Home › Community › B-hyve Indoor Underground Timer › Guide: Link B-Hyve to personal Ambient Weather Station via Weather Undergound

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  • July 10, 2018 at 3:45 am #4485
    eckirchn
    Blocked

    I thought I would post this guide for anyone else that had an interest to link their own Personal Weather Station to their B-Hyve Sprinkler Timer. I live in an area that has a very local weather, 1/4 inch or more rain could fall 2 miles away, and I’ll get nothing (micro-climate). I was hope this helps anyone in a similar situation. Water here is a very valuable commodity, and the more accurate I could make this device work the better.

    This guide is based on using a Ambient Weather WS-2902 Wifi enabled sensor.

    1. Link Weather Station to Weather Underground (https://www.ambientweather.com/weatherbridge.html)
    2. Confirm Weather Undergound updates data from your weather station (https://www.wunderground.com/personal-weather-station/mypws)
    3. Sign up for a Weather Underground API key (https://www.wunderground.com/weather/api)
    4. Sign up and create a station at PWSWeather (https://www.pwsweather.com)
    NOTE: I used the same ID as WeatherUnderground for my ID, but you can use anything you want, just know it’s public.
    It will appear to other B-Hyve users as PWS_[YOUR ID NAME]. Also note the GPS data is available for cut and paste from your WeatherUnderground Listing
    5. Using your Weather Underground Station ID, API key, PWSWeather Station ID, and PWSWeather Password open a browser and edit the following URL (Source: http://wufyi.com/)
    http://wufyi.com/?wuAPI=YourWeatherUndergroundAPI&wuID=WeatherUndergroundStationID&pwsID=PWSstationID&psw=YourPWSpassword
    6. Confirm data has been received by PWSWeather after logging into PWSWeather
    https://www.pwsweather.com/stationlist.php
    7. Setup a Web Based Cron Job to execute this data transfer automatically
    8. Sign up for account at https://cron-job.org
    9. Create a Cron Job at a 2 minute interval with the URL specified above (note, the script will only update every 2 minutes, so no need to try to update more often)
    10. Let time elapse a few minutes
    11. Check that data has been received at PWSWeather (https://www.pwsweather.com/stationlist.php) by selecting your station and checking the history at the bottom
    12. Using the B-Hyve Mobile Application (Android for my guide, iOS might be different) got to Settings/Devices/[YOURDEVICE]/Weather Adjustments/Select Weather Station
    Note: The application is flaky here for me, enable the PWS option at the bottom of the Map, these PWS stations may or may not appear, someone from Orbit would need to answer for the poor mobile app.
    13. Select your Weather Station

    This guide is as accurate as I could recall for my own process, but if something is unclear, I will clarify it, just let me know.

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    July 14, 2018 at 3:04 pm #4666
    RSchaefer
    Participant

    So I started to try this however WU now apparently wants you to pay for the API? I sent an industry request to Weather Channel/IBM based on the pages that come up from your WU API link and they are suppose to call me to provide pricing? Maybe once they see that I’m just a homeowner wanting to transmit my WU PWS info there will not be a charge, will have to wait and see. Am I miissing something relative to getting the WU API for my PWS?

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    July 15, 2018 at 1:30 am #4686
    eckirchn
    Blocked

    RSchaefer:

    I got my API key many years ago to use with KODI / XMBC. If I recall it might have been a small one time fee, like under $10. It’s well worth the charge, I do NOT pay any fees for it today, I just don’t recall what I did when i first got it.

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    July 15, 2018 at 11:55 am #4695
    RSchaefer
    Participant

    I will have to see what they say when they call me – apparently the only way you can get a key now. Their questionnaire is specific to a company, you can’t submit it without giving a company name, number of employees, annual revenue. Maybe when they find out your a one man retired show with a weather station it will be free or minimal.

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    July 15, 2018 at 1:27 pm #4702
    eckirchn
    Blocked

    Sorry RSCHAEFER. this was the only way I could make it work. I looked back to see how my API / Account was setup, but all I see is an expiration date in 2019. It says I signed up in 2017 but I know I got my API key long before that. We needed an API key to extract weather data for my XMBC Media Player. I will be interested in what you find out. Everyone is doing what the can to monetize the internet these days, news and newspaper sites are near useless with all the crap they try to through out at you just to read a story.

    You can look at this thread if you want, I couldn’t make it work, but it might be another option:

    https://bhyve.orbitonline.com/topic/how-to-add-my-personal-weather-station/

    There is a LOT to be desired from this product. Uploading data to WeatherUnderground is free with the Ambient Weather device I have, I only needed the API key to transfer the data to what Orbit has decided to use. If I were to do this again, I would have gone with the rachio, at least it appears their stuff works as advertised. This b-hyve is a Alpha level product, Beta if you don’t use anything “smart”. I am very disappointed myself, but I am stuck with it now, so gotta manipulate it to work the best I can.

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    July 15, 2018 at 1:42 pm #4703
    RSchaefer
    Participant

    So I have a WS-1001-WiFi and apparently I can get my PWS onto my B-Hyve with this device from Ambient (), cost $55. Was assuming a less expensive option!

    I do see various hacks available to do the same, however your solution seemed a little more robust

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    July 15, 2018 at 1:44 pm #4704
    RSchaefer
    Participant

    Link did not seem to go thru – its Ambient Weather ObserverIP Module

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    July 15, 2018 at 8:05 pm #4719
    eckirchn
    Blocked

    I have run across those, but not sure why you need it. I would hold off to see about that API. Surprised you had to contact them for one. I don’t remember it being a complicated thing, maybe I’ll open a new WU account and try myself.

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    July 15, 2018 at 9:36 pm #4722
    RSchaefer
    Participant

    I had reviewed the other “Guide” link you had sent earlier and do not want to have a dedicated computer/CPU to do the handshaking.

    Yeah just go to your WU PWS page and I think the API link is at the bottom. You get a new screen from Weather Channel/IBM explaining the API is no longer free and a variety of extended features available via a “new” business account. I think if you click the button “more info” or something like that, you will see a questionnaire come up asking for all of your biz info and indicating someone will contact you.

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    July 16, 2018 at 1:57 pm #4736
    eckirchn
    Blocked

    According to this post on GitHub, the fee based API key is a very recent (May 2018) change, sorry.

    https://github.com/initialstate/wunderground-sensehat/wiki/Part-1.-How-to-Use-the-Wunderground-API

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    July 21, 2018 at 8:41 am #4989
    kate
    Participant

    Easycron.com is another easy-to-use cron job service that provides a free plan.

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    July 21, 2018 at 1:06 pm #4992
    RSchaefer
    Participant

    ECKIRCHN – Could you update the guide using Easycron.com instead of the WU API. I tried it but am getting confused on the correct url based on the Easycron API Key.

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    July 21, 2018 at 3:33 pm #4996
    eckirchn
    Blocked

    RSCHAEFER,

    The API key is for WeatherUnderground. A CRON job is simply a task a computer executes at a time interval, it’s a timer. When i say enter in that URL for the CRON, all that website is doing is loading up that webpage every 2 minutes, that webpage transfers the data from WeatherUnderground to PWSWeather.

    Does that make sense? That API key is critical, I am not sure how to do it without a weather underground API key. People must have been abusing their API keys or WU got bought out and is going corporate. I thought it was much more community based in the past, but these things happen. Good free services get bought then manipulated for profit.

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    July 21, 2018 at 10:25 pm #5009
    RSchaefer
    Participant

    I understand however EasyCron.com includes an API and provides a key in addition to allowing you to establish a CRON job. So I may be mistaken but it looks like maybe you could use the EasyCron.com API, create the necessary CRON job and utilize a resulting URL to load the WU PWS data to PWSWeather.

    I’m not a programmer but just a newbie that is able to take direction. Just wanting to get my PWS data into my B.Hyve

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    July 21, 2018 at 11:01 pm #5011
    eckirchn
    Blocked

    RSCHAEFER – I can’t speak to EasyCron, but https://cron-job.org is free, just create an account.

    Did you get an WU API key? Without that, nothing matters, unless someone else has a suggestion. If you are online now, and want to chat about it, I am online, you can hit me up via the IRC:

    Open: https://webchat.freenode.net/
    Enter a Username: [ANYNAME]
    Channel: “#orbitpwsweather”

    This is public, but the thread is maintained.

    We can have a dialog there in real time. I’ll keep that chat open for a while, but we can always use that room to chat, old school style.

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