WxDisplay
(Weather Data Display)

See the main page for the WxTools overview

Description

This program is intended for displaying the data collected and vetted from an Oregon Scientific Professional Weather Station (e.g. the WMR180 and WMR928N) using the WxLog, WxLogger and WxVet programs. The name WxDisplay derives from the common abbreviation WX for "weather conditions". The program was developed by Anthony S. Wilson under the supervision of Ken Turner.

WxDisplay uses the Java 2D Graph package, which is included with WxDisplay for convenience.

Customisation

The WxDisplay program is provided in source form. Store it where you wish, though it might be best to place it underneath your home web directory. Compile everything with javac *.java, and optionally create a jar file from the classes. (This is what the included Unix shell script build does.) The code must be edited to adapt it to your local environment. Specifically, the following constants must be altered at the start of the main class (WeatherGraph):

directory

where the weather data files are stored (no '/' or '\' at end of name)

url

where the weather data files are stored as URLs (no '/' or '\' at end of name).

In addition, you may wish to alter the following constants:

borderBottom

bottom border for graph (pixels)

borderLeft

left border for graph (pixels)

borderRight

right border for graph (pixels)

borderTop

top border for graph (pixels)

labelColour

graph label font colour

labelFont

graph label font name

labelSize

graph label font size

labelStyle

graph label font style

legendX

x coordinate for top legend (pixels)

legendY

y coordinate for top legend (pixels)

lineMarker1

line marker style 1 (first measurement)

lineMarker2

line marker style 2 (second measurement)

lineMarkerScale

line marker scale

lineStyle

line style (1/0 = line/no line)

lineWidth

graph line width (pixels)

markerFile

filename for graph marker symbol definitions

maxGraphs

maximum number of graphs to display

prefix

condensed data file prefix

suffix

data file suffix

titleColour

graph title font colour

titleFont

graph title font name

titleSize

graph title font size

titleStyle

graph title style

windowSize

window size (pixels)

If you use the separate WxVet program, the directory setting must match that for the displayer.

Usage

The data format used by WxDisplay is that of the WxLog and WxLogger programs, with minor variations according to the file. WxDisplay also uses the condensed day/week/month/year files created by WxVet.

WxDisplay can be run from the command-line using the following parameters:

  java WeatherGraph DD MM YYYY MMMM ...
  

The day, month and year are given. Each can be given as a pair of values separated by a dash. Thus '01-05 02 2005' means 1st to 5th February 2005, while '01 02-04 2005' means 1st February to 1st April 2005. All measurements in a date range must exist. The date specification is followed by a list of measurements to be graphed:

ID, IH, IP, IT

indoor dewpoint, indoor humidity, (indoor) pressure, indoor temperature

OD, OH, OR, OT

outdoor dewpoint, outdoor humidity, (outdoor) rainfall, outdoor temperature

WC, WD, WS

wind chill, wind direction, wind speed

With one exception, these must be followed by AVE (average), MIN (minimum) or MAX (maximum). Rainfall (OR) is always a cumulative total - the average/minimum/maximum values are the same. Thus, 'IDMIN OHMAX WCAVE OR' will graph the indoor dewpoint minimum, outdoor humidity maximum, wind chill average, and rainfall total. A maximum of four graphs will be displayed (determined by the maxGraphs constant mentioned below). However, several graphs of the same kind (e.g. minimum and maximum humidity) are amalgamated and count as one graph.

WxDisplay can also be run as an applet. The parameters are similar to those used from the command line. See displayer.html for insight into its usage as an applet. This file would need customisation for the local environment (e.g. the location of files, the use of Apache '#exec').

The Unix shell script wxshow is provided as a convenience for displaying the contents of data files on the console. The Unix shell script wxview is provided as a convenience for displaying weather graphs.

Control Files

The displayer uses a slightly modified form of the Graph2D package. The Graph2D file marker.txt defines marker symbols for graphs. The format of this is defined by Graph2D and is not given here.

Licence

This program is free software. You can redistribute it and/or under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation - either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.

This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful but without any warranty, without even the implied warranty of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. See the GNU General Public License for more details. You may re-distribute this software provided you preserve this README file.

The separate Graph2D package is included for convenience in the graph directory. This is also released under the GNU General Public License.

History

Version 1.0: First public release, Ken Turner, 7th July 2005

Version 2.0: Second public release, Ken Turner, 11th July 2006

• created common methods in GraphMaker, MultiGraphMaker
• added line width and fixed legend display in Graph2D.DataSet
• better indication of measurement units in Calculator
• added more configuration constants to GraphMaker, MultiGraphMaker, WeatherGraph
• added window titles in WeatherGraph and Calculator
• used a thread for data retrieval in WeatherGraph so that progress messages can be shown
• extended AxisUnscaled to show meaningful horizontal axis labels
• fixed MultiGraphMaker for display of whole years

Version 1.3: Ken Turner, 18th February 2013

• WxDisplay now deals with output from WxLogger, notably the addition of UV data, but remains compatible with WxLog

Version 2.0: Ken Turner, 13th February 2017

• the code has been made available from SourceForge