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Where do I start?

Other discussion about creating web sites for Cumulus that doesn't have a specific subforum

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Gruver
Posts: 2
Joined: Fri 15 Sep 2017 3:06 am
Weather Station: Davis VP2
Operating System: Windows 8.1

Where do I start?

Post by Gruver »

Hi all.

I have been a Cumulus user for years and I have been uploading to sites such as WU and PWS Weather, but recently would like to learn build my own website. I am a meteorologist lacking quite a bit of coding and website building skills and I figured learning how to build my own website using my PWS data would be a good way to boost my skills.
My first question would be where do I begin? I have been looking online at the basics of HTML, but I'm not sure how I would incorporate that into making a website using the templates I see here. I see the SteelSeries weather gauges are HTML based, but reading the ReadMe is a bit overwhelming already.
The next thing I don't quite understand is how do I get my weather data to show up on a website using one of those templates?

I am at a complete loss right now and I don't know where to begin. Any help would be appreciated.
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PaulMy
Posts: 3775
Joined: Sun 28 Sep 2008 11:54 pm
Weather Station: Davis VP2 Plus 24-Hour FARS
Operating System: Windows8 and Windows10
Location: Komoka, ON Canada
Contact:

Re: Where do I start?

Post by PaulMy »

Hi Gruver,
I will gladly share my experiences on where and how to start... and also being one that had no background or knowledge at all, just a lot of cut and paste, trial and error :oops:

Since you're running Cumulus you've got half of it done already. Next is get a domain, and a web host service - not a huge cost... and many options to chose from. Then start with the Cumulus standard template to get your feet wet and then you can decide what else you would like.

Recently I got an email inquiry from someone about 100 km from me who was interested to get a weather station and website and asked if he could come and visit to see what I had as he had no knowledge nor experience in any of that - he is a HAM. Within a week he received his Davis VP2 and had the standard Cumulus webpage up and running. Within a relative short time he has modified to www.blenheimweather.ca

Enjoy,
Paul
Davis Vantage Pro2+
C1 www.komokaweather.com/komokaweather-ca
MX www.komokaweather.com/cumulusmx/index.htm /index.html /index.php
MX www.komokaweather.com/cumulusmxwll/index.htm /index.html /index.php
MX www. komokaweather.com/cumulusmx4/index.htm

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novy
Posts: 32
Joined: Thu 16 Feb 2017 2:37 pm
Weather Station: davis vantage vue
Operating System: Windows 7 / RASPBIAN
Location: Scotland

Re: Where do I start?

Post by novy »

Ive been playing about doing this my self in cumulusmx on raspbery pi . i have used the cumulusmx dashboard interface and running that as my website because i prefer the look of dark dashboard than the other white one . all the data works although i now need to block access to certain settings pages if possible
its not very secure like this so i would not advise to do it this way but i have it running like this fine on a raspberry pi.

I bought my domain name from 123-reg
On 123-reg web site i have forwarded www. to my ip address and port number as i host it myself .
Last edited by novy on Tue 19 Sep 2017 10:52 am, edited 2 times in total.
water01
Posts: 3215
Joined: Sat 13 Aug 2011 9:33 am
Weather Station: Ecowitt HP2551
Operating System: Windows 10 64bit
Location: Burnham-on-Sea
Contact:

Re: Where do I start?

Post by water01 »

"Not very secure" is putting it mildly.

"although i now need to block access to certain settings pages." which is only going to stop someone accessing your settings. If they know the name of any file in the local interface (which most Cumulus users would or indeed anyone accessing the Wiki can find out) be that an html file or json file or a simply the js scripts they can cause havoc not only with the Cumulus but anything else on your Pi once they have access.

This is NOT a good idea. It would be much better to get Cumulus to output its standard html files to a secure area on the PI and make that accessible from the web.
David
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novy
Posts: 32
Joined: Thu 16 Feb 2017 2:37 pm
Weather Station: davis vantage vue
Operating System: Windows 7 / RASPBIAN
Location: Scotland

Re: Where do I start?

Post by novy »

water01 wrote:"Not very secure" is putting it mildly.

"although i now need to block access to certain settings pages." which is only going to stop someone accessing your settings. If they know the name of any file in the local interface (which most Cumulus users would or indeed anyone accessing the Wiki can find out) be that an html file or json file or a simply the js scripts they can cause havoc not only with the Cumulus but anything else on your Pi once they have access.

This is NOT a good idea. It would be much better to get Cumulus to output its standard html files to a secure area on the PI and make that accessible from the web.

am still learning lol but i know what you mean ok thanks i will look further into this way of doing things.
sfws
Posts: 1183
Joined: Fri 27 Jul 2012 11:29 am
Weather Station: Chas O, Maplin N96FY, N25FR
Operating System: rPi 3B+ with Buster (full)

Re: Where do I start?

Post by sfws »

Gruver wrote: would like to learn [to] build my own website. I am a meteorologist lacking quite a bit of coding and website building skills and I figured learning how to build my own website using my PWS data would be a good way to boost my skills.
See if http://wiki.sandaysoft.com/a/Customised_templates gives you any help in understanding HTML and modifying the web pages that come with Cumulus. Start with some very simple changes. There are several sites online that give examples of using HTML tags, CSS descriptors, and so on. Some of these sites allow you to edit a little bit of the code and see the effect, that might be helpful.

With a previous broadband provider my package included some web space that I decided to use to share some group photos without using a commercial site. I did succeed in mounting my own web page with a few photos, but it was a long struggle, and using something like instagram is far easier!

However, when I was using Cumulus, I surprised myself by getting its web pages onto that web space. Subsequently redesigning those pages to teach myself HTML, CSS etc. was then also easier than I expected, and I was soon creating my own pages trying out all the features of web programming I could discover. I don't have any online presence now, but my boosted skills are still developing for me on a web server hosted on my PC.
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novy
Posts: 32
Joined: Thu 16 Feb 2017 2:37 pm
Weather Station: davis vantage vue
Operating System: Windows 7 / RASPBIAN
Location: Scotland

Re: Where do I start?

Post by novy »

water01 wrote:"Not very secure" is putting it mildly.

"although i now need to block access to certain settings pages." which is only going to stop someone accessing your settings. If they know the name of any file in the local interface (which most Cumulus users would or indeed anyone accessing the Wiki can find out) be that an html file or json file or a simply the js scripts they can cause havoc not only with the Cumulus but anything else on your Pi once they have access.

This is NOT a good idea. It would be much better to get Cumulus to output its standard html files to a secure area on the PI and make that accessible from the web.
this is exactly what i have done now
copied the cumulusmx webfiles folder contents to apache2 www folder on my pi
copied the cumulusmx web folder contents to the apache2 www folder
set up cumulus internet web/ftp settings

Host name ip address of your pi

FTP port 21

Directory path to apache2 www folder

pi username
Password

set the apache2 listen port to 99 as port 80 will not work for me
open/forward port 99 on my router to my raspberry pi ip address
on 123-reg.co.uk i setup web forwarding to my public ip http://12.32.567:99/index.htm

all working now
Last edited by novy on Thu 28 Sep 2017 11:15 am, edited 1 time in total.
Gruver
Posts: 2
Joined: Fri 15 Sep 2017 3:06 am
Weather Station: Davis VP2
Operating System: Windows 8.1

Re: Where do I start?

Post by Gruver »

Thanks for the replies.

Well I finally bought a domain name through dreamhost.com, as recommended by the Wiki page here. However, when using FileZilla to FTP to the server, it is telling me my U and P are incorrect. (I am using the one I signed up to create a DreamHost account) Upon searching the site I must also buy hosting? I thought when I bought my domain name that was all included?

So if I buy hosting for the domain I bought, should I then be able to create a U and P for the account so I can ftp the files?

This is already a lot more involved than I thought it would be.
typiod
Posts: 12
Joined: Thu 21 Sep 2017 9:21 pm
Weather Station: aercus WS2083
Operating System: RPI stretch

Re: Where do I start?

Post by typiod »

Gruver yes you need to buy a hosting package, you will then be able to ftp into your site.
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PaulMy
Posts: 3775
Joined: Sun 28 Sep 2008 11:54 pm
Weather Station: Davis VP2 Plus 24-Hour FARS
Operating System: Windows8 and Windows10
Location: Komoka, ON Canada
Contact:

Re: Where do I start?

Post by PaulMy »

This is already a lot more involved than I thought it would be.
In a few weeks you'll wonder what the fuss was all about...
So if I buy hosting for the domain I bought, should I then be able to create a U and P for the account so I can ftp the files?
Yes, once you have a hosting service your provider should be able to guide you in setting up your account and then you should be able to use a program like Filezilla (free) to manually FTP the required initial files, and through the Cumulus settings also have Cumulus update the data on a regular basis.

Give it some thought on where, root or subfolder, in your hosting you want your weather station to reside. My domain is komokaweather.com and that is my host account. But I have my Cumulus template in a subfolder /weather so http://www.komokaweather.com/weather/

Because I use more than one template set I have other subfolders such as /weather28 for http://www.komokaweather.com/weather28/ pws/for http://www.komokaweather.com/pws/ and /j-template for http://www.komokaweather.com/j-template/ so that each template can reside on its own without interference from another. I then have a modified index file in my hosting root that allows me greater customizing and including my Cumulus template basic page in an iframe - http://www.komokaweather.com or more explicit http://www.komokaweather.com/index.php

For initially, keep it simple and get the Cumulus template set up and working, it is the simplest... Once you have your hosting in place and can access your remote webserver throuhg Filezilla create a subfolder, i.e. /weather or /cumulus, your choice. Then follow the Wiki steps http://wiki.sandaysoft.com/a/Website_setup and http://wiki.sandaysoft.com/a/Simple_Website_setup

Any questions along the way, just ask.

Enjoy,
Paul
Davis Vantage Pro2+
C1 www.komokaweather.com/komokaweather-ca
MX www.komokaweather.com/cumulusmx/index.htm /index.html /index.php
MX www.komokaweather.com/cumulusmxwll/index.htm /index.html /index.php
MX www. komokaweather.com/cumulusmx4/index.htm

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candrasa
Posts: 10
Joined: Thu 21 Sep 2017 5:26 am
Weather Station: PCE FWS 20
Operating System: Windows7

Re: Where do I start?

Post by candrasa »

novy wrote:
water01 wrote:"Not very secure" is putting it mildly.

this is exactly what i have done now
copied the cumulusmx webfiles folder contents to a new folder on my pi
copied the cumulusmx web folder contents to the new folder
set up cumulus ftp setting path to the new folder
pointed apache2 to the new folder
set the apache2 listen port to 99 as port 80 will not work for me
open/forward port 99 on my router to my raspberry pi ip address
on 123-reg.co.uk i setup web forwarding to my public ip http://12.32.567:99/index.htm

all working now
Hello novy,

How do we set up our Apache2 in our cpanel on the hosting ?

tq
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ConligWX
Posts: 1570
Joined: Mon 19 May 2014 10:45 pm
Weather Station: Davis vPro2+ w/DFARS + AirLink
Operating System: Ubuntu 22.04 LTS
Location: Bangor, NI
Contact:

Re: Where do I start?

Post by ConligWX »

candrasa wrote: Hello novy,

How do we set up our Apache2 in our cpanel on the hosting ?

tq
Your hosting cPanel Apache configuration should already be setup. what are you wanting to do with the setup?

just upload your files to the /public_html_ folder or a sub folder of that depending on what you have.

since you are not forthcoming with information we cannot just guess what you want.
Regards Simon

https://www.conligwx.org - @conligwx
Davis Vantage Pro2 Plus with Daytime FARS • WeatherLink Live • Davis AirLink • PurpleAir •

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novy
Posts: 32
Joined: Thu 16 Feb 2017 2:37 pm
Weather Station: davis vantage vue
Operating System: Windows 7 / RASPBIAN
Location: Scotland

Re: Where do I start?

Post by novy »

Hello novy,

How do we set up our Apache2 in our cpanel on the hosting ?

tq
not sure what you mean can you explain more ? have you managed to set it up ?
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