post an update here hopefully soon when they have fixed it so everyone knows. :)
Title: Re: NANY 2014 RELEASE: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: RichTWebGuy on December 17, 2014, 02:28 PM
Yep, I saw that right after I posted - I got a few local stations working so I'm OK - thanks!!!
Title: Re: NANY 2014 RELEASE: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: hamradio on December 17, 2014, 02:31 PM
Yep, I saw that right after I posted - I got a few local stations working so I'm OK - thanks!!!
-RichTWebGuy (December 17, 2014, 02:28 PM)

No problem thanks for letting me know so I could look into it not just for you but also for everyone that might be trying as well. :)
Title: Re: NANY 2014 RELEASE: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: hamradio on December 29, 2014, 10:56 PM
By the way delete cache folder files inside the Weather Station Warlock folder and it should be ok next time you load the station finder.  Appears the NWS has fixed their issue a few days ago. :)
Title: Re: NANY 2014 RELEASE: Weather Station Warlock
Post by: hamradio on September 17, 2015, 04:59 PM
Updated to 1.0.0 build 1 with a few fixes as listed.  If you got the error with previous version be sure to go into the cache folder and delete states.txt file as well.

1. Added a user agent for when the feed gets downloaded to fix download forbidden as the national weather service has started requiring a user agent to prevent an error 403 forbidden on requests it appears.
2. In turn by adding a user agent it is now downloaded slightly different.

Please update to the latest version as previous versions will no longer work the way it appears (download link in first post (https://www.donationcoder.com/forum/index.php?topic=36717.msg343746#msg343746)).

Thanks! :)