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Get-Weather-Data

Hack into AcuRite from Raspberry Pi to constantly extract weather data

vv Instructions below!! vv

Adapted from this amazing blog series by Dave Thompson: http://www.desert-home.com/2014/11/acurite-weather-station-raspberry-pi.html usbexample1.c and weatherstation.c were copied verbatum from that blog and readWeatherData.py is based on code from it. Everything else is my own creation.

I didn't have the tools, equipment, desire, or knowledge to ditch the weather station console and go striaght to intercepting the RF signals, or else I would direct you to Dave's GitHub repo for this project. I'll link it here anyways: https://github.com/draythomp/Desert-Home-WeatherStation

I had to do quite a few things differntly from Dave when I set it up myself, and it wasn't always clear to a beginner like me what his instructions meant, so I thought I'd put the exact process I followed in one place. To be clear, at the time of writing, I am still a beginner. I'm sure there are better ways to do most of what's below, but hopefully this will help someone else who doesn't want to take the time to figure it out themself.

The .py files are throughly commented by me to explain what's going on. Both of the .c files are commented by Dave Thompson for the same purpose.

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A brief overivew of the files involved:

  • usbexample1.c allows us to access the USB cord connection the RPi to the AcuRite console.
  • weatherstation.c accesses the AcuRite console and retrievs the data it collects from the weather station itself. It outputs that data every 15 seconds. You can change the timer interval in the top of the file.
  • readWeatherData.py collects the output from weatherstation.c, formats it how I wanted it, and writes it to a .csv file for storage. It creates a new .csv file every day at midnight to store the next 24 hour's data.
  • collect-weather.sh lets weathernstation.c and readWeatherData.py interact outside of the terminal and be run as a service.

My equipment:

  1. I have the AcuRite weather station model 01536.
  2. I used a Raspberry Pi 3 B v1.2 to hack into the AcuRite weather station console.
    • You can read details about it here: https://www.raspberrypi.org/products/raspberry-pi-3-model-b/
    • You have to order a microUSB power cord separately. I didn't realize this and had to wait a few extra days for it to arrive.
    • It is running Raspbian on a microSD card that has NOOBS v1.9 preinstalled.
    • I'm using an HDMI monitor and wireless USB mouse and keyboard to control the GUI on the RPi.
    • Although my RPi has 4 USB ports, I could have done it with 2:
      • One for the wireless USB keyboard and mouse
      • One to connect with the AcuRite sensor

Instructions: The first step, obviously, is to plug everything in. The USB port on the AcuRite is under the panel you have to take off to replace the batteries. Plug in the USB cord that comes with the AcuRite to both that port and a USB port on the RPi.

The below section corresponds to Dave's first related post: http://www.desert-home.com/2014/11/acurite-weather-station-raspberry-pi.html We don't have permissions to access the USB cord. To verify that we don't have permissions:

  1. Open terminal in the RPi
  2. Type cd /dev to go to the directory storing all the USB types. Hit enter (hit enter after each command you enter in terminal).
  3. Type ls -l to look at all of the permissions.
  4. This USB type is something like hidraw2. The number could be different.
  5. Note that we can't do much to it. To change permissions so we can access the USB:
  6. (Optionally) type clear
  7. Type dmesg
  8. Look for something like this:

    • [ 2.536425] usb 1-1.2: New USB device found, idVendor=24c0, idProduct=0003

      [ 2.538128] usb 1-1.2: New USB device strings: Mfr=0, Product=2, SerialNumber=0

      [ 2.541669] usb 1-1.2: Product: Chaney Instrument

      [ 3.127499] udevd[156]: starting version 175

      [ 5.553287] bcm2708-i2s bcm2708-i2s.0: Failed to create debugfs directory

      [ 12.559829] hid-generic 0003:24C0:0003.0001: usb_submit_urb(ctrl) failed: -1

      [ 12.561497] hid-generic 0003:24C0:0003.0001: timeout initializing reports

      [ 12.563452] input: Chaney Instrument as /devices/platform/bcm2708_usb/usb1/1-1/1-1.2/1-1.2:1.0/input/input0

      [ 12.569076] hid-generic 0003:24C0:0003.0001: input,hidraw0: USB HID v1.11 Device [Chaney Instrument] on usb-bcm2708_usb-1.2/input0

    • It will probably be at the very end, since its the last thing you plugged into the USB ports.

  9. Find the line that says New USB device found, idVendor=24c0, idProduct=0003 in your terminal. The values for idVendor and idProduct could be different than the values I have.
    • Take note of what it defines idVendor and idProduct as. In my example, they are 24c0 and 0003 respectively.
  10. To make the USB readable by anything other than root, go to the directory /etc/udev/rules.d.
    • Type cd /etc/udev/rules.d
  11. Create a file named 10-local.rules
    • There are multiple methods, but one option is to type nano 10-local.rules.
  12. Make sure it has a line in it that says SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTRS{idVendor}=="XXXX", ATTRS{idProduct}=="YYYY", SYMLINK="weather" MODE="666",GROUP="users".
    • Once you've typed it out, replace XXXX with the idVendor and YYYY with the idProduct that you found earlier.
    • Then hit ctrl+x, type y, and hit enter.
  13. Now check to see if we have permissions on the USB.
    • Type cd /dev
    • Type ls -l
    • Look for weather. That's what we renamed it in the file.

This next part corresponds with this post: http://www.desert-home.com/2014/12/acurite-weather-station-raspberry-pi.html Next we need to get the ability to connect to the AcuRite console through code:

  1. Go to this link and download it on your RPi: https://sourceforge.net/projects/libusb/files/latest/download?source=files
  2. Go in terminal to the directory where you put the download. Type tar xvf filename (replace filename with the filename of the download)
  3. Before you can install the library you need to make sure your RPi is completely up to date.
    • Type sudo apt-get update
    • Type sudo apt-get upgrade
    • Type y
    • This will take a while. IIRC, it took me about an hour, but it will vary based on your CPU and download speed.
  4. You also need to get another library first. Type sudo apt-get install libudev-dev
  5. Now go to the directory where the original download is. Read the INSTALL file to get the instructions. They could have changed between when I wrote this and you read it, but they were:
    1. sudo ./configure
    2. sudo make
    3. sudo make install
    • If it's different for you, make sure you're logged in as root or put sudo before the commands. Otherwise it won't work.
  6. Now download usbexample1.c from this repository and put it somewhere on your RPi. It doesn't matter, but I put mine in a folder on my desktop. Where ever you put it, remember it, because all the other files in this repository need to go to the same place.
  7. This particular file needs to be compiled to /usr/local/lib. To compile it, type cc usbexample1.c -L/usr/local/lib -lusb-1.0.
  8. Compiling it should leave you with an a.out file. You need this; leave it there.
  9. If you run a.out, you'll see output that tells you that it was able to find the device and open it.

This next part corresponds to this post: http://www.desert-home.com/2014/12/acurite-weather-station-raspberry-pi_3.html The AcuRite console gives off two different types of output. The weatherstation.c file reads them. Here's how to set it up:

  1. Download the weatherstation.c file from this repository to the same directory you put usbexample1.c in.
  2. Read the comments in weatherstation.c if you want. They kind of explain how to use it and what it does. This is optional; I'll tell you everything (the bare minimum) that you need to make it work.
  3. weatherstation.c needs to be compiled too; type cc -o weatherstation weatherstation.c -L/usr/local/lib -lusb-1.0
  4. When you run it, the stdout output will be the data from the console in a dictionary. To run it, type ./weatherstation
  5. All the output you see is a combination of the stderr and stdout output. To narrow it down you can type ./weatherstation 2

Now we use a python file to put the data into a file for storage. The file Dave provided was in python 2.7.9. I don't know python 2 and wanted to edit the code, so I changed it to python 3.4.2. I originally wanted it to send the previous 24 hour's data file to a specified email every time it created a new one, so that I wouldn't have to worry about the RPi eventually running out of space to store the data. But I couldn't get it to work, so I moved on to more important things.

The RPi is naturally set to run python 2.7.9 even though it has multiple versions installed. In order to run the readWeatherData.py file we first have to change the default python version to 3.4.2:

  1. First make sure you know what your python version is: python --version
  2. If it says 2.7.9, type update-alternatives --list python to list the current versions of python. If it returns 3.4.#, you can skip to step 7.
    • You'll probably get a result saying update-alternatives: error: no alternatives for python
  3. Type update-alternatives --install /usr/bin/python python /usr/bin/python2.7 1
    • This sets python 2.7 as one of the alternatives. Even if you don't want to use it now, you should do it to make switching between versions later easier.
  4. Now type update-alternatives --install /usr/bin/python python /usr/bin/python3.4 2
    • This sets python 3.4 as another alternative.
  5. You should now be set to 3.4.2 for your default.
  6. If, at any time in the future, you want to change between python versions, type update-alternatives --config python and follow the instructions shown in terminal.
  7. Now go ahead and download readWeatherData.py into the same directory as the previous two .c files.
  8. Download emailData.txt into the appropriate directory and edit its contents to be specific to you wants.
  9. Now, to store the data, go to that same directory and create a folder called Data. The file readWeatherData.py is hardcoded to use it. You can go into the file and change it in line 26 if you don't like the name. Regardless, you'll need to update line 26 to match the filepath to the directory you're using for this project.
  10. To run the file, type ./weatherstation.c 2| python readWeatherData.py.
  • This takes the stdout output of weatherstaion.c and pipes it into readWeatherData.py as the input.
  • readWeatherData.py takes that input and writes it into a file it creates in ./Data named for the date.

Great! Now you have the data being collected and stored in a directory where you can access it. This is as far as I went in following Dave's blogs. The rest of his blogs on this topic are linked here:

It is unrealistic to have your monitor permantently connected to the RPi which has to be connected to the AcuRite weather station console to work. Therefore, you'll probably want to be able to run the files via SSH. Here's how to set it up: (adapted from http://www.instructables.com/id/Use-ssh-to-talk-with-your-Raspberry-Pi/)

  1. Before disconnecting your monitor, you need to enable SSH on your RPi.
  2. At some point, you'll probably be prompted to login. The default username is Pi and the default password is raspberry.
  3. Type sudo raspi-config.
  4. Navigate to Interfacing Options > SSH > Yes
  5. Hit the right arrow key twice to navigate to Finish
  6. Now you need to reboot to save the changes. After making sure all your files are saved, type reboot.
  7. After it restarts, open terminal and type ifconfig to find the IP address.
  8. You're looking for inet addr: ###.###.###.###, probably under the wlan0 heading. Write down the value of inet addr.
  9. Now you need to install PuTTY on the computer you're going to SSH from.
  10. You can download it from here: http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/putty/download.html
  11. Install it by running the .exe
  12. Run PuTTY.
  13. In the field marked Host Name (or IP address) enter the inet addr you wrote down earlier.
  14. Click open.
  15. A window will pop open. I would choose "no" the first time so that you can make sure everything works as expected.
  16. A black screen will appear and, after a possible (short) wait, you'll be prompted to login. Login using the user credentials for you pi.
    • Remember that the default username is pi and the default password is raspberry.
  17. If everything went correctly, you've now got acces to the terminal running on your RPi!

Now we need to make the two scripts executable over SSH. It isn't practical to have it running in the SSH terminal, as it would prevent you from doing anything else. The solution I chose was to make it a service. Services can be set to run at certain points. I set mine up to start every time the RPi turns on.

  1. Download the check-weather.sh file into your directory. This file executes the weatherstation.c file and pipes its output into readWeatherData.py and runs it too.

  2. Now we need to make the service. Type in cd /lib/systemd/system.

  3. We're going to make a file called check-weather.service that controlls what (the check-weather.sh file) and when it is run. Type sudo nano check-weather.service.

  4. Type the following: [Unit]

    Description=Hello World

    After=multi-user.target

    ``

    [Service]

    Type=simple

    ExecStart=/usr/bin/python /home/pi/hello_world.py

    Restart=on-abort

    ``

    [Install]

    WantedBy=multi-user.target

  5. Hit ctrl+x, y, and enter.

  6. Now execute the following commands to set the permissions, make the file executable, and start the service:

    sudo chmod 644 /lib/systemd/system/check-weather.service

    chmod +x <filepath to your directory with the weather stuff in it>

    sudo systemctl daemon-reload

    sudo systemctl enable check-weather.service

    sudo systemctl start check-weather.service

  7. The script should now be running. If you want to check it for stderr (errors and logs), type sudo systemctl status check-weather.service.

  8. If you want to make sure its working right, you can go to the /Data folder and make sure the right file has been created and that it has the right content.

  9. If you want to read more about running a script as a service, check out http://www.diegoacuna.me/how-to-run-a-script-as-a-service-in-raspberry-pi-raspbian-jessie/

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