The Kansas Department of Transportation website is having some kind of issue today. The site would barely open for me this morning and continues to be sluggish at the time of this post. This poses a major problem for my Web cam project script, since it uses most of the pictures from KDOT's site.
I started the script 5 minutes ago and it is just now two-thirds done. Usually it only takes my computer a couple of minutes tops to finish the entire thing.
Obviously this issue is a bit out of my hands so hopefully the fine folks at KDOT get the site back up to full speed soon.
If you are trying to run the script and just want to skip past one of the KDOT cameras, hit (Ctrl-C) and it will ask you "Terminate Batch job (Y/N)?". Hit Y then (Return) and the entire script will stop. N (Return) it will advance to the next URL2File line.
Saturday, December 18, 2010
Tuesday, November 16, 2010
An early Thanksgiving treat
Here in my (ever-diminishing) spare time tonight I've managed to do a little updating. It appears the changes are working just fine...if you see anything out of the ordinary, let me know.
Check the "WebCam Project Links" on the right hand side of the page to get the newest versions.
Check the "WebCam Project Links" on the right hand side of the page to get the newest versions.
Monday, September 13, 2010
It's Fit to Print
I've been working on this update for the better part of a month now, tweaking and editing until I finally got it right. I appreciate your patience as I'm very excited about this update! Not only are things cleaned up, but there are a TON of new cameras I've found in Kansas. The Kansas Turnpike Authority (KTA) recently added 9 new cameras late this Summer. The web service "Kanoklacountry.com" has added a number cameras to the mix as well.
As I mentioned in a post this past Spring, Win 7 behaves a little differently than XP when it deals with simple file changes in the "Program Files" directory. To clear that hurdle, I've set up a completely new directory on my C: drive that simply stores all of my GRLevel data. Here's what it looks like in the code for the placefile:
If you'd rather keep your old directory intact, please note you'll have to change the directory listing (circled in red) from "C:\GRLevel3 Data\WebCam Project" to whatever you used in the past. I'm not going to publish two versions of the placefile. It's hard enough to keep track of one file, let alone multiple versions!
As always, the updated files are on the right side of the blog, under
Look for kscambat.txt and kscampf.txt. As always, if you have any questions...please let me know!
As I mentioned in a post this past Spring, Win 7 behaves a little differently than XP when it deals with simple file changes in the "Program Files" directory. To clear that hurdle, I've set up a completely new directory on my C: drive that simply stores all of my GRLevel data. Here's what it looks like in the code for the placefile:
If you'd rather keep your old directory intact, please note you'll have to change the directory listing (circled in red) from "C:\GRLevel3 Data\WebCam Project" to whatever you used in the past. I'm not going to publish two versions of the placefile. It's hard enough to keep track of one file, let alone multiple versions!
As always, the updated files are on the right side of the blog, under
The Live GRLevel3 Webcam Project Links.
Look for kscambat.txt and kscampf.txt. As always, if you have any questions...please let me know!
Monday, August 2, 2010
Look who's back
Holy crap! I haven't updated this thing since March? That's what happens when the severe weather season kicks in. While that's come and gone, family duties and projects have my plate full even as the new school year draws closer.
Well, I haven't stopped working on this. Sunday I did an inventory of the working cameras in the WebCam project and it was pathetic. Less than half were working at the time. That number is now much better with KDOT back on-line. (None of their cameras were working then).
I have found a ton of new cameras too, some from the Kansas Turnpike and from other sources. I have started the preliminary work of getting that data incorporated into the scripts. Hopefully we'll debut that before too long.
And you won't have to wait until March either...
Well, I haven't stopped working on this. Sunday I did an inventory of the working cameras in the WebCam project and it was pathetic. Less than half were working at the time. That number is now much better with KDOT back on-line. (None of their cameras were working then).
I have found a ton of new cameras too, some from the Kansas Turnpike and from other sources. I have started the preliminary work of getting that data incorporated into the scripts. Hopefully we'll debut that before too long.
And you won't have to wait until March either...
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
Out like a Lion
Thanks to Scott Roberts for the tips on my Windows 7 issues. Anytime you make changes to the "Program Files" directory, Windows 7 will prompt you. To get around that, I've had to move all of my GRLevel3 data (for webcam images, placefiles, etc) to its own directory outside of the Program Files folder. I also have to move URL2File out of the Windows\system32 directory. The bad thing about that is now you must have URL2File in each data directory for my batch files to run right.
So, now I have a separate directory called "GRLevel3 Data" on my C: drive and I've moved the "places", "SPC" and other directories to this folder. I also made a "WebCam Project" folder to keep all of this information separate and organized. And yes, there is a copy of URL2File in each of these directories.
The good news is that if you don't have Windows 7 or (probably) Vista (untested on this operating system) and still are running XP SP2/SP3 then you won't have any changes to make. However the newer system will need this change to work properly. Down the road though, I won't be writing scripts for 2 or 3 different operating systems, just one to run on all.
Clear as mud?
So, now I have a separate directory called "GRLevel3 Data" on my C: drive and I've moved the "places", "SPC" and other directories to this folder. I also made a "WebCam Project" folder to keep all of this information separate and organized. And yes, there is a copy of URL2File in each of these directories.
The good news is that if you don't have Windows 7 or (probably) Vista (untested on this operating system) and still are running XP SP2/SP3 then you won't have any changes to make. However the newer system will need this change to work properly. Down the road though, I won't be writing scripts for 2 or 3 different operating systems, just one to run on all.
Clear as mud?
Monday, March 1, 2010
Welcome to March!!
Meteorological Spring has arrived. Yes, March Madness is here....I love this month!!
If you haven't seen it, GR3 ver 1.70 is out and it's a great improvement with the addition of high-resolution L3 data. Awesome stuff! This is a fantastic addition for the upcoming severe weather season.
I've been tinkering around with a few random projects in the last couple of weeks. Not the fog channel stuff though but some other things. While I'm having no problem with it working on my Windows XP machine, my new Windows 7 box is giving me some grief. Every time I run URL2File within my scripts on this new machine, I get a prompt box for every line of code (Do you want Windows to make changes to this machine?). I thought I had all of the proper boxes and settings checked to let this run but something is amiss. I'm not sure what I'm missing but it's frustrating to say the least! And until I figure it out, I'm reluctant to release any new improvements/additions to my projects.
Anyone have any ideas?
If you haven't seen it, GR3 ver 1.70 is out and it's a great improvement with the addition of high-resolution L3 data. Awesome stuff! This is a fantastic addition for the upcoming severe weather season.
I've been tinkering around with a few random projects in the last couple of weeks. Not the fog channel stuff though but some other things. While I'm having no problem with it working on my Windows XP machine, my new Windows 7 box is giving me some grief. Every time I run URL2File within my scripts on this new machine, I get a prompt box for every line of code (Do you want Windows to make changes to this machine?). I thought I had all of the proper boxes and settings checked to let this run but something is amiss. I'm not sure what I'm missing but it's frustrating to say the least! And until I figure it out, I'm reluctant to release any new improvements/additions to my projects.
Anyone have any ideas?
Thursday, February 4, 2010
Into February
No new updates to tell you about this morning. I haven't come across any new Kansas web cams in the last few weeks while searching the web. If you stumble across one, please let me know. I'm always eager to add more to the camera scripts.
A little side project I've dabbled with here lately is adding fog channel imagery to GR3. We have had a ton of fog around Wichita over the last few weeks. Obviously, that presents some forecasting headaches so if it's out there, I want to know.
The problem with the imagery that's available on the web either ends early (like around 5:15am local time) or it has some kind of time stamp in the URL, making it impossible to look for a static address to put in the placefile. I'll keep on this and hope to come up with a solution soon.
A little side project I've dabbled with here lately is adding fog channel imagery to GR3. We have had a ton of fog around Wichita over the last few weeks. Obviously, that presents some forecasting headaches so if it's out there, I want to know.
The problem with the imagery that's available on the web either ends early (like around 5:15am local time) or it has some kind of time stamp in the URL, making it impossible to look for a static address to put in the placefile. I'll keep on this and hope to come up with a solution soon.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)