Installation
weewx-nws manual · weewx-nws on GitHub · Report an issue
weewx-nws requires Python 3.9 or later, WeeWX 5, and the python requests and dateutil packages. Neither is a WeeWX requirement (WeeWX 5.4 needs neither), which is why they are installed here.
Upgrading from an earlier release? There is nothing to do about the database. The schema has changed several times and there is no migration, but since 6.1 weewx-nws notices an old one at startup and rebuilds it — the next poll refills it. See Upgrading.
1. Install the prerequisites
On a pip install, activate WeeWX’s virtual environment first (the path varies by install; /home/weewx/weewx-venv and ~/weewx-venv are the usual ones):
source /home/weewx/weewx-venv/bin/activate
pip install python-dateutil
pip install requests
On a Debian or Red Hat package install, WeeWX runs in the system python, so install the system packages. On Debian:
sudo apt install python3-dateutil
sudo apt install python3-requests
2. Download the extension
Download weewx-nws.zip from the releases page.
3. Install it
On a pip install weectl lives in the virtual environment, so activate it first (yours may sit elsewhere; ~/weewx-venv is the usual place):
source ~/weewx-venv/bin/activate
weectl extension install weewx-nws.zip
On a Debian or Red Hat package install there is no environment to activate and weectl is already on the path:
weectl extension install weewx-nws.zip
No sudo: that install put your account in the weewx group, which owns the files. If you installed WeeWX in this same login session, log out and back in first so the group membership takes effect.
The install adds user.nws.NWS to data_services and writes four sections into weewx.conf: [NWS] itself, the [[nws_binding]] data binding, the [[nws_sqlite]] database, and an [[NWSReport]] report stanza for the sample report. Every option in [NWS] arrives with a comment saying what it does — see Configuration.
4. Set User-Agent
NWS’s API rules ask that every request identify who is making it. The installer writes a placeholder; edit weewx.conf and put your own site and contact address in its place:
[NWS]
User-Agent = "(my-weather-site.com, me@my-weather-site.com)"
This is the one option that needs editing. Everything else has a working default.
5. Restart WeeWX
sudo systemctl restart weewx
6. Confirm it took
The extension announces itself in the log at startup. These are the lines to look for:
INFO user.nws: Service version is 6.0.
INFO user.nws: Using binding 'nws_binding' to database 'nws.sdb'
INFO user.nws: request_urls: twelveHourForecastUrl: https://api.weather.gov/gridpoints/MTR/92,88/forecast
INFO user.nws: request_urls: oneHourForecastUrl: https://api.weather.gov/gridpoints/MTR/92,88/forecast/hourly
INFO user.nws: Downloaded 156 ForecastType.ONE_HOUR records generated at ...
INFO user.nws: Saved 156 ForecastType.ONE_HOUR records.
The Downloaded lines come from the poller threads, which fetch immediately at startup; the Saved lines come at the end of the next archive period. After the report cycle that follows, the sample report appears at <HTML_ROOT>/nws/ — a seven-day page, an hourly page and an alerts page. See The sample report.
The gridpoint URLs above are resolved from your latitude and longitude through NWS’s /points endpoint. If NWS maps your location to the wrong gridpoint, the log says so — see Gridpoints.
7. Add the tags to your own reports
The sample report has the tags already. To use them in another report — the Seasons skin, say, or a skin of your own — name the search list extension in that report’s stanza:
[StdReport]
[[SeasonsReport]]
[[[CheetahGenerator]]]
search_list_extensions = user.nws.NWSForecastVariables
Both the [[[CheetahGenerator]]] line and the search_list_extensions line may need adding. Then see Report tags and Recipes.
Uninstalling
weectl extension uninstall nws
(Activate the virtual environment first on a pip install.) This removes the extension’s files and the sections it added to weewx.conf. The database, nws.sdb, is left where it is; delete it by hand if you want it gone.