KDOT troubles

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.

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.

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

The Live GRLevel3 Webcam Project Links.

Look for kscambat.txt and kscampf.txt. As always, if you have any questions...please let me know!

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...

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?

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?

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.

Happy New Year

Whew...at last! We're set to close the book on 2009 and over the past couple of days, I'm closing the book on my latest update. I've (finally!) got the KDOT cameras added to the fray and have added/tweaked others too. Thanks for your patience on this!

On the right hand part of the page, scroll down until you see "kscambat.txt" and "kscampf.txt".

Since a few of the KDOT cameras are co-located with each other (i.e. @ Walker along I-70) I've kept a handful of them out of the scripts. Otherwise, don't be surprised to see a few of them down from time to time. It just happens with technology.

An interesting stat: we're up to 91 cameras now officially in my scripts! That's quite an improvement since the project began in late summer 2006. Hopefully, we'll add a few more in the coming year.

If I have any New Year's resolution concerning this blog, it would be to update it more often. And that's what I'll try to do. From the GRLevel3Geek: Happy New Year!

Stuff in the Queue

I was very excited to learn that KDOT has finally made available 25 new web cameras along I-70. This information is available on their website . I'm quite busy with a number of projects at home and at work, so I'll be working on adding this data to the web cam project as time allows. I'd like to turn it around faster but I'm afraid that won't happen.

Stay tuned for more updates...

Major Housecleaning

It had been a few weeks since I went though the entire list of Kansas camera sites and I was disappointed to see so many cameras down (16). It's not uncommon to see some of the school sites down during the summer as there's nobody at the school on a regular basis. But it wasn't just some school sites though. I did a little house cleaning and got things back in order.

Unfortunately, I have no new cameras to add. I did my usual search with Google for "Kansas web cams" and "Kansas construction cams"....even used the new site "bing.com" that I've seen advertised. No luck. I think I've pretty much given up on KDOT getting their site up anytime soon. Hopefully they will prove me wrong. It's a downer when they advertised it coming on-line "early First Quarter 2009" and we're just into 3Q now.

No News is Bad News

I wish I had some great excuse to explain the lack of updates recently but I don't. Besides work, I honestly haven't spent as much time on the computer. That's not a bad thing though as the weather has been so nice here over the last couple of weeks, only turning active in Kansas today after 4 days of 90 degree weather.

I haven't located any new cameras recently with my typical Google searches on the web. And I'm not holding my breath on updates from KDOT concerning their web cameras they've been promising since the first quarter of 2009. They keep saying they're working on problems with their page but so far nothing new from their camp.

Something new

I managed to get an update to the Kansas scripts yesterday to fix some broken links and the like.

Still nothin' from KDOT. (sigh)

No foolin'....some updates!

It was a rather crazy month of March at work, as I changed shifts for a few weeks while we trained on a completely new weather system. Needless to say, I had little time for extra stuff.

Thankfully, the new system has debuted and I'm back on my normal shift. With that, I'm happy to report some updates to the Kansas scripts this afternoon. I added one new camera, an old one returned and I weeded out some non-functional cameras.

Still waiting on KDOT though...no updates on their situation.

You want new cameras?

I learned recently from KDOT that their new cameras won't be ready until further notice as they continue to tackle some unresolved issues. I really hope they are up before severe weather starts to kick in big time!

While that's a bummer, I'm happy to report a couple of new cameras, one in Dodge City and in Independence. Plus, I found some older cameras have returned so I made a pretty sizable update to the Kansas camera scripts today. I've tested them and so far everything seems OK. Please report any problems though as I hurried like hell to get them done before shoving off to work today!

I know..I'm running behind

Sorry GRLevel3Geek followers...I'm way behind on updates. I've been a little busy with family commitments as we had a death in the family earlier this month.

I promise I'll have some new updates here soon...just wanted you know why things haven't been posted recently.

Have a good weekend,
Rodney

We've got a Mission

Who knew hanging out in the crawl space and on the roof of my house could be so much fun?! I've been pretty busy the last few days installing cables and the like for my nearly-completed "shack", as in a "radio shack". I've been an amateur radio operator since 1992 . But even with that on my plate and family stuff, I have managed to do some major detective work too concerning web cameras across Kansas.

I stumbled across the "Kansas Communities on the Web" site earlier this week. It's like me--not particularly flashy--but it gets right to the point: providing links to the majority of Kansas communities on the web. So, like the Little Einsteins, I was on a mission: to search for new web cameras possibly located on each city's web page. The tedious work paid off: I found a camera at the Eisenhower Center in Abilene and one in Derby where a new library is being built. In addition, I found a camera in Haysville too. Unfortunately, it hasn't updated in over a month.

Time permitting, I will be adding the cameras to the scripts. I have already jotted down the coordinates via Google Earth.

More good news on the camera front. KDOT is still good to go for an "early 2009" debut of 25 additional web cameras along I-70. It would be great to get them before the end of the month...fingers crossed.

Happy New Year!

I hope you're having a great holiday season. As we get ready to close out 2008, I finally managed enough time to update the Kansas camera scripts. I'm waiting for a whole slew of cameras from KDOT to come on line any day now, hopefully in the next month (is that too much to ask?). That will be exciting to say the least!

I've noticed a few of the WeatherBug/InstaCams down...not uncommon during the extended holiday break with nobody at school to maintain them. I won't remove them from the scripts at this point though and hope they return next week when schools are back in session.

Overall, it's been a rather productive year for the site. In addition to all of the Kansas camera scripts I continue to update, I added the Profiler and Upper Air data scripts in March. September brought the "Poor Man's Mesoanalysis", which was really fun.

And as this gift to you for the holidays, here's a couple of other scripts I threw together at some point during the year but never released. Maybe some of you will have a use for it, perhaps not. The first one is the Westar Outages Placefile. (Westar is a utility company that covers much eastern Kansas):

---------
;Westar Outages Placefile

Refresh: 5
Title: Westar Service Territory Outages

Image: https://www-11.westarenergy.com/outagemaps/CountyMaps/ServiceTerritory.JPG
36.82076, -99.05001, 0, 1
40.22578, -99.07336, 0, 0
40.10921, -93.08062, 1, 0
36.82076, -99.05001, 0, 1
40.10921, -93.08062, 1, 0
36.72185, -93.31198, 1, 1
End:
---------

This second one is for the Houston LDAR Network Realtime Data Display. Unfortunately, the network is down so it really doesn't serve much purpose until Texas A&M fixes the inoperative sensors around Houston.

---------
;Houston LDAR Lightning Placefile

Refresh: 2

Title: Houston LDAR Network Realtime Data Display
Image: http://atmo.tamu.edu/ciams/ldar/images/network.png
27.96037, -97.32729, 0, 1
31.41292, -97.39441, 0, 0
31.42265, -93.45268, 1, 0
27.96037, -97.32729, 0, 1
31.42265, -93.45268, 1, 0
27.98037, -93.48268, 1, 1
End:
---------


Happy New Year!

New KDOT cameras...later

I got disappointing news earlier this week. I was hoping the rest of the new KDOT cameras would come on-line in November but in a press release, KDOT said it would be "early 2009." Oh well, they have been installed. Said KDOT: "25 new camera have been installed along I-70 between Goodland and Topeka; I-135 near Salina; and on US-75 in North Topeka. These are in addition to the existing eight camera views that are updated every 15 minutes and shown on the 511 Web site."

That's a good thing for travelers and the camera scripts.

Lil' Update

I just posted a very minor update to the Kansas camera scripts today. One camera in particular has been down for the last couple of weeks so I removed it.

Otherwise, I'm rather busy with work and family commitments so these updates may be rather infrequent for the time being. Thanks...

Profiler status updated

I mentioned last Tuesday that I would be updating and streamlining the Profiler scripts once the data was back up on UCAR's site. I noticed the return this morning at work, so this afternoon we got down to business.

The scripts are nearly identical to the upper air scripts but instead they'll display 8 profiler sites in/around Kansas. Please refer to the "profiler.txt" placefile and the "profilerUCARbat.txt" batch file in the "Profiler/Upper Air Project" section on the right hand side of the page.

As always, there's incredible flexibility built in with this application. You can easily take out a site that doesn't apply to your needs and plug in the appropriate one. Just be sure to change the URL and file names in the batch file, get the correct lat/lon for it and you'll be good to go.

At this time, I'm not going to write a script that puts all 30+ sites that UCAR has into one placefile. It can be done...just not today!