I have a newly installed AAG Cloudwatcher connected to my laptop via a serial/usb adapter. The AAG Cloudwatcher software is all set up including the path for each of the dat and csv files.
I have Chris Rowland’s Safety Monitor ascom driver installed; I have the AAG patch from Lunatico installed; I have the Boltwood OK to Image and OK to Open installed. I have each of the Boltwood monitors configured with maximum settings (configured by clicking on the settings icon in the sequence window for each) and have set the correct file paths to the AAG_CWNetData.dat file.
I have selected the OK to Image in the sequence window and connected to the Safety Monitor. SGP reports Unsafe (red illuminated circle) whilst I know it is Dry, Dark and Clear of clouds. If I open the Cloudwatcher SW, it is happily plotting graphs: so the unit itself is working fine and reports Safe. It is updating the CSV file and the file size is increasing with each recording session. The two dat file sizes (the CCDAP4 and AAG_CWNetData) do not however increase in size.
I have repeated checking file paths about a dozen times trying to get the safe status the same in Cloudwatcher and SGP. Buzz has been valiantly replying to PMs for the last couple of hours trying to help too.
The SGP log reports connecting fine to the Safety Monitor.
If I select the Chris Roland’s Safety Monitor in the SGP sequence window (rather than Boltwood OK to Image) and then click on the settings icon, it brings up a window and when I click the Check File option it says it is having difficulty reading the AAG_CWNetData.dat file. Does this mean that any of the Safety Monitors (CW Monitor, Boltwood OK to Image and Boltwood OK to Open) are not making a connection to the correct .dat files?
If anybody is able to shed light on where I am going wrong I’d be really grateful (feels like I’m going slowly insane).
The problem was located between the keyboard and chair, ie me!
I hadn’t correctly installed the patch that makes AAG Cloudwatcher’s software work with Chris Rowland’s AAG Safety Monitor. All done now after closely following the instructions. Jaime of Lunatico was quick with support throughout the day too. Thanks to Buzz too for pointers.
You must make sure you paste the patch .exe file into the installed CW software directory and to set the AAGSafetyMonitor ascom driver in SGP, pointing to the AAG_CCDA4P.dat file.
Changing parameters in the CW software, closing it down, and then connecting to the driver in the SGP sequence window and the Safety Monitor was reporitng the corresponding correct status. Great.
I have not so far been able to get my Boltwood Safety Monitor to work with SGP. Undoubtedly because I do not have all the required drivers/software installed. Is there a topic that provides all the required links, and hopefully any necessary details?
I believe I need the latest AAG Cloundwatcher program, an AAG patch from Lunatico, and correct file paths to the AAG_CWNetData.dat file, CCDAP4 file, and the CSV file. I have these set and I am getting a CSV file and AAG_CWNetData.dat file, but I do not have any CCDAP4 file getting created on my system. I have the CSV set to accumulate entries so I have a continuous record of the weather. Do I have to set it to the 1 line format?
I couldn’t get the Boltwood Safety Monitor to work either. I am using the Chris Rowlnd’s safety Monitor as the ascom driver which I select in the SGP sequence window. This read the AAG_CCDA4P.dat file which is one of the output .dat files from the CW software.
I installed the new CW 7.2 software, then pasted the new .exe file patch into the folder in my Programs folder where the AAG software is stored. I installed the Chris Rowland’s Safety Monitor driver. I then set up the folder for the AAG Cloudwatcher data.
I then opened the Cloudwatcher software to configure the driver with a Master Installation (the seria/usb adapter is connected to my Obsy laptop). I set the path for each of the entries in the Setup tab to point to the new folder I created (I am at work so can’t type exactly where they are in the CW software, sorry - but happy for you to PM me if you get stuck).
I Started the software collecting data to check all was OK. Browsing to the data folder I could see that the CSV and two .dat files were created (one for the CCDA4P and one the CWNetData) as well as a couple of image files. I shut down the CW software.
I opened SGP to my most recent sequence file. Once open I selected the Chris Rowland’s Safety Monitor as the acom driver (not the Boltwood ones) in the sequence window. I connected and then clicked on the settings icon. I could then set the path to the AAG_CCDA4P.dat folder (not the CWNetData one) and everything has worked from there.
Sorry, what I didn’t make clear is that the Unsafe conditions are set within the CW software which writes these out to the AAG_CCDA4P.dat file. The ascom driver set in SGP reads this .dat file, so you don’t need the Boltwood drivers.
just to summarize in easy steps what Barry just wrote, and starting with a working AAG CW Windows program running:
close the program
apply the patch (that is, overwrite your current AAG_CloudWatcher.exe file with the new one)
run program again, will be the new version, and select a suitable folder for the AAG_CCDAP4.dat file
you can now use either Chris Rowland’s safety monitor driver, or Lunatico’s one (from the same page as the patch). If using Lunatico’s, then the safe / unsafe conditions will honor the ones defined in the software.
Works! Thanks a bunch for all the help. I followed your instructions and connected to the Lunatico driver, and SGP now follows correctly the safe condition in the monitor.
A minor issue I had some trouble with:
The setup page of the AAG monitor program does not list AAG_CCDAP4.dat for data file location. It only lists AAG_CWNetData.dat. From my earlier install this was being written to C:\Users\Jerry\Appdata\Local\VirtualStore\Program Files (x86)\AAG_CloudWatcher. SGP file selection dialog for AAG_CCDAP4.dat would not let me point to C:\Users\Jerry\Appdata. I set the AAG_CWNetData.dat data path to F:\xxx but it continued to update AAG_CCDAP4.dat in the \Appdata… directory. To fix this, I had to toggle the Master/Remote selection to Remote then back to Master so I could set the data path there. I set it to F:\xxx and now all three data file outputs are being written to F:\xxx and it works great.
I’m sorry I missed this message. Glad it’s working, and I’ll take a look at that problem specifying the folder for the AAG_CCDAP4.dat… nice workaround setting the software to remote then back to master!