WX with APRX help please.

[f5...@free.fr]

Hello

I am using APRX 2.8 with a raspberry in an external local of my house.
The link is via wi-fi.
I use it as :
Igate
Digipeat F5PHW-3
Sending objects F5ZRB and F5ZPH

I have also a WMR200 WX station. I collect data of WMR200 with software Cumulus who make a wxnow.txt file wich contain wx data for APRS.
Cumulus and wxnow.txt are in my PC in my house.

I try to send data to aprs.
I can send WX symbol but never data.
Below an extract of my aprx.conf.
The path \\WINDOWS-PC\Cumulus\wxnow.txt is good and works with UI-view32.


<interface>
serial-device /dev/ttyUSB0 9600 8n1 KISS
initstring "\x0dTXD60\x0d^M\x0dKISS ON\x0dRESTART\x0dMON ON\x0d"
callsign $mycall
tx-ok true
</interface>


<beacon>
beaconmode radio
cycle-size 15m # Une balise toute les 10min si decay en route
beacon symbol "/#" $myloc comment "Digi Raspi-APRX" via "WIDE2-2"
</beacon>

<beacon>
beacon file \\WINDOWS-PC\Cumulus\wxnow.txt
beaconmode radio
cycle-size 15m
beacon symbol "/_" $myloc comment "WX in Brittany" via "WIDE2-2"
</beacon>

This is only what I can send
2015-08-21 18:45:15 CEST: F5PHW-3>APRX28,ED1YBD-3*,WIDE2-1,qAR,ED1ZAR-3:!4745.17N/00311.46W_WX in Brittany

Another question : I would like to use another call-sign for WX information : F5PHW-12.
How I can do it please ?

My english is not very good, so please, if you an example of aprx.conf with WX transmits, I should really appreciate it.

Best 73 from France

F5PHW Phil



Web page on http://f5phw.free.fr
F5PHW on FACEBOOK : https://www.facebook.com/phil.berger.75

[David Ranch]

Curious, if you copy over a copy of the SMB based wxnow.txt file to the local Rpi file system and reconfigure Aprx to use the local copy, does it work?   This could very well be a SMB/Samba file access within Aprx.

--David
KI6ZHD 

[f5...@free.fr]

Hi David

Thanks for quick answer.
I have created a wxnow.txt file in /home/pi/ on the raspberry where aprx is intalled.

I have copied in this file the data

Aug 21 2015 21:35
000/000g000t066r000p000P000h70b10223

APRX seems to find the file but I have only the begining.

This is what aprs.fi gave me :

2015-08-21 21:42:15 CEST: F5PHW-3>APRX28,TCPIP*,qAC,T2NUERNBG:Aug 21 2015 21:35 [Unsupported packet format]

It is better than before, but not good yet !

Any idea David ?

My aprx.conf

<beacon>
beacon file /home/pi/wxnow.txt
beaconmode radio
cycle-size 10m

beacon symbol "/_" $myloc comment "WX in Brittany" via "WIDE2-2"
</beacon>

73

Phil


Web page on http://f5phw.free.fr
F5PHW on FACEBOOK : https://www.facebook.com/phil.berger.75

----- Mail original -----
De: "David Ranch" <dra...@gmail.com>
À: "Aprx software" <aprx-s...@googlegroups.com>
Envoyé: Vendredi 21 Août 2015 19:57:30
Objet: [Aprx] Re: WX with APRX help please.

Curious, if you copy over a copy of the SMB based wxnow.txt file to the local Rpi file system and reconfigure Aprx to use the local copy, does it work? This could very well be a SMB/Samba file access within Aprx.

--David
KI6ZHD

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[kg4pid]

When beaconing a file, aprx only sends the first line, and that's why you are seeing "Aug 21 2015 21:35" in the payload. The file is not in the correct format to be sent as a weather beacon, but it is close, and needs some conversion done on it before it will work. Once you can get the file into the correct format, aprx stills need an option to delete the file after it sends it to keep from sending old date. As it stands, aprx can not send your weather data.

Max KG4PID

On Friday, August 21, 2015 at 2:49:37 PM UTC-5, F5PHW Phil BERGER wrote:

[f5...@free.fr]

Hello Max.

Thanks also for answer.
I cut the first line, but it seems not to be ok yet.

By the way, I am installing WeeWx on another raspberry.
I just found that WeeWx doesn't produce any wxnow.txt (or did not find it ...), but WeeWx is able to connect to aprs server.

So, I think I will send via aprsis F5PHW-12 and after F5PHW-3 will send it on the radio.
I saw in forum ham who made this.

Many thanks to all.

Best 73 de F5PHW Phil

Web page on http://f5phw.free.fr
F5PHW on FACEBOOK : https://www.facebook.com/phil.berger.75

----- Mail original -----
De: "'kg4pid' via Aprx software" <aprx-s...@googlegroups.com>
À: "Aprx software" <aprx-s...@googlegroups.com>
Envoyé: Vendredi 21 Août 2015 23:49:51
Objet: Re: [Aprx] Re: WX with APRX help please.

[Kenneth Finnegan]

APRX can definitely support what you want to do, but there's two
issues with your current setup:

1. Being able to arbitrarily refer to files like
"\\WINDOWS-PC\Cumulus\wxnow.txt" is a Windows thing. In Linux, you
first need to mount the remote CIFS share before you can access files
from that share. i.e. mount -t cifs -o username=<share
user>,password=<share password> //WIN_PC_IP/<share name>
/mnt/WINDOWS-PC

See guides on how to permanently mount cifs shares such as:
http://midactstech.blogspot.com/2013/09/how-to-mount-windows-cifs-share-on_18.html
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MountWindowsSharesPermanently

2. APRX only beacons the first line of any beacon file you give it, so
you need to remove the date header from your file.

If you would like the source callsign of the beacon line to be
different, you should be able to use the srccall parameter:

<beacon>
beaconmode radio
cycle-size 15m

beacon srccall F5PHW-12 file /mnt/WINDOWS-PC/Cumulus/wxnow.txt
</beacon>

Despite what Max says, as long as you update your weather report file
more often than you beacon it, aprx should work perfectly for what you
want. He's just harping on the fact that he thinks his beacons are
useless if they're not sent out exactly when he wants them to be.
--
Kenneth Finnegan
http://blog.thelifeofkenneth.com/

[kg4pid]

My point was that if the program that generates the weather data stops, aprx will continue to beacon old data. Simply deleting the file would correct that! Why is that so hard to understand? Why not make a good program better?  Incorrect data is worse than no data ! ! ! 

Kenneth still has a lot to learn!

Max KG4PID

[kg4pid]

I forgot to add that the data in the file needs to be in a format that aprs clients understand. For weather data, start on page 62 of the aprs 101.pdf

http://www.aprs.org/doc/APRS101.PDF

Max KG4PID

[Kenneth Finnegan]

>Why not make a good program better?

Because just adding more options for specific problems is a miasma on
the APRS network that makes the software unmaintainable and the
protocol impossible to implement. APRX supports beaconing from a file,
and supports beaconing from an executable. That's it. I am not going
to add another knob to aprx which I have to then perpetually maintain,
document, and support, just because you can't be bothered to write a
few lines of glue code to implement the functionality you desire for
interfacing a specific deployment with another system.

https://gist.github.com/PhirePhly/dcbfc6515d3fa39fcd74

Don't belittle me when I'm insisting on a minimalistic Unix software
design *and* actually writing the code to make it happen.

If you have no already read it, I wholeheartedly encourage you to read
The Art of Unix Programming. I found it a very enlightening tome that
has fundamentally altered how I approach software engineering:
http://www.catb.org/esr/writings/taoup/html/index.html

--
Kenneth Finnegan
http://blog.thelifeofkenneth.com/

[Javier Henderson]

> On Aug 21, 2015, at 8:32 PM, 'kg4pid' via Aprx software <aprx-s...@googlegroups.com> wrote:
>
> My point was that if the program that generates the weather data stops, aprx will continue to beacon old data. Simply deleting the file would correct that! Why is that so hard to understand? Why not make a good program better? Incorrect data is worse than no data ! ! !

How would aprx know the file is stale and needs to be deleted, when aprx is not generating the file and has no notion of when the data is stale?

I like how simple and compact aprx is, I’d hate to see it become bloatware.

73,
-jav k4jh

[kg4pid]

Simple, beacon the file then delete it. (with an option in the .conf file) If there is no file to beacon, aprx does nothing. Aprx doesn't need to check to see if the file is current or not. If the program that is creating the file stops, aprx would have nothing to beacon and wouldn't continue sending old data. I wouldn't consider this to be bloatware since it prevents a potential problem.

If I could program in C I would gladly fix it myself.

Max KG4PID

[Kenneth Finnegan]

> (with an option in the .conf file)

And that's the part I find morally repugnant. Why should I have to
write 50 lines of code and 100 lines of documentation when the current
config options already support what you want? I have already given you
the seven lines of shell code to do what you want. What more do you
want from me?

--
Kenneth Finnegan
http://blog.thelifeofkenneth.com/

On Fri, Aug 21, 2015 at 9:51 PM, 'kg4pid' via Aprx software

<aprx-s...@googlegroups.com> wrote:
> Simple, beacon the file then delete it. (with an option in the .conf file)
> If there is no file to beacon, aprx does nothing. Aprx doesn't need to check
> to see if the file is current or not. If the program that is creating the
> file stops, aprx would have nothing to beacon and wouldn't continue sending
> old data. I wouldn't consider this to be bloatware since it prevents a
> potential problem.
>
> If I could program in C I would gladly fix it myself.
>
> Max KG4PID
>
>
>
> On Friday, August 21, 2015 at 11:20:13 PM UTC-5, Javier Henderson - K4JH
> wrote:
>>
>> > On Aug 21, 2015, at 8:32 PM, 'kg4pid' via Aprx software
>> > <aprx-s...@googlegroups.com> wrote:
>> >
>> > My point was that if the program that generates the weather data stops,
>> > aprx will continue to beacon old data. Simply deleting the file would
>> > correct that! Why is that so hard to understand? Why not make a good program
>> > better? Incorrect data is worse than no data ! ! !
>>
>> How would aprx know the file is stale and needs to be deleted, when aprx
>> is not generating the file and has no notion of when the data is stale?
>>
>> I like how simple and compact aprx is, I’d hate to see it become
>> bloatware.
>>
>> 73,
>> -jav k4jh
>

[kg4pid]

"What more do you want from me?" NOTHING, ABSOLUTELY NOTHING ! ! !

Max KG4PID

[Sean Campbell]

Wow!

Just FYI, I have already accomplished this exact goal.

It's pretty easy to do with linux shell.

I'd have to go to the WX location to download my scripts, but basically, you can use linux shell commands to cut the 2nd line out of wxnow.txt and paste it on to a prefix file with the aprs RAW beacon prefix data.  Then APRX is simply set to beacon the contents of the merged file.  I set up CRON to run the script ever 30s, always keeping the WX data up-to-date.

It has worked flawlessly for months!  It is correct that if the other program stops updating wxnow.txt, aprx will continue to send out old data.......but if the wx program stops generating the txt file....there is a problem that needs addressed.

Remember:  when it comes to linux shell, there is always a way!  Our devs are unpaid and generously volunteer their time.  If we insult them, we won't have a developer....

Good Luck & 73,

KS9N

[Liz]

On Sat, 22 Aug 2015 07:17:11 -0700 (PDT)
Sean Campbell <samwat...@gmail.com> wrote:

> Wow!
>
> Just FYI, I have already accomplished this exact goal.
>
> It's pretty easy to do with linux shell.
>
> I'd have to go to the WX location to download my scripts, but
> basically, you can use linux shell commands to cut the 2nd line out
> of wxnow.txt and paste it on to a prefix file with the aprs RAW
> beacon prefix data. Then APRX is simply set to beacon the contents
> of the merged file. I set up CRON to run the script ever 30s, always
> keeping the WX data up-to-date.
>
> It has worked flawlessly for months! It is correct that if the other
> program stops updating wxnow.txt, aprx will continue to send out old
> data.......but if the wx program stops generating the txt
> file....there is a problem that needs addressed.
>
> Remember: when it comes to linux shell, there is always a way! Our
> devs are unpaid and generously volunteer their time. If we insult
> them, we won't have a developer....
>
>
>
> Good Luck & 73,
>
>
> KS9N

If you are scripting, then you would run the script through cron?
If so, you write the first line of the script to delete the old data,
so if there is no new data, you get an error emailed to you, and old
data is not broadcast.

Liz
VK2XSE

[Sean Campbell]

That's totally doable.

I haven't had a problem so it wasn't necessary and I just kept the script simple.

Good idea!

[Sean Campbell]

Kenneth,

Here's how I've been doing it:

Assuming my shell script is named wxbeacon.sh:

* * * * * /usr/bin/sh /path/to/wxbeacon.sh

Since CRON can't run a job more often than one minute, the shell script runs the commands (which happen almost instantaneously), followed by a "sleep 30)", then a repeat of the commands.

Although I don't remember the exact syntax of the shell script, the gist is this:

I have a file called wxprefix.txt that is a static file (never changes), and it has the first part of the raw WX beacon.  This file never gets changed unless you wish to change the lat/lon or station name.

The script cuts only line 2 from wxnow.txt, then pastes it on to the end of wxprefix.txt, and writes a new file called "wxbeacon.txt"

Then you set aprx to beacon the raw file (wxbeacon.txt) as normal.  The data shows up prefectly on aprs.fi and the graphs accurately reflect the WX data.

Gotta love linux!!!  Always a way to make it happen.

KS9N

 

I'm interested how you have cron run something every 30 seconds. I've
never been happy with the ways I've been doing it.

[f5...@free.fr]

Hello everybody.

I am not a good specialist in linux, cron ...

My goal was :

- 1st raspberry : collect with the software weewx data from my personnal weather station WMR200.
- 2nd raspberry used by APRX F5PHW-3 (Digi + igate) : send F5PHW-12 Data weather on radio.

Problem :
Weewx is not making a file like wxnow.txt or beaconwx.txt ...
So I saw on internet that it's possible with APRX to send DATA from APRSIS to Radio.

I found how to send F5PHW-12 (WX) to APRSIS, and after, I configured APRX in order to receive only F5PHW-12 and send it to radio.

It works well now.

Many thanks for your help.

Best 73 de F5PHW Phil

Web page on http://f5phw.free.fr
F5PHW on FACEBOOK : https://www.facebook.com/phil.berger.75

----- Mail original -----
De: "Sean Campbell" <samwat...@gmail.com>
À: "Aprx software" <aprx-s...@googlegroups.com>
Envoyé: Dimanche 23 Août 2015 02:34:14
Objet: [Aprx] Re: WX with APRX help please.

[Nate Bargmann]

This may work for you.

I have a Pi running WeeWX and it sends weather data to the APRS-IS
servers using the call N0NB. The other Pi is running APRX and connects
to the APRS-IS servers using the call N0NB-10 and has a server filter
for all packets within 100 km. As a result, my WX data is sent to
N0NB-10 and is transmitted every ten minutes.

I have figured out a couple of key items with this setup:
- The WX data must be sent to the APRS-IS servers using an amateur radio
callsign with a passcode and not a CWOP ID.

- The callsigns must be different as it is my understanding that the
APRS-IS server will not send the WX data back to the same callsign as
I had tried this trick with YAAC using the same callsign for each and
it did not work.

Neither Pi is in communication with each other even though they are on
the same LAN.

73, Nate

--

"The optimist proclaims that we live in the best of all
possible worlds. The pessimist fears this is true."

Ham radio, Linux, bikes, and more: http://www.n0nb.us