Data and monitoring: linux for weather station

1 to 30 of 42

- CommentAuthordjh
- CommentTimeApr 24th 2012
I have a weather station that plugs in to a USB port. It's been plugged into my desktop and working happily but now I want to move the weather station to my building plot. So I'm looking for a cheap device that runs Linux or can easily be made to run it, and that has a USB port and either some flash memory or a disk. Ideally, something I can just pop along the high street to buy. There's mains available on site.

Flame on ...
- CommentAuthorSteamyTea
- CommentTimeApr 25th 2012
http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=8346&page=1
- CommentAuthorSprocket
- CommentTimeApr 25th 2012
I've got one of these in a cupboard (where it's been for the last year or two):-

http://yourfamily.o2.co.uk/o2familyjoggler/

It's even got a 4GB memory stick booting to linux installed on it.
Can't remember what distro but there's plenty about. I think it might even be Ubuntu.

eg. http://joggler.exotica.org.uk/ubuntu/

And it's x86 (Atom 510) and has ethernet built-in too, and an LCD screen (pixels are a bit small for comfy use of a linux desktop but it works and would be fine for instrumenttion display).
Downside, it take a continuous 5~8W power (though so does a v1 pogoplug). Working PSU included.
It runs a little warm so don't seal it in a box or cover the vents. It loks quite stylish on a desktop.

If you can put it to use you're welcome to it. Just whisper where to send it and I'll try to get it in the post this week.
- CommentAuthorEd Davies
- CommentTimeApr 25th 2012
I have a Pogoplug:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Pogoplug-File-Media-Sharing-Device/dp/B003FZB6C8/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1335339008&sr=8-1

Seems like they're now somewhat end of line, which is a pity, but maybe the Pogoplug Mobile or something would help.

Mine's running Debian:

http://edavies.me.uk/2011/09/ssh-pogoplug/

for just the sort of thing you want. It's an ARM processor, though, so you'd need an appropriate version of your software if it doesn't run from source.
- CommentAuthorskyewright
- CommentTimeApr 25th 2012 edited
Do any of the solutions at www.meteohub.de or www.meteoplug.de seem useful?

Meteohub requires a bit more computer power (I started off on an NSLU2, but now use an ALIX-1D), but holds everything locally, and is a one off cost (after evaluation).

Meteoplug requires little power (I could if I wished install it on my Fritz!Box router), but needs to push data up to the central server regularly (typically every 10 minutes, but it can cope with a loss of connection for quite a while - the size of the buffer varies depending on which hardware you are using. IIRC my bifferboard has coped with outages approaching 24 hours?). Meteoplug is a subscription based service (after evaluation).

I have no connection with Meteohub & Meteoplug other than being a long term satisfied user.
- CommentAuthordjh
- CommentTimeApr 25th 2012
Thanks for all the replies.

ST, that thread seems to be about software?

Sprocket, looks an interesting device but doesn't appear to be available now.

Ed, that looks like the type of beast. It may be getting long in the tooth but it does still seem to be available. I don't need any software (apart from standard stuff like rrdtool) so that should be OK. All I need it to do is log the readings so I can extract them later.

Skyewright, they're fine products but I'm just looking for logging hardware.

Thanks all.
- CommentAuthorEd Davies
- CommentTimeApr 25th 2012
The Pogoplug draws about 3 W, if I remember correctly and my plug-thingy is accurate at those levels plus a couple of watts for the 1 TB hard drive I have plugged into it when that's busy - as well as some logging it acts as a backup device (using rsync) and I leave it to download iPlayer stuff overnight.

Only hassle I have is that it doesn't seem to recognize the hard drive after a boot (e.g., after a power cut).

As I understand what's happening the installation instructions I referenced are to allow it to boot from an external drive. Debian is installed on the external hard drive and should boot instead of the Pogoplug native Linux system which is still present on the internal Flash. However, if the hard drive is not awake this doesn't work and the Pogoplug software boots. I have to SSH in, mount the hard drive in /tmp to wake it up then issue a â€œrebootâ€ command to load Debian.

Luckily it seems to survive short power glitches OK and I've only had two proper power cuts (both about 20 minutes, one of which was scheduled and notified in advance) in the last six months or so.
- CommentAuthorwookey
- CommentTimeApr 25th 2012
Any of sheevaplug, pogoplug, dreamplug, solidrun cubox, beagleboard, pandaboard, NSLU2, Friendlyarm boards, imx53, efika smartbook, efika smarttop, ac100, QNAP TS110 series, OpenRD, rasberry PI, Spark, balloonboard might do the trick depending exactly what spec/storage/form factor you want. A few of those have Sata, all have USB host. They include arm v5,6,and 7 CPUs. All of them will run Debian. Some are no longer available new. Some are a bit weedy to do anything beyond simple server/logging functions - some will run a fancy media system. None are available on the high St SFAIK, but easy to get online.

I'd buy an imx53 ($100), cubox (â‚¬80) or maybe openRD ($189) if I wanted to do NAS/logging work. All will take a SATA drive (I currently use an NSLU2 but it is limited by 32MB RAM and annoying power-button characteristics).
- CommentAuthordjh
- CommentTimeApr 27th 2012
So I ordered a pogoplug soon after my previous posting ...

Posted By: Ed DaviesI have to SSH in, mount the hard drive in /tmp to wake it up then issue a â€œrebootâ€ command to load Debian.

Ah, I'll need to look out for that. There's no network where I plan to install it, just mains, so that would be a more embarrassing situation. Hopefully, I can squeeze an OS on a flash card with enough room for data so there won't be any spin up time.

wookey, thanks for the list. I'll keep it in my mind next time :)
- CommentAuthorborpin
- CommentTimeApr 27th 2012
Posted By: djhI have a weather station that plugs in to a USB port. It's been plugged into my desktop and working happily
You never said what software was running on the desktop.
- CommentAuthorSeret
- CommentTimeApr 28th 2012
You can pick up an old Eee PC off Ebay for chump change and they'll all run any of the big distros without incident. They're pretty frugal with power too (c.10W with the screen turned on). Reuse/recycle is greener than buying new, surely?
- CommentAuthorDamonHD
- CommentTimeApr 28th 2012
You can have my old Eee PC if you want at a pinch, but I don't consider it frugal (which is why I no longer use it) as it doesn't seem to have a proper sleep mode and uses as much when idle as my MacBook which is much much more powerful, and never mind my SheevaPlug.

Rgds

Damon
- CommentAuthorSeret
- CommentTimeApr 28th 2012
Posted By: DamonHDdoesn't seem to have a proper sleep mode

How do you mean? We have a couple and they sleep, but I couldn't tell you how much they draw while snoozing.
- CommentAuthorDamonHD
- CommentTimeApr 28th 2012 edited
As far as I could tell mine used essentially no less power when sleeping than fully on, which is scandalous. I don't think that those Celeron chip-sets supported a proper sleep mode. (IIRC)

Rgds

Damon
- CommentAuthorSeret
- CommentTimeApr 28th 2012
Did you just put it on a plug-in meter and check how much the power supply was drawing? Mine are Atom machines rather than Celerons, but I might check them when I get home. I suspect they do better than yours, as I have to leave it idle for a day or so before I notice any real shortage of battery when opening it back up.
- CommentAuthorDamonHD
- CommentTimeApr 28th 2012
That is probably what I did in conjunction with watching what the battery-management software was reporting as the power drain when not on mains.

The beast is sitting 4" from my left hand, still gathering dust...

Rgds

Damon
- CommentAuthorwookey
- CommentTimeApr 28th 2012 edited
10W is not 2W. Atom (flash) eePCs use at least 10W. Any arm box should be <3W. Sleep power consumption obviously can dominate on a low-usage device, and they vary a lot. Attaching a disk will add another 4-10W so disk sleep consumption/enablement can be at least as important as the box itself.

Oh and I forgot trimslice, snowball, igloo, origen and imx6 in the above list. Some of those aren't really available to punters yet. lots of welly though.
- CommentAuthorSeret
- CommentTimeApr 29th 2012
Posted By: wookey10W is not 2W

Absolutely, but the difference in consumption does work out to only 70kWh per year. That's about Â£9 and 37kg CO2e if you run it off scungy grid power. That's low enough that buying a brand new machine could well have a larger carbon footprint and will certainly have greater cost than re-purposing an older one.

Just sayin: let's not always rush off to buy new IT gear. There's a vast pool of perfectly good hardware out there, most of it only a couple of years old and already heading for the tip taking its embodied energy with it. It's a bit like the argument between CFL and LED. If you've got CFL lighting then swapping it for LEDs before the CFLs die will actually increase your carbon footprint. Once you get down to pretty low power usage the difference between competing products becomes small.

I totally agree that ARM is the way to go if you are going to splash out on new kit though. Having said that, the new Ivy Bridge chips for bigger machines look pretty impressive. Full noise multi core desktop chips with 35W TDP, and 17W ones coming out later in the year apparently. Nice.

As for disks, I reckon you'd probably be better off just with an SD card for a wee box like this.
- CommentAuthorwookey
- CommentTimeApr 29th 2012
All good points. Can't disagree with any of that. So long as people do their sums on embodied energy and used energy. Anyone have a good figure for the carbon equivalent of typical electronics per Â£ or Kg?

(I've been thinking about disks looking at a replacement home server with raid). If the box really is just logging then SD is ideal.
- CommentAuthorSteamyTea
- CommentTimeApr 30th 2012
Posted By: wookeyAnyone have a good figure for the carbon equivalent of typical electronics per Â£ or Kg?

If you know the major components, mainly silica, gold, solder, epoxy/plastic or whatever they are made from and strip those prices out from the finished goods, then plot the remaining price by by mass, that may give an indication of EE.
Some things we do know the EE of, PV springs to mind and that is probably not so different.
- CommentAuthorSeret
- CommentTimeApr 30th 2012 edited
Could well be. I'd imagine the silicon is probably the most energy-intensive part of an electronic device to produce.

There's an interesting table of embodied energy for some electronic components here: http://light.lbl.gov/pubs/tr/lumina-tr9-embodied-energy.pdf
- CommentAuthorikimiki
- CommentTimeSep 10th 2012 edited
Not too far off this thread's topic:

I'm looking for a weather station solution satisfying a few criteria:

(a) affordable
(b) not closed and proprietary, but if so, it needs to be flexible and programmable
(c) provides continual readings, down to say 1min frequency, of (i) wind speed and direction, (ii) relative humidity, (iii) precipitation, and (iv) barometric pressure
(d) does not require an 'always on' desktop PC, but can be run from low-powered box such as NSLU2 running linux
(e) easily adaptable software to enable broadcasting/uploading the readings to the cloud (uploads may be a little more 'lumpy' than the readings themselves)
(f) low-power radio/wifi connection to NSLU2 or equivalent

Does your weather station come close to this?

Any suggestions warmly welcomed!
- CommentAuthorSteamyTea
- CommentTimeSep 10th 2012
There is realistically only one weather station to go for and that is the Davis Pro.
Unless Skywright knows different. He has one that runs with Linux I think.
- CommentAuthordjh
- CommentTimeSep 10th 2012
ikimiki, the weather station I have is a Lacrosse WS-2300 - http://www.heavyweather.info/english_uk/english_uk_2300.html - it meets your requirements. There's a pretty active user group based around some open software that has a mailing list - http://www.lavrsen.dk/foswiki/bin/view/Open2300/WebHome
- CommentAuthorborpin
- CommentTimeSep 10th 2012
There is a thread on the Wview group on running that software on a Pi. The main issues seem to be the USB interface.
- CommentAuthorskyewright
- CommentTimeSep 11th 2012 edited
Pretty much the only "non-proprietary" weather station would be one built from 1-wire based components. If that interests you then "Weather Toys" (http://www.weathertoys.net/weathertoys/main.html) would be a good place to take a look.

If you want flexibility and low power take a look at www.meteohub.de and www.meteoplug.de. Meteohub is Linux data logging, reporting and distribution software. Meteoplug is a related product that runs on even slimmer hardware as a client uploading data to an on-line server.

Meteohub (& Meteoplug) can be fed from a long list of off the shelf weather stations, and there is a plug-in interface if you wish to feed it data of your own (e.g. I feed 1-wire data to it via a custom plug-in).

My system is built around Meteohub running on an ALIX-1D (~5W). The ALIX-1D hardware replaced an NSLU2, which IIRC consumed nearer to 10W.

For sensors I have a mix, all conected to the Meteohub. There is a Davis VP2, a load of Oregon wireless sensors received and fed to Meteohub by an RFXCOM receiver, various 1-wire sensors (mainly kit from Hobby Boards in the US), and a CurrentCost electricity monitor.

You might also find the forum Weather-Watch forum (http://www.weather-watch.com/smf/) useful.

PS. The Davis VP2 is what most people who really get into weather recording end up wishing they'd bought in the first place. Expensive, but good kit.
- CommentAuthorskyewright
- CommentTimeSep 11th 2012
PS. If you are only really interested in wind (or if you want an anemometer for 1-wire), take a look at the Inspeed Vortex and eVane (& Windworks if not using 1-wire). Inspeed kit is also very well built.
- CommentAuthorikimiki
- CommentTimeSep 11th 2012 edited
Thanks very much! I shall take some time to digest and investigate.

Ironically, I found openws -- the open source weather station -- in googling "Inspeed Vortex" :-)
http://code.google.com/p/openws/wiki/Home

The Davis VP2 seems to be close to $600; am I right in thinking that it'll cost Â£600-ish in the UK?
- CommentAuthorSteamyTea
- CommentTimeSep 11th 2012
May be easier if you tell us what you want to measure, then it may be possible to coble something good enough together.
Where about in the country are you? Nearest town is good enough.
- CommentAuthorikimiki
- CommentTimeSep 11th 2012 edited
Greetings from Manchester!

I am looking to understand the outside elements impacting upon our semi:

<> wind strength, direction
<> precipitation
<> temperature
<> humidity
<> barometric pressure (why not)

The intent is to marry and synchronize these data series up (an operation to be performed 'in the cloud') with an array of air and surface temperature readings from different locations dotted around the house.

Purpose: to try to understand the heat-loss dynamics better.

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Data and monitoring: linux for weather station