APRS / CWOP Network Admins having a tiff again?

[JaxWeather]

Anyone following the mailings in the CWOP Quality Control mailing list regarding third and fourth APRS net servers being taken off line for CWOP data?

date   Feb 3, 2008 8:36 PM
subject   [wxqc] Unexpected loss of 1/2 the servers that support CWOP.

Wasn't it just 6 months ago that we had a similar issue?

-Bob

[psklenar]

Bob,   Yep.  Saw Dave A's first posts about it last night.  It's unfortunate it came to this, but the upside is that Dave H now seems to be trying to address the problems finally.  And the other positive bit, if you've continued reading this morning, is that it's come out that the old Tier-2 servers ARE still accepting packets, so that's some good news.

Brian,   Would it be possible to add an option to the CWOP upload settings to allow us to select an "every X minutes" upload option where X would be an odd value like 8, 9 or 11?  Right now we have the option of every 5, 10, 15, 30 etc minutes, but it sounds like such "boundaries" can lead to server overloads where as an odd upload interval would be a constantly changing time as the day progresses, thus reducing those "hot spots".  It sounds like this might help address what sounds like one of the larger complaints the server admins have.

Thanks,

[JaxWeather]

Pat,

It is my understanding that since 10.37h Build 18 we have that ability...

You don't indicate what version of WD you are running - but using 1037H build 18, in the CWOP area just above the buttons for setting every x number of minutes is an "offset minutes by" selector.  If you want to upload to cwop every 10 minutes but spaced for instance 7, 17, etc - set the "offset to 7".  if you want to upload every 15 minutes, set the offset, select that button, etc.

This will finally force me to upgrade *sigh*  LOL

-Bob

[psklenar]

Hmmm ... I'm running 10.37h ... but only "Build 05".  I guess I need to look at more than just the major version name. <sigh>  This would help to some extent, but it'll still be at the "same time" every hour, where as if we could set it to upload every 9 or 11 minutes we'd more effectively randomize the uploads over the course of a day.

Also, I'm not quite sure when this was requested, but when I started, we were told to upload every 15 minutes.  Apparently CWOP (at request of NWS?) started asking folks to upload every 5 to 10 minutes in the not too distant past.  Hence the suggestion for the option to upload every 9 or 11 minutes.

[JaxWeather]

I never changed from every 15 minutes and I am inclined to stay at that but change from using 00 - 15 - 30 - 45 to use an offset of "3" as my station ID ends with 3...

-Bob

[niko]

Here's the recent thread about the upload timing http://www.weather-watch.com/smf/index.php/topic,29185.0.html

[psklenar]

niko,   Thank you for that pointer!  I haven't had the time to watch the forums much lately and missed that one.

I never changed from every 15 minutes and I am inclined to stay at that but change from using 00 - 15 - 30 - 45 to use an offset of "3" as my station ID ends with 3...

hmmm ... I have two CWOP ID's ... AR651 and N1PRS-9.  FindU shows me as N1PRS-9.  MesoWest shows AR651 as my "ID" and N1PRS-9 as my "Name".  So.  Should I upload with an offset of 1 or 9?

FWIW, the current "build" of v10.37h is 26.  wow, my version sure was old in comparison!

[JaxWeather]

Pat,

Not sure but either would be better then leaving at 00 - 15 - 30 - 45

Also there was a recommendation in one of the messages today that CWOP only, not ham operators, start using cwop.aprs.net which resolves as follows:

;; QUESTION SECTION:
;cwop.aprs.net.                 IN      A

;; ANSWER SECTION:
cwop.aprs.net.          60      IN      A       64.58.200.120
cwop.aprs.net.          60      IN      A       67.18.222.130
cwop.aprs.net.          60      IN      A       134.173.254.38
cwop.aprs.net.          60      IN      A       165.91.140.28

rotate.aprs.net only rotates to two servers right now and using cwop.aprs.net would allow for quick moving of weather data to a separate server or network in the future if needed...

Note that to enable to offset you have to select the minute offset in your WD CWOP setup screen and then reset the time interval, which is officially recommended at every 10 minutes
http://www.wxqa.com/news.html
Jan 16, 2008 Date

(I have been using 15 since day one and ain't changing that now LOL)

-Bob

[JaxWeather]

Just as a follow-up since I switched both the time of the uploads (yeah I finally ungraded) and started using cwop.aprs.net I have recorded data every 15 minutes where before some hours only two got through and sometimes 3 but never all 4 each hour (since the upheaval)

-Bob

[psklenar]

Thanks Bob, I've switched my primary target to cwop.aprs.net as well.  Let's see what I find when I get up in the morning.

G'night,

[jmcmurry]

I have switched as well, but it seems I have to shut WD down and restart for the new settings to work.  Working great now.

- Jim

[Weather Display]

should I now make
cwop.aprs.net
the default server?

[psklenar]

Bob,   After switching to cwop.aprs.net last night ... doesn't look like I missed a single submission.

Jim,   How long had it been since you'd restarted your WX PC?  Or at least WD?  I tend to reboot every 4-6 weeks (primarily to capture MS patches. ), but I was able to change my CWOP targets multiple times yesterday w/o a single restart.

Brian,   Have you had any recent communincations with Dave Anderson or Dave Helms from CWOP?  It *sounds* like cwop.aprs.net should be the new default, but I'm on the outside looking in and would hate to misguide you.  Dave Anderson, yesterday, published a white paper on recommended changes to the CWOP network it bullet #1 does state that client software should connect to port 14580 of DNS alias cwop.aprs.net.  It might be a good idea to touch base with them.

pat----

[JaxWeather]

Brian,

I am forwarding you an email from the CWOP Quality Control List that to me appears to have both Dave Anderson and Dave Helms agreeing to start switching CWOP traffic to use cwop.aprs.net

-Bob

[Weather Display]

I have emailed and heard back from Dave Anderson.
(as I have never heard from Dave Helms about this).
And so the next full update of WD (i.e with the new ftupd.exe) will use the cwop.aprs.net by default.
Luckily WD is not one of the software that has been causing a problem, from what I have heard back.