Frozen data

[michael252]

I had an unusual occurrence the past day or so.
I often only monitor my weather info by visiting my WU page on my morning "rounds" of websites, mainly to make sure they are receiving my data ok. When I looked this morning, it said no updates for 2 hours (normally 2-20 seconds), and showed an inaccurate temperature. About 8pm on Tuesday, my WeatherCat stopped receiving new data from the weather station. From then until I noticed it Thursday morning, all readings are repeated. Looking at the data viewer/editor, it seems the data is not missing, per say, just duplicated over and over for 36 hours. My iMac is dedicated to WeatherCat, nothing else (other than backups) running on it. Since my Mac and WeatherCat have been ultra-reliable for so many years, i sometimes don't look at it for days, especially when no important weather is happening. Once I restarted WeatherCat, everything has been fine (at least for the few hours since I restarted it). Any ideas what caused this?

iMac, mid 2011, High Sierra 10.13.6
WeatherCat, 3.11, receiving data through a VantageVue console
Davis Vantage Pro II wireless ISS, approx. 40 feet from my console (same location for 15 years)

Thanks,Michael

[xairbusdriver]

Possible answers may be sitting in the WC logs. Console->~/Library/Logs->WeatherCat. You should see eight ".txt" logs. Each one is for a specific day but you will have to click on each one to see which date that is ("log-OEB625.txt" is for 2021/01/05 on my computer, yours will probably have a completely different name).

If you don't have the WC "Kickstarter" enabled, I would suggest doing that. It may do two things for you:
 1. Recover from a minor crash which might have been what caused the "stuck-data-importing" problem.
 2. record an entry in the WeatherCat log in a file labeled "WeatherCatKicker.log" along with those other daily logs.

[michael252]

I attached the log file that shows what WC is doing during this time (edited out long stretches of repetition). It tries to upload to WU every half hour or so.Also, my graphs display this missing data as a straight line. And I can find no mention of kickstarter in the WC help file.

[xairbusdriver]

I can find no mention of kickstarter in the WC help file

True, nor is it mentioned in The Manual, AFAIK. But if you will open the WC Prefs, select the "Units/Misc1" tab, at the bottom of the window is a checkbox labeled "Monitor & Re-Launch WeatherCat". Checking hat will enable "WeatherCatKickStarter.log".

There are two other Prefs settings that affect logging:
"Misc2" includes a checkbox for logging FTP operations.
"Webcam" has a checkbox for logging "Informational Web-Cam Messages"

Amazingly, I have just now discovered that Console has changed drastically in Catalina! I'm about to post a thread about that. I'm still using Mojave on the mini that is dedicated to running WC, so Console is still helpful there.

[michael252]

Thanks, Driver. I clicked "monitor & relaunch" and "FTP operations." I have no webcam, but the "Web cam Messages" box is checked, even though it's grayed out.

Side note that has nothing to do with this issue:
A month or two ago, I transferred WC to the iMac from my Mini that I used for about 8 years (I think it was a 2011 also). The mini was the worst Apple product I've ever had, and I've had a lot over the years. It worked, but was so slow. If I clicked on Safari, or even System Prefs, it would take as long as 6-10 seconds to open. My previous mini from 2009, I think, ran perfectly.

[xairbusdriver]

I stripped as much as I could from the "new" mini (actually built in 2014) when I bought it. I think it still came with a 5400 HD. Last Fall I bought and installed a 1TB SSD in about 30 minutes, moved the OS install to that and am extremely happy! Only wish I had bought the iMac with a bigger SSD!!

[michael252]

Well, it did it again. I'm stumped. (kicker log was not helpful)

[xairbusdriver]

So, what does today's log show? Once you find today's log, you can search for items in the log like "error" or "failed" or "unable". Then look backward a few minutes worth of entries to see if some thing sees to have failed.

BTW, after changing an app's Prefs, it is generally best to Quit and then restart the app. That is an effective way to make sure the app "sees" the changes made.

[michael252]

Logs show basically the same as the file I previously uploaded.

I am now trying the old, several-times-a-day windows trick: shutdown, wait a few, reboot.   

[elagache]

Dear Michael, X-Air, and WeatherCat troubleshooters,

I had an unusual occurrence the past day or so. . . . .

. . . . . Also, my graphs display this missing data as a straight line. . . . .

Normally when WeatherCat displays straight lines on its graphs it is because data isn't being received from the Weather station.  The WeatherCat Status window will give you any communications and/or sensor errors.  Check the Live Data (under the Tools menu,) for details on which sensors might be not sending valid data.

Please keep us informed about what you discover.

Cheers, Edouard

[michael252]

Live data looks normal and updates regularly. No errors.
BTW, where does WC store the address for the CWOP file? Log shows that it's trying to write to a folder from a previous computer, but I can't find where in WC to change that file path.

[elagache]

Dear Michael and WeatherCat troubleshooters,

Live data looks normal and updates regularly. No errors.

Unfortunately, WeatherCat only records sensor errors since its last restart.  So if you haven't seen "flat line" graphs since your last start, you haven't been able to observe whatever was causing those graphs.

BTW, where does WC store the address for the CWOP file? Log shows that it's trying to write to a folder from a previous computer, but I can't find where in WC to change that file path.

Unfortunately, I'm not sure what address you are referring to.  Do you mean the WXNOW.TXT file?  It will be stored in:

~/Application Support/WCWeb

There is no way to change it's storage location.  Could you copy the log file entries and post them here?  That would help with the troubleshooting.

Cheers, Edouard

[michael252]

Here is what raised my question on the file location. This is from the WC log window.
"Weather" was the user on the old computer.

BTW, no data freezes since yesterday.

[xairbusdriver]

BTW, where does WC store the address for the CWOP file?

I assume you are talking about the text file that is sent to CWOP, not the actual url for CWOP. The later is hard coded into WC, it does not change and there is no need for us to type that in to any WC Pref. The CWOP info file (WXNOW.txt) should be stored in your user library directory: ~/USERname/Library/Application Support/WCWeb/

The log shows you have a couple of different items in the path. If you still had a user named "Weather", it would probably have that text file at that path.

If you want to place that file in the normal place, check the WC Prefs->On-Line, Simple Web (I'm assuming that's what you are using to generate a local web site). Look at the "Save Pages At:" text. It probably has that "/User's/Weather/Sites/WCWeb/" path. "Sites" is the default directory the OS will use when you create an html file. That path probably got entered in the "Set Save Path" text box when you previously set up WC. If you changed the Admin/User name from "Weather", it should not be used in most settings in the OS or any app, since it probably no longer is relavant or even exists.

To set that to the correct path, just use the "Set Save Path" (surrounded by a red box, in the image below) in the WC Prefs.

[michael252]

Give the man a cigar!!!
That's exactly what I was looking for. For several years, I did create my own web page. But eventually decided just to use Weather Underground's page for my data. http://weather.tech252.com/

Thanks, Driver!!