WU Free API Keys going away Anyone else see this? How will this affect the ability of Gene’s work around to work?
If you are using beta.wufyi.com or in case your account is part of the private (aka closed garden) beta, you should not be effected at all. That being said the raw wufyi.com will need to be upgraded, thanks for the heads up @pup975.
Seems existing keys seem to work for now (not sure for how long), but in case this changes prior to me redoing the site users should simply change the URL to start with beta.wufyi.com instead of just wufyi.com (simply add “beta.” in front of wufyi.com) and everything else should continue working as is. The rest of the old wufyi url can be left as is (no need to get rid of “api=…” section).
Cheers,
Gene
Didn’t even know there was a “beta” version! Just swapped mine over. Thanks! Would be nice if Rachio allowed older users to use the new Weather Intelligence Plus that has WU stations available on it natively.
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I second this!
I’m 57. Old enough? Lol
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from the comments on WUFYI:
This is a part of their current (IBM) business approach with some important “players” that make products with big investments and look to kill competition that relies on the WU service so they can be the only one that uses the WU users PWS network. This is all about money. IBM currently advertise about some hyper-local weather ← this is simply from our PWS they are using the data from… this is the perfect opportunity…
i assume IBM will keep that wufyi.beta up until water sensors from users of smart controllers and other vendors/satelite data providers delivers the same hyperlocal weather forecast and it can do without them. in the end, eventually they want you to pay for your own data… like facebook.
Just a small clarification IBM has purchased (and now owns) Weather Underground and seem to be in the process of restricting access to the API in order to generate profit.
WUFYI (and beta.wufyi.com) are coded by me. Not sure how long I’ll be able to keep the service going, but good news for Rachio users is that the native WU support seems to be a part of WI+ development so a native Rachio support is at least on the horizon.
Meanwhile beta.wufyi code does not rely on the free API keys, just on information WU makes public elsewhere. If the availability of free API keys are the only thing WU is changing in the foreseeable future, than wufyi may end-up running until there is no more need for it.
Cheers,
Gene
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ah ok, thanks for clearing that up.
Good thing gen3 is using wunderground.
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Confused noob here. What is this all about?
tldr: Previously there was no way to directly use weather underground data with Rachio. A workaround using a free API key, previously available from wunderground, is no longer possible. Previously established free keys continue to work so far, but no one knows when this may change.
If you don’t need a workaround to use WU data (such as you having a WI+ support from Rachio), than there is nothing to worry about. For everyone else I recommend to use beta.wufyi.com.
Cheers,
Gene
How can we use that url without api key? I thought you needed api from wunderground? I am just trying to translate a station near me into pwsweather so I can use it. -update just saw the beta url, going to try and figure it out. I’ve set up a pwsweather account just need to try this
This is completely amazing! So much easier than other complex methods thanks for doing this and maintaining wufyi!
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Does the Gen 3 system actually allow for selecting of weather stations from Weather Underground? We just installed an Ambient Weather WS-8478 that isn’t showing on our Gen 2 system. We’d be willing to upgrade to a Gen 3 and sell our relatively new Gen 2 if so… unless there’s a better option.
With Gen3 We give the user two distinct options now.
Interpolated weather data that you don’t have to worry about stations going down or not reporting precipitation which takes the burden off the homeowner of making sure they have an accurate reporting station. Interpolated data is great but won’t be exactly the measured amount that a PWS would give you near the house.
The ability to choose from over 250,000 WU PWS and National stations (Gen 1/2 has about 40,000 PWS stations). I’m also working on a WI plus feature that will self “heal” a chosen station, always making sure you are using one that is online, automatically choosing the next closest station. So yes, a native integration.
@Gene is also running a “bridge” to WU. http://wufyi.com/
Thanks for the insight. We just installed the Gen 2 last fall so I wasn’t looking to upgrade quite yet, although the confirmed ability to pull from Weather Underground on Gen 3 is quite enticing. However, I had set up the referenced bridge (Thanks, @Gene!) and am finding that to work quite well for now: https://www.pwsweather.com/obs/KMIBRONS4.html. This should buy me some time before needing to upgrade.
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@franz can you explain why this isn’t available with gen 1/2 devices? Unless I’m wrong, everything you have described happens in the cloud, not on the actual devices. Please don’t pull an Apple move on us and force people to upgrade to get new functionality that works just fine on older devices.
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The product team is working on this and will provide more information when available.
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@Gene how are you? Been a little while since we chatted.
My Wunderground PWS page (KSMOUNT85) hasn’t updated for >8 days. Meanwhile my Acurite page has been updating just fine. So I think there’s a problem between Acurite and Wunderground; or else between my smarthub and Wundergound? Acurite won’t respond to my emails; I just now wrote to Wunderground to see if they know anything.
Also, cronjob.com has reported sporadic failures, on my wufyi job, too. Maybe (again) this points to some kind of issue at Wunderground?
Just a shot in the dark, but thought maybe you have more logging available to diagnose, or maybe you’ve seen/heard something?
TIA.