New File Added: UniWeather

[Zorro]

Downloads: A new file has been added by Zorro:

UniWeather

I've created a new Weather plug-in. In contrast to the stock plug-in, this one uses the WeatherUnderground service to retrieve weather information.

Features:

• Define up to 20 locations of which you want to monitor the weather
• Shows current conditions and a forecast of the next 4 days
• Shows weather details, such as Humidity, Windchill, ...
• Shows recent webcam pictures of the selected location (where available)
• Shows radar picture of the selected location (where available)
• Shows weather alerts (where available)
• Shows weather information for your current GPS position (NAV module only)
• Fully supports LogoDashboard

Requirements:

Centrafuse version 2.1.1331.1 (no older versions, no beta)
To use this plug-in you must have online access to the internet in your car.

Instructions:

1. To add this plug-in, download the ZIP file and extract it into your CF Plugins folder.
2. Download this DLL and extract it into the Flux Media\Centrafuse folder.
3. Run CF, add a button for the main page (Weather).
4. Go into the Setup (UniWeather) and configure your locations.

Supported skins:

• Aura only!

If you want a different skin, you have to create it yourself.

Supported languages:

• German
• English
• Dutch (thanks to osvikvi)

If you want to translate it into your language - go ahead.

Known issues:

The WeatherUnderground service sometimes appears to be offline. There's no workaround for this, simply try again later.

Documentation:

See below.

Terms and conditions:

For private use only.

[Zorro]

UniWeather has been updated!

[Zorro]

Documentation

This is the UI you'll get after you've added this plug-in to CF:

Left hand you'll see the current temperature (high and low values below), the observation time and date and wind conditions. Temperatures are supposed to be in Celsius or Fahrenheit - depends on the units you have configured in CF.

In the middle we have the current condition.

Right hand is the forecast of the next 4 days.

Buttons (from top to bottom):

• Webcams
• Radar
• Details
• Page Up
• Page Down

The counter between Page Up and Page Down tells how many locations you have configured or how many webcam images are available.

Note: Webcams and Radar buttons might be disabled, depends on whether or not this location delivers such information.

Clicking on the Webcams button will load the first webcam image available and overlay the current condition.

The Page Up and Page Down buttons will allow you to switch cams. The counter will tell how many webcam images are available and which is currently being displayed.

Clicking the Radar button will overlay the current condition with the radar image.
Note: This will work for locations in the US only. Also, the Radar image is static, not animated.


Clicking the Details button will show some more details of the current condition witihin the selected location.


to be continued...

[Zorro]

Some of the locations (mostly in the US) will deliver weather alerts. This can be spotted through the warning symbol:


Clicking this symbol will open a different dialog, which lists the alert informations. Sometimes it happens that more than one alert pops up. In this case you can browse through them using the arrow buttons.


Setup:
The setup dialog doesn't have much settings. There are Display name, Refresh interval and Locations. Configuring the locations happens in a separate dialog.


If you use GPS to retrieve weather information, you can choose between your current location and the destination location (GPS = DEST). Both require a NAV module to be installed (no, it doesn't work with embedded 3rd party plug-ins).

to be continued...

[Zorro]

To configure the locations you'll get this dialog. Use the + or - buttons to add or remove locations from the list.
Use the arrow buttons on the right to move the selected location up or down. Use the arrow buttons on the left to get the next or previous page.



For adding a new location hit the + button and enter the name of the location in the OSK dialog. For example: "Paris, France".
After a little while, you'll get a list of available observation spots in the selected area (mostly airports). Pick one and click OK.



After that, the new location will show up in the list of locations.

Note: If you're not online, the location configuration dialog will refuse to show up.

LogoDashboard tweakers:
You have access to a ton of information from this plug-in. As there are:
LOCATION
CONDITION
CONDITION.IMAGE
LOCALTIME
TEMPERATURE
COMPASS.IMAGE
WINDSPEED
WINDDIR
WINDDEGREES
PRESSURE
VISIBILITY
WINDCHILL
DEWPOINT
HUMIDITY
UNINDEX
SOLARRADIATION
FORECAST.0
FORECAST.1
FORECAST.2
FORECAST.3
FORECAST.4
FORECAST.5
FORECAST.6

Whereas xxx.IMAGE will always return an image and has to be defined as such in Content.xml

FORECAST.0-6 will require additional information in param1:
DAY
DAYSHORT
TEMPHIGH
TEMPLOW
CONDITION

This is a sample of what you get in LD:


The according Content.xml:

    <Page description="Weather" show="True">
      <Content type="Text" position="20;180" size="400;24" dataSource="PLUGIN" style="Text6C_Hi">{UNIWEATHER,CONDITION}</Content>
      <Content type="Text" position="320;72" size="92;48" dataSource="PLUGIN" style="Text1C">{UNIWEATHER,TEMPERATURE}</Content>
      <Content type="Text" position="363;142" size="58;24" dataSource="PLUGIN" style="TempLo2">{UNIWEATHER,FORECAST.0,TEMPLOW}</Content>
      <Content type="Text" position="306;142" size="58;24" dataSource="PLUGIN" style="TempHi2">{UNIWEATHER,FORECAST.0,TEMPHIGH}</Content>
      <Content type="Image" position="298;212" size="132;156" alignment="Center" file="ForecastBack.png">
      </Content>
      <Content type="Image" position="318;252" size="92;92" dataSource="PLUGIN" alignment="Center">{UNIWEATHER,FORECAST.3,CONDITION}</Content>
      <Content type="Text" position="298;220" size="132;24" dataSource="PLUGIN" style="Text2C_W">{UNIWEATHER,FORECAST.3,DAYSHORT}</Content>
      <Content type="Text" position="363;342" size="66;24" dataSource="PLUGIN" style="TempLo">{UNIWEATHER,FORECAST.3,TEMPLOW}</Content>
      <Content type="Text" position="299;342" size="66;24" dataSource="PLUGIN" style="TempHi">{UNIWEATHER,FORECAST.3,TEMPHIGH}</Content>
      <Content type="Image" position="154;212" size="132;156" alignment="Center" file="ForecastBack.png">
      </Content>
      <Content type="Image" position="174;252" size="92;92" dataSource="PLUGIN" alignment="Center">{UNIWEATHER,FORECAST.2,CONDITION}</Content>
      <Content type="Text" position="154;220" size="132;24" dataSource="PLUGIN" style="Text2C_W">{UNIWEATHER,FORECAST.2,DAYSHORT}</Content>
      <Content type="Text" position="219;342" size="66;24" dataSource="PLUGIN" style="TempLo">{UNIWEATHER,FORECAST.2,TEMPLOW}</Content>
      <Content type="Text" position="154;342" size="66;24" dataSource="PLUGIN" style="TempHi">{UNIWEATHER,FORECAST.2,TEMPHIGH}</Content>
      <Content type="Text" position="20;8" size="400;48" trimming="True" link="1101" dataSource="PLUGIN" style="Text1C">.: {UNIWEATHER,LOCATION} :.</Content>
      <Content type="Image" position="10;212" size="132;156" alignment="Center" file="ForecastBack.png">
      </Content>
      <Content type="Text" position="10;220" size="132;24" dataSource="PLUGIN" style="Text2C_W">{UNIWEATHER,FORECAST.1,DAYSHORT}</Content>
      <Content type="Image" position="30;252" size="92;92" dataSource="PLUGIN" alignment="Center">{UNIWEATHER,FORECAST.1,CONDITION}</Content>
      <Content type="Text" position="10;342" size="66;24" dataSource="PLUGIN" style="TempHi">{UNIWEATHER,FORECAST.1,TEMPHIGH}</Content>
      <Content type="Text" position="75;342" size="66;24" dataSource="PLUGIN" style="TempLo">{UNIWEATHER,FORECAST.1,TEMPLOW}</Content>
      <Content type="Image" position="142;52" size="156;148" dataSource="PLUGIN" alignment="Center">{UNIWEATHER,CONDITION.IMAGE}</Content>
      <Content type="Text" position="24;76" size="266;24" dataSource="PLUGIN" style="Text2_W">RH: {UNIWEATHER,HUMIDITY}</Content>
      <Content type="Text" position="24;108" size="266;24" dataSource="PLUGIN" style="Text2_W">P: {UNIWEATHER,PRESSURE}</Content>
      <Content type="Text" position="24;140" size="266;24" dataSource="PLUGIN" style="Text2_W">VIS: {UNIWEATHER,VISIBILITY}</Content>
    </Page>

Note: The weather conditions shown in LD will always access the currently selected location in the plug-in.

[Zorro]

One more thing:

Q: Why is it called UniWeather?
A: Thats because the plug-in is able to use different WeatherProviders (external DLLs which operate on a defined interface) to retrieve the weather information. For now there's only one provider available, that's the WeatherUnderground (Welcome to Weather Underground : Weather Underground) but it might be extended in the future.

If you're a programmer who likes to implement a different provider, drop me a PM and have a look into the WeatherInterfaces.dll. That's the interface you have to implement in your provider to make it work with the UniWeather plug-in.

Though, be aware that most of the services available will require you to sign some agreement or paying fees for using it. This is not the case with WeatherUnderground, that's why I've picked that one.

[Salmizar]

Fantastic job Zorro!, I haven't tried it yet, but you have addressed all the things I wanted to see added to the stock weather tool.

[dangerous]

I have tried it and like all of zorros plugins they works straight out of the box once i sussed out that in settings it shows up as uniweather but when you assign a button it shows up as weather so you might have 2 to choose from. Its great to know what the weather is like where you are going.

[Zorro]

Originally Posted by dangerous

I have tried it and like all of zorros plugins they works straight out of the box once i sussed out that in settings it shows up as uniweather but when you assign a button it shows up as weather so you might have 2 to choose from. Its great to know what the weather is like where you are going.

True. That's because the Display name is also used as button caption and UNIWEATHER is a bit too long.

However, for those how zapped in recently: As dangerous says, the name is UNIWEATHER in the Setup and WEATHER in the buttons menu. Since there're now two of them, you'll have a fair 50/50 chance to pick the wrong

[Carz]

Is Singapore or other countries supported? When I search Singapore, the search found 2, (1) Singapore and (2) Singapore, Singapore. But when I select either one, it will go back to UniWeather List of Current Weather Station for a split second and then back to Pick a Location again. Tried Asia and it found only (1) Asia and (2) Asia, Philippines. However, they also can't be selected having same behaviour as my intended first search.