Idiots guide to weewx on a Pi

[Robin]

Is there a 'recipe sheet' for installing weewx on a Raspberry Pi?

I'm new to the Pi and have no experience of Linux. Yes, I know that "Some familiarity with Linux or other Unix derivatives;" is in the required skills but I'm old and thick so need help!

I want to learn, but I also want to see my weather station up and running.

Anybody help?

[Shaggy]

As a complete beginner a few months ago, in addition to the excellent guide in the Weewx documentation, I also used this write-up by Chris Davies-Barnard.  There is of course lots of overlap, but bear in mind that only the Weewx documentation is kept up to date with more recent releases.  Although it has a few more steps, personally I preferred to go down the setup.py route rather than installing the Deb package, but go with whatever you're comfortable with.  Start with the sqlite database and Simulator as data source, then configure your station and if you want to, a separate mysql database, once the basics are working.  To keep things simple, I found it worthwhile installing a webserver (Apache2) on the Pi at first, so that you can check the results without relying on the FTP configuration working as well.

In my experience, everyone here has always been really helpful, so if you have any problems, search the forum first and post if you can't find the information you need.

[Branislav Vedel]

I've been running weewx on a RPi for almost a year now and must second what shaggy wrote. Weewx is very well documented and the people in this forum are helpful.
Although, if you are new to RPi and linux, you may want to start there, with things like installing the operating system on the RPi (e.g. Raspbian) and administering it from shell (command line). It's quite probable you will want to run your RPi headless (i.e. without a display) and in this case some basic linux knowledge is unavoidable.
My first (although not related to weewx directly) advice would be - buy a good SD card. The SD card is the weakest part of RPi and if something gets broken (HW), 99% of the time it's the SD card. Second advice: make backups. HW & SW can be repaired or replaced, however when you lose e.g. several months/years of collected weather data, they're gone forever.
And, have fun learning! ;)

[Robin]

UPDATE

Thank you to everyone that posted replies here or emailed me (or both).

After reading everything I decided to give a simple Debian installation a go. 

So for those newbies like me looking for a start point, this is what I did.

• Downloaded the latest RASPIAN image and followed the instructions to get my Pi running.
  
• Installed appache using 'sudo apt-get install apache2'
• Followed the instructions at http://www.weewx.com/docs/debian.htm
• Plugged in my Fine Offset clone and.....nothing.
• TOP TIP for Fine Offset users
• install the cumulus software and check the USB link
• set the data log interval to required period
• shut down pi 'sudo halt'
• connect weather station to Pi
• Start Pi
• JOB DONE

You can see my web page at www.weather.molyvos.eu and I am live on Weather Underground at http://www.wunderground.com/personal-weather-station/dashboard?ID=IEGEOEGE2

You will need to learn a little about Debian to make this all possible but a quick search will bury you with options. You will also need to learn to use something like 'vi' to edit weewx.conf via the commend line.

An especially big thank you to Vince for your patient coaching.

NEXT JOB

Make my own web page look pretty.

Enjoy your Pi everyone.

[Sathish Durai]

Hi But this idiot guide doesn't work for me...?!?!

could any help be provided..??

[Dave Webb KB1PVH]

Are you installing on a Raspberry Pi and if you are, what model? 

Dave-KB1PVH


Sent from my Galaxy S7

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[Sathish Durai]

Am installing on a Raspberry Pi B+ 2 model...

rgds

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[Dave Webb KB1PVH]

Could you be more specific as to what troubles you are having? 

Dave-KB1PVH


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[Sathish Durai]

Below i what i get on my command line after i follow the http://www.weewx.com/docs/debian.htm

pi@ActPi:~ $  sudo dpkg -i whew_3.6.2-1_all.deb                    #Press enter#

dpkg: error proceeding archive whew_3.6.2-1_all.deb (--install):

cannot access archive: No such file or directory

Errors were encountered while processing:

Weewx_3.6.2-1_all.deb

pi@ActPi:~ $

[Dave Webb KB1PVH]

You have 

pi@ActPi:~ $  sudo dpkg -i whew_3.6.2-1_all.deb

Try this  sudo dpkg -i weewx_3.6.2-1_all.deb

Dave-KB1PVH


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[Sathish Kumar Duraisamy]

Sorry for the typo auto correction (as "whew" on this page) by google... 

but i did type... 

sudo dpkg -i weewx_3.6.2-1_all.deb

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Regards

    Sathish

[Sathish Kumar Duraisamy]

Should i download the "weewx_3.6.2-1_all.deb" on to my Pi through the web browser on the Pi ?!?

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Regards

    Sathish

[Dave Webb KB1PVH]

You could do 

wget http://www.weewx.com/downloads/weewx_3.6.2-1_all.deb from the command line to download it.

Dave-KB1PVH


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[Sathish Kumar Duraisamy]

Cool...it worked...

Its downloading now...

What next with that?!?!

[Dave Webb KB1PVH]

Chances are that it downloaded to /home/pi, so go there or wherever it is  and execute the commands.

Dave-KB1PVH


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[Sathish Durai]

okay now that it can got downloaded... 

how to find where it is?? 

what commands do i use now...?

(am a mechanic... not used to this software troubles... sorry !!)

Cool...it worked...

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Regards

    Sathish

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Regards

    Sathish

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    Sathish

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[Dave Webb KB1PVH]

Try   cd /home/pi

Then follow the install instructions for deb install.

Dave-KB1PVH

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[Sathish Kumar Duraisamy]

when i execute the command i get this below....

pi@AgriPi:~ $ sudo dpkg -i weewx_3.6.2-1_all.deb

(Reading database ... 123360 files and directories currently installed.)

Preparing to unpack weewx_3.6.2-1_all.deb ...

Unpacking weewx (3.6.2-1) over (3.6.2-1) ...

dpkg-deb (subprocess): cannot copy archive member from 'weewx_3.6.2-1_all.deb' to decompressor pipe: unexpected end of file or stream

dpkg-deb: error: subprocess paste returned error exit status 2

dpkg: error processing archive weewx_3.6.2-1_all.deb (--install):

 cannot copy extracted data for './usr/share/doc/weewx/images/weektempdew.png' to '/usr/share/doc/weewx/images/weektempdew.png.dpkg-new': unexpected end of file or stream

Processing triggers for systemd (215-17+deb8u5) ...

Errors were encountered while processing:

 weewx_3.6.2-1_all.deb

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Regards

    Sathish

[Sathish Kumar Duraisamy]

Cool ... But how do it set the reporting to Underground and other sites?!?!

It doesn't ask me for those details?!?

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Regards

    Sathish

[Dave Webb KB1PVH]

You need to edit weewx.conf with your station info

Dave-KB1PVH


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[Branislav Vedel]

hello Sathish,

I would suggest you read the weewx manual first (link at the bottom). All the questions you've asked are explained there in an easy-to-follow manner. Including the required skills anybody wanting to use weewx needs to have, quote:

You should have the following skills:

- The patience to read and follow this guide;
- Willingness and ability to edit a configuration file;
- Some familiarity with Linux or other Unix derivatives;
- Ability to do simple Unix tasks such as changing file permissions and running commands;
- No programming experience is necessary unless you wish to extend weewx. In this case, you should have some familiarity with Python

http://weewx.com/docs/usersguide.htm

[Sathish Kumar Duraisamy]

i did open the 'weewx.conf' file in test editor and do the changes but when i save it says... 

"Can't open file to write".

[Dave Webb KB1PVH]

Try using sudo.

Dave-KB1PVH


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[Erwin Heger]

details about the conf-file are to be found here
http://www.weewx.com/docs/usersguide.htm#weewxconf

in earlier days of installing and using software a common word was rtfm, but nowadays this is no more political correct ;-)

take care which user you are using to edit the files. Via commandline "sudo" is your friend ...

Erwin

[Sathish Kumar Duraisamy]

i did open the 'weewx.conf' file in text editor and do the changes but when i save it says...  "Can't open file to write", and doesn't save the changes..?!?

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    Sathish

[Dave Webb KB1PVH]

Try  sudo nano /etc/weewx/weewx.conf

Dave-KB1PVH


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[Erwin Heger]

do you work via commandline in a terminal window?

If yes, notice this:
http://www.weewx.com/docs/usersguide.htm#permissions

[Sathish Kumar Duraisamy]

Thank you Very Much, Dave, Erwin, for now it is on and also generating reports on local raspberry Pi. I'll rectify the remaining tomorrow.

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Regards

    Sathish