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All Projects → peted-davis → WeatherFlow_PiConsole

peted-davis / WeatherFlow_PiConsole

Licence: GPL-3.0 license
Raspberry Pi Python console for WeatherFlow Tempest and Smart Home Weather Stations

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WeatherFlow PiConsole

The WeatherFlow PiConsole is a Python console that displays the data collected by a WeatherFlow Tempest or Smart Home Weather Station. The console uses the WeatherFlow REST API and websocket to stream data from your station in real time via the internet, including the 3-second rapid wind updates.

The console is compatible with Raspberry Pi 3 and 4 running 32 bit Raspberry Pi OS with the Official 7 inch touchscreen or equivalent. It can also be run on a PC with Ubuntu 20.04 LTS or Raspberry Pi OS. For full system compatibility details, see below.

For a list of supported features and screenshots of the console in action, please checkout the WeatherFlow community forums: https://community.weatherflow.com/t/weatherflow-piconsole/1933

https://weatherflow.com/tempest-weather-system/
https://community.weatherflow.com/

Contents

Compatibility
Installation Instructions
Update Instructions
Auto-Start Instructions
Advanced Installation: Windows
Credits

Compatibility

Raspberry Pi

The console is fully supported for Raspberry Pi 3 Model B/B+ and Raspberry Pi 4 running the the 32 bit version of Raspberry Pi OS. It can be run on earlier models, or the 64 bit version of Raspberry Pi OS, but no direct support is provided for these environments. It is not compatible with Raspberry Pi Zero or Zero W.

For Raspberry Pi 3, the 'Legacy' (Debian Buster) version of Raspberry Pi OS with desktop must be used. On a Pi 3, the console will not run on the most recent version of Raspberry Pi OS (Debian Bullseye). For Raspberry Pi 4, either the Legacy (Buster) or most recent (Bullseye) version of Raspberry Pi OS may be used.

The console is compatible with the Raspberry Pi Official 7 inch Touchscreen or other HDMI equivalents. Note, screens that attach solely to the GPIO pins (SPI) are not compatible and the console will not start

PC / Laptop

The console is fully supported on laptops and PCs running Ubuntu 20.04 LTS or the desktop version of Raspberry Pi OS. It will run on other debian-based operating systems with Python version 3.7 or above, but no direct support is provided for these environments.

Installation Instructions

The installation of the WeatherFlow PiConsole is fully automated, and can be started from the terminal with a single command. The automated installation should take ~1 hour.

The automated installer assumes you have already sucesfully setup your Raspberry Pi and have installed Raspberry Pi OS with Desktop, or you ar running on a PC with Ubuntu 18.04 or Raspberry Pi OS installed. For a Raspberry Pi you should have also attached the touch screen, and have either a keyboard and mouse attached directly to the Pi, or have accessesd the Pi remotely through SSH/VNC. If you are starting from scratch with a Raspberry Pi, the documentation should help get you started:

Install WeatherFlow PiConsole

The WeatherFlow PiConsole can be installed quickly and conveniently with the following command:

curl -sSL https://peted-davis.github.io/wfpiconsole | bash

Piping a command directly to bash is controversial, as it prevents the user from reading code that is about to run on their system. If you are worried about the contents of the installer, please examine the first and second install files in the Git repository before running the install command. The PiConsole requires a number of Python dependencies. Please check the second install file if you think there may be any conflicts with existing software on your on system.

Raspberry Pi 4

For those of you running a Raspberry Pi 4 an extra step is needed to get the console running perfectly. The “Task Bar” panel on the Raspberry Pi desktop needs to be hidden or else it will displace the console on the screen. There are two options to achieve this. First right click on the “Task Bar” panel on the Raspberry Pi desktop and select Panel settings. Select the Advanced tab. Then either:

  1. Un-tick "Reserve space, and not covered by maximised windows", or
  2. Tick "Minimise panel when not in use" and set "Size when minimised" to 0 pixels.

Please note that you also cannot use SSH to start the console on a Raspberry Pi 4. Instead for remote access it is recommended to setup VNC (https://www.raspberrypi.org/documentation/remote-access/vnc/)

Configure and Run WeatherFlow PiConsole

When the console is run for the first time, you'll be asked to enter a WeatherFlow Personal Access Token and a CheckWX Aviation Weather API key. The Personal Access Token is required for the PiConsole to access the data from your station, and the CheckWX API key is required to download the closest METAR information to your station location.

A Personal Access Token can be generated, viewed, and deleted here: https://tempestwx.com/settings/tokens, and a CheckWX API key can be obtained by registering for a free account here: https://www.checkwxapi.com/auth/signup

Once you have a Personal Access Token and registered with CheckWX, go ahead and run the console for the first time using:

wfpiconsole start

You'll be asked to enter the API keys you have just generated above, as well as information about your station. This includes your station ID and device IDs for your AIR, SKY, or TEMPEST modules. To find this information either open the WeatherFlow app or view your station page in a web browser. Click on the gear (settings) icon -> Stations -> [Station name] -> Status.

If all goes smoothly the console should automatically add the extra information it needs to your configuration file and then start running. You should not need to enter this configuration information again.

Congratulations, you have installed the PiConsole for the Weather Flow Tempest and Smart Home Weather Stations.

Screen size

By default the PiConsole will run in full screen mode. If you are running on a Raspberry Pi 4 or a PC with Raspberry Pi OS or Ubuntu 18.04 LTS, fullscreen mode can be disabled in Menu -> Settings -> Display. In this case the console will use the dimensions specified in the configuration file (wfpiconsole.ini), which can be changed manually. Please note that extreme changes to the aspect ratio will result in text fields running into one another. Under Settings -> Display there are also settings to show/hide the cursor and show/hide the window border.

Update Instructions

The WeatherFlow PiConsole can be updated quickly and easily with the following command:

wfpiconsole update

The update process will retain your existing user settings, but may prompt for input from time to time in order to add new functionality. Once the update has finished, restart the console using:

wfpiconsole start

Auto-Start Instructions

The WeatherFlow PiConsole can be configured to run automatically when the Raspberry Pi powers up. To enable the console to start automatically, run

wfpiconsole autostart-enable

To stop the WeatherFlow PiConsole from starting automatically, run

wfpiconsole autostart-disable

If you are going to use the auto-start method, it is highly recommended that you can SSH into your Raspberry Pi, as the console can only be stopped using the stop command or a hard shutdown:

wfpiconsole stop

Advanced Installation: Windows

Although not officially supported, use the following step-by-step instructions to install and run the WeatherFlow PiConsole on Windows.

  1. Download and install the Python 3.7 version of Miniconda for Windows (a lightweight Python interpreter): https://conda.io/miniconda.html

  2. Once Miniconda is installed open the ‘Anaconda Prompt’ program.

  3. In the Anaconda prompt, run:

python -m pip install --upgrade pip
  1. Once that process has finished, run:
python -m pip install autobahn[twisted] pytz pyasn1-modules service_identity geopy ephem Cython numpy packaging

  1. Once that has finished, follow steps 2 and 3 under “Installing the kivy stable release” to install Kivy: https://kivy.org/doc/stable/installation/installation-windows.html This is the GUI library that drives the console.

  2. Once Kivy is installed, run the following commands in order in the Anaconda Prompt. This will install the WeatherFlow PiConsole.

cd && mkdir wfpiconsole && cd wfpiconsole
curl -sL https://api.github.com/repos/peted-davis/WeatherFlow_PiConsole/tarball -o PiConsole.tar.gz
tar -xvf PiConsole.tar.gz --strip 1
del /f PiConsole.tar.gz
  1. You’re almost there now! You can start the console using python main.py. As this is the first time you have run the console, you’ll be asked for some API keys. Details of what you need can be found under "Configure and Run WeatherFlow PiConsole" in the Installation Instructions.

Credits

Many of the graphical elements in the console are based on the Weather34 Home Weather Station Template (https://www.weather34.com/homeweatherstation/) copyright 2015-2021 Brian Underdown. The Weather34 Home Weather Station Template is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

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