Weather Routing

[rgleason]

Rick...
It's not this simple... There actually might be a reason why weather_routing_pi refuses to work with climatology_pi 0.3. If not with the current codebase then with some changes Sean is planning to do. You can't simply change this and assume it will be ok unless you know why it's there...Pavel

After change of Weather_routing_pi.cpp line 235 from minor version "2" to "3" in Release version Climatology data can be used. See Post #206

Well, Pavel it appears you were right! Here is the situation.

Climatology_win32_pi19_v02-*_ov320_pi.dll (Opencpn version 3.2.0)
uses CL-DATA-5 (not compressed cyclone data)
if data is not found will use a URL to download the data

Climatology_win32_pii19_v03-*_ov33406001_pi.dll (Opencpn 3.3.604)
uses CL-DATA-6 (compressed gz cyclone data)
if data is not found will use a URL to suggest download of the data
goes to http://sourceforge.net/projects/opencpnplugins/files/climatology_pi/

More on this here Climatology Post #207 and Climatology Post #208

Sean left Weather_routing_pi working with v02. I changed it to v03 for the minor version number to get the current code working for v03. Perhaps both v02 and v03 should work, if possible.

I think we need to make this clear to users somehow, and host both CL-DATA-5 for Climatology v02 (v3.2.0+)
CL-DATA-6 for Climatology v03 (v3.3.406+)

[rgleason]

In git and github.com I wanted to check my fork rgleason/climatology_pi of seandepagnier/climatology_pi and my local repository git clone of climatology_pi to see if it was current. -It was not, a newbie learning event. -I apologize. There is only one current version of the climatology_pi plugin. I must

$git remote add upstream https://github.com/seandepagnier/climatology.pi.git
#Assigns the original repository to a remote called "upstream"

Then do a git fetch and git merge a process which I will summarize in Development Environment Thread later and THEN cmake and MSVC compile! Then the 3.2.0 version will be at Climatology Plugin version 03. I apologize for any confusion thus created.

Additionally in reading Sean's code changes on github it is clear that he intends to have only version 03 of the plugin released. Also he modified the 03 code to read both compressed data and and uncompressed data. (So 03 will read both CL-DATA-5 and CL-DATA-6) compressed and uncompressed data.

Additionally, it appears that Weather_routing will not need to be recompiled.

[rgleason]

Plugins- All of Sean's Plugins + Weather_Routing & Climatology Updates - Hopefully these are the release versions, also new CL-DATA-5.
Find the new updates and compiles for rtlsdr and watchman.
For more details see Plugin Threads Post #80
Opencpn Beta Login - Plugins - rguser, rgpass.

[kubek]

Hi rgleason,

I have also tried updated version of weather_routing plugin with climatology and I have an error "Climatology plugin version not supported, no climatology data".

Kubek

[rgleason]

Kubek,
First you need to get Climatology working with data. The greyed out checkboxes in Climatology are a signal that Climatology has no data to work with. The data must be under "../opencpn/plugins/climatology/data" Download the CL-DATA-5.zip which has been refreshed. The Climatology plugin should now read both compressed and uncompressed data (I've tested that, and Sean's commit notes indicate those changes, and I see it in the code).

Once Climatology has access to its data, the Weather_routing notice will disappear.

Reminder to others, don't forget to download data files for plugins climatology, weather_routing and celestial_navigation, and place the data in the following respective directories:

../opencpn/plugins/climatology/data
../opencon/plugns/weather_routing/data
../opencpn/plugins/celestial_navigation/data

[kubek]

Originally Posted by rgleason

Kubek,
First you need to get Climatology working with data. The greyed out checkboxes in Climatology are a signal that Climatology has no data to work with. The data must be under "../opencpn/plugins/climatology/data" Download the CL-DATA-5.zip which has been refreshed. The Climatology plugin should now read both compressed and uncompressed data (I've tested that, and Sean's commit notes indicate those changes, and I see it in the code).

Once Climatology has access to its data, the Weather_routing notice will disappear.

Reminder to others, don't forget to download data files for plugins climatology, weather_routing and celestial_navigation, and place the data in the following respective directories:

../opencpn/plugins/climatology/data
../opencon/plugns/weather_routing/data
../opencpn/plugins/celestial_navigation/data

Hi,

As you can see on screenshot climatology plugin works perfect without any problem (see that values are shown in climatology window)

Kubek

[rgleason]

My eyes may not be so good, sorry.
What version of climatology?
What version of weather_routing.?
Also filenames actually being used please.
Also what data are you using? (file name and date please)
I have to go, can check back tonight and look into more.

Also version number for Opencpn?

[kubek]

Originally Posted by rgleason

My eyes may not be so good, sorry.
What version of climatology?
What version of weather_routing.?
Also filenames actually being used please.
Also what data are you using? (file name and date please)
I have to go, can check back tonight and look into more.

Also version number for Opencpn?

Hi,

I download all files today morning (2013-07-01)
climatology_win32_pi19_v03_ov320_pi.dll
weather_routing_win32_pi110_v08-2_vo33604_pi.dll
CL-DATA-5.7z

OpenCPN 3.3.604001

Kubek

[rgleason]

Kubek,
I am sorry, I think that was an older version done 6-22-13.
I have deleted it and uploaded the one I recently compiled and am using.
weather_routing_win32_pi110_vo08-3_ov33604_pi.dll
Don't know how that happened, but I had planned on uploading it and listed it in the Plugins thread (I'm going to check the others.)

Thanks for testing! Sorry for any inconvenience.
Rick

[rgleason]

A new Weather_Routing_Plugin wiki has been created
Weather_Routing_Plugin | Official OpenCPN Homepage

Any ideas, comments, contributions would be appreciated.

[rgleason]

From reading Sean's github, it appears he has left us with some updates of Watchman, Climatology and Weather_Routing plugins. I've compiled them for Windows and will update file thingie later, but I wanted to try something to see if we could get grib wind and currents working in weather_routing.

1. Run two instances of the grib plugins

grib_pi showing RTOFS current data
girb_pi showing Wind data

2. Run new version of Climatology with July set
3. Run the new version of Weather_routing with

Position Start-FL near Florida shore
Postion Fin near England

4. Set interval to 12 hours, and set time to current and current grib date
5. Hit Wx-Rte START

The route developed appears to follow the Gulf Stream currents!

The first screen shot is a route taken when Climatology currents was checked, so in Climatology I unchecked "currents" and ran a new route with the same start and end points, using only the Grib currents....

The second screen shot close up shows a definite intention to utilize the Gulf Stream, and the third screen shot of the whole trip gives that kick north along the Gulf Stream even more significance.

===
So I believe Weather_routing will read all data provided by running two grib instances, one with just RTOFS "Current" checked and another with "Wind" checked.

===
I now ask if there is some easy way to incorporate this simple feature (ability to run two instances of grib files in order to provide that data to weather_routing? The first grib selected would be dominant, and any data type selected in that grib would take precedence. The second grib selected, would grey out all checked data types previously selected in the first grib. I believe this is a feature that needs to be added to the Grib_pi plugin.

===
I'll augment the current feature request in the Grib_pi flyspray .

Rick

[Taarnskov]

Rick,

I think it is going to be confusing to have several Grib-file windows open in order to use current in the route planning. I believe the best thing to do is having a check-box in the original grib-file window where you can choose to ad a current file.

[rgleason]

Taarnskov, That is exactly right, and is similar to what I am asking for!! Thank you for putting it simply. I wanted to show that it works currently with two grib files, so it wouldn't be that difficult to make it easier for the user.

[Taarnskov]

I have been thinking a lot about using climate data for route-planning. Using actual grib-filer, there are specific data for wind speed and direction as for current.

I am planning a trip from south of France to Gibraltar in April 2014. On the attached picture you can see that from the wind rose I could get 40 knots from north or 30 knots from south besides some other directions and speed. How does the route-planning take that into consideration.

When planning in OpenCPN the result is ad shown in the picture. The result, 4 days, is the best possible scenario. I believe it could take up to more than 10 days

When using climate data for planning the correct thing to do, is calculate a range of scenarios. The results will very a lot, and can tell you have long I will take, and how many days you might have to stay in the harbor and wait for better weather.

[nohal]

Taarnskov...
Just from the look at the wind roses you can tell a single thing: at that time the weather can (and will) be pretty much anything. The long term stats are useless to tell anything but that. You simply have to wait for the weather windows to do the hops along the coast.

Pavel