HamWeather / Bringing weather to your web.

By having VWS post your weather station(s) data to the HAMweather servers, you will be making your information available to others across the world. The information will be used by NOAA for educational and research purposes. Local forecasts on weatherforyou.com will include your data and a link back to your web site. You will also have access to other benefits such as the ability to add weather stickers of your data to your website and much more.

First, you need a weather station that supports computer connections. Then, you need software to process data from the weather station and send it to the Internet. Currently software that supports posting to HAMweather include Virtual Weather Station, Weather Display and FreeWX. If you have software that supports this feature, or would like to add this capability to your software, contact joet@weatherforyou.com for more information. And, finally, you need to register at HAMweather to post your data.

No, this service is free of charge thanks to the combined efforts of HAMweather, LLC (www.hamweather.com) and Weather For You (www.weatherforyou.com)

Yes. Users from around the world are welcom to post their weather station data to the HAMweather servers.

Registration:

How do I register?

Visit http://www.hamweather.net/weatherstations/ and click the sign-up link. Simply follow the directions, by first signing up and then adding a weather station to your account.

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I'm already registered to post my data to another Weather Service. Can I still post my data to HAMweather?

Yes, VWS will allow you to post your data to multiple weather services, including HAMweather and Weather Underground.

Yes, if you want to post data to the HAMweather servers you will also need to register at HAMweather. The process of signing up to post to HAMweather is easy, just visit: http://www.hamweather.net/weatherstations/

When you register at HAMweather, you will use your email address and then a password of your choice.

After you register at HAMweather, then you will be able to add weather stations to your account. When you add a weather station, you will be allowed to request a station ID of your choice, which can be the same used at another weather service. If the station ID you have requested has already been reserved, HAMweather will suggest a station ID for you.

Yes. HAMweather allows you to sign up multiple weather stations under one account. Once signed up you can manage all your weather stations very easily from one web based interface.

Personal Weather Station Set-up:

Now that I have signed up at HAMweather, how do I start posting to HAMweather?

Instructions vary by software type, so consult their instructions for more information. In general, you should look for information on servers, HAMweather, Weatherforyou or some combination of these. You'll need to enter your station ID and password and then set an update schedule.

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Do I need to leave my computer connected to the internet all day, every day so it can post data to HAMweather?

Posts of current observations will only occur while your software is running. If you are on a dial-up connection, your software should connect as necessary (according to the �Upload Schedule�) to send your data.

Typically, National Weather Service stations update every half hour or every hour. While the software can upload more often and the HAMweather servers will allow you to update as often as the software will allow, we have found that a half hour upload schedule is suitable.

The database at weatherforyou.com is manually updated when new stations are found to be posting. These updates happen every few days, so it may take a few days before you'll find your data on weatherforyou.com.

What can I do with my data now that it is being posted to HAMweather?

You can do many things with your data after posting it to the HAMweather servers. To name a just a few things:

Add weather stickers of your data to your web site.

Allow other web sites to add weather stickers of your data.

Add weather stickers of other users data to your web site.

Add scrolling java applets of yours and other users data to your web site.

Have the HAMweather products installed on your server access yours and other users data.

Thanks to Weather For You (www.weatherforyou.com) you can visit the tools page at http://www.weather4you.com/pwstools/. Here you will find easy to follow instructions on adding weather stickers to your web site.

Yes. Visit the tools page at http://www.weather4you.com/pwstools/ and follow the instructions for adding weather stickers to your page. But in place of your station ID, use the station ID (or even an ICAO of a METAR reporting station) of the other station you want to display data for. If you use the data of another station, please give them credit with a link from the image back to their site.

Yes. Those stations that have opted to have their station IDs openly listed are available at http://www.weatherforyou.com/iws/pwsidentifiers.php

Yes. Other sites will be able to add weather stickers and java applets to display your stations data and that of other weather stations if you have opted for your station ID to be openly listed. The data can also be displayed through HAMweather 3 and HAMweather 2 installations.

Yes, HAMweather will be archiving the data from your posts. This data will be made available on the HAMweather site and there are plans to release a plug-in for HAMweather 3 that will allow you to display archived data on your web site that has HAMweather 3 installed as well.

Interfacing the Personal Weather Station data with your HAMweather Installation:

I have HAMweather installed on my web server. Can I allow it to access my data?

Yes, as a VWS user posting to the HAMweather servers your will have free limited access to allow your HAMweather installation to use the HAMweather METAR mirror, which will contain your stations data.

For HAMweather 2:

Browse your HAMweather Web based administration.

Click �Forecast Types�

Find the line for the forecast type of �metar� and click �edit.�

On the new page set the Server to www.hamweather.net

Click the save button.

For HAMweather 3:

Open your /configs/fc_metar.ini file with Notepad or other plain text editor.
Change the [URLs] section to read as follows:

metar_url=www.hamweather.net|weather.noaa.gov|weather.noaa.gov
metar_prefix=/weather/current/%%find_place%%|/pub/data/observations/metar/decoded/%%find_place%%|/weather/current/%%find_place%%
metar_postfix=.html|.TXT|.html

You can cut and paste the above into your file. Your HAMweather installation will now use the HAMweather METAR mirror. To access your stations data just browse to your hamweather.cgi or hw3.cgi setting the forecast type to �metar� and the icao to your station ID. For Example: hw3.cgi?forecast=metar&icao=KVABLACK1

NOTE: You should review the License and Usage agreement you agreed to when registering to post your data to HAMweather for more information on the use and restrictions of use of the HAMweather METAR mirror.

Yes. You can change the METAR station associated with your town to your station ID. Review the HAMweather 2 manual on 'Associated Places' or the HAMweather 3 manual on 'Altplaces' for instructions.

Yes, Once you set up your HAMweather installation to access the HAMweather Metar mirror it will be able to display data for other stations. Simply set the forecast type to metar and set the icao to the other stations ID.

Yes. Once you follow the above procedure to allow HAMweather to access the HAMweather Metar mirror, then HWimage on your server will have access to you stations data.

HAMweather 2.x installation will not be able to display your archived data on your web site. But with the release of HAMweather 3, there will be plug-ins developed to allow you display your stations archived data on your web site.

Misc Questions:

Who is HAMweather anyway?

HAMweather, LLC is the company that has brought you the HAMweather suite of products that allow you to freely add weather forecasting to your web site. For more information, visit http://www.hamweather.com

Weather for You was created to increase awareness about independent weather stations and the role they play in reporting information from areas where there are not existing reporting stations. One of their goals from the beginning was to bring together information from these private stations. They also provide support and services to personal weather stations to enhance their web sites with various forecast and weather information products. More information on Weather for You can be found at http://www.weatherforyou.com.

A forum specifically for questions about this program is available at http://support.hamweather.com. look for the topic 'Personal Weather Stations and HAMweather'.