Getting the (US only) Weather Forecast on a Vintage Machine

Assuming that one has an internet-enabled vintage machine (my IIgs has the Uthernet II, Webber, Contiki and other free software), how to get current weather forecasts for some area of the US?

I thrashed about with this for forever and a day. I banged around on The National Weather Service quite a bit (including FTP and warnings from Google) and then I found a solution that works very well.

Just do it in the URL. Use airport codes, and send them to FrogFind, which is an amazing piece of software from ActionRetro. I picked a small prop-plane airport about five miles from my home and used it's IATA code of K12N like this:

frogfind.com/read.php?a=https://forecast.weather.gov/zipcity.php?inputstring=K12N

Instant results from the NWS. Tried it in Contiki (took a bit of typing) and it works fantastic.

I switched over to Webber (by Speccie) and did the same. The correct data loads quickly, but the font is a bit hard to read in Webber. I am not sure if it is Webber or FrogFind with the font issue. However, it works. The nice thing about Webber is being able to save the URL in favorites so I don't have to type out that rather long address.

Ultimately, I was able to reach my goal of quickly reading the weather forecast on an Apple II. I do wish Contiki had an option for a saved URL, but I'm not the coder who could do something like that.

Thanks for reading. Posted from an Apple IIgs.

Matthew

On Thursday, September 15, 2022 at 1:21:02 PM UTC+10, matthe...@gmail.com wrote:
> Getting the (US only) Weather Forecast on a Vintage Machine
>
> Assuming that one has an internet-enabled vintage machine (my IIgs has the Uthernet II, Webber, Contiki and other free software), how to get current weather forecasts for some area of the US?
>
> I thrashed about with this for forever and a day. I banged around on The National Weather Service quite a bit (including FTP and warnings from Google) and then I found a solution that works very well.
>
> Just do it in the URL. Use airport codes, and send them to FrogFind, which is an amazing piece of software from ActionRetro. I picked a small prop-plane airport about five miles from my home and used it's IATA code of K12N like this:
>
> frogfind.com/read.php?a=https://forecast.weather.gov/zipcity.php?inputstring=K12N
>
> Instant results from the NWS. Tried it in Contiki (took a bit of typing) and it works fantastic.
>
> I switched over to Webber (by Speccie) and did the same. The correct data loads quickly, but the font is a bit hard to read in Webber. I am not sure if it is Webber or FrogFind with the font issue. However, it works. The nice thing about Webber is being able to save the URL in favorites so I don't have to type out that rather long address.
>
> Ultimately, I was able to reach my goal of quickly reading the weather forecast on an Apple II. I do wish Contiki had an option for a saved URL, but I'm not the coder who could do something like that.
>
> Thanks for reading. Posted from an Apple IIgs.
>
> Matthew

It's kinda funny you ask about this as I've actually been working on an NDA for the IIgs that does what you want on and off for years (I started in 2015!). I've been working on it again in recent times and have it calling a weather API, parsing the JSON response, and displaying the results in an NDA window. There are a number of features that I do not have working yet, but watch this space. :-)

Cheers,
Mike

Matthew,

> I switched over to Webber (by Speccie) and did the same. The correct data loads quickly, but the font is a bit hard to read in Webber. I am not sure if it is Webber or FrogFind with the font issue.

I assume you have read the Webber manual, but maybe you missed the two features in Webber to help you with such pages.

If it is a small font size that is the problem, check the "Large Text" box in Preferences, and the font size will not go below 12 pt.

If it is the Frog Find coloured text that is the problem, either press OA-R, or use “Remove Colour” from the Edit menu. The page will change to black on white.

I tried to be as accurate as possible with the font sizes and colours on web pages in Webber within the limitations of the IIgs screen, and most of the time it works. For those times it doesn’t, use those two features...

Cheers - Ewen

> It's kinda funny you ask about this as I've actually been working on an
> NDA for the IIgs that does what you want on and off for years (I started
> in 2015!). I've been working on it again in recent times and have it
> calling a weather API, parsing the JSON response, and displaying the
> results in an NDA window. There are a number of features that I do not
> have working yet, but watch this space. :-)
>
> Cheers,
> Mike

I also thought about it for years off and on. I figured a JSON parser on a server was the way to go. I'm not a great coder, but I can get by if I really plug-in. I just didn't have the time (nor the immediate knowledge) to do such a thing. I thrashed about with a ton of different ideas, but the one that worked immediately was simply feeding a URL with airport codes into FrogFind. ActionRetro is the real weather provider! Where I got stuck was inputing zip codes. The API just didn't seem to take it until I tried airport codes. Maybe there's a parameter I missed, but zip codes just wouldn't work. Took a while, but I finally found an easy solution (for me). Thanks for reading, and I will certainly watch here for your NDA! Peace...

> I assume you have read the Webber manual, but maybe you missed the two
> features in Webber to help you with such pages.

You caught me, I missed that part. I tried it, and black and white fixes the concern perfectly. Thanks for writing... it's pretty cool to chat with the person who invented the software I am using right now to reply!

Peace...

Matthew,

> You caught me, I missed that part. I tried it, and black and white fixes the concern perfectly. Thanks for writing... it's pretty cool to chat with the person who invented the software I am using right now to reply!

I am quite used to that. Webber was written simply an update to the now defunct 25 year old SIS script set for Spectrum...

Cheers - Ewen

> I am quite used to that. Webber was written simply an update to the now
> defunct 25 year old SIS script set for Spectrum...

Just asking out of curiosity... Is Webber a finished product, or do you still revisit development?

Peace

Matthew,

> Just asking out of curiosity... Is Webber a finished product, or do you still revisit development?
I revisit my software if bugs are reported, I have an idea of useful features I could add to them, or time permits. Some of my software I will probably never revisit, but there is a pending bug with Webber I will probably fix sometime soon.

Either keep an eye on my web site, or install Versions, and you will be able to keep up with any updates I release...

https://speccie.uk

Before then, there is no substitution for reading through the software manuals at least once! :-)

Cheers - Ewen

Hi Ewen,

> Before then, there is no substitution for reading through the software
> manuals at least once! :-)

Point well taken sir! May I report one thing that comes up for me regularly... now, this could be my particular system, as it is accelerated. When I use OA-R to switch to B/W (a great feature), very often the navigation history runs down the screen along with whatever text from the web page I am on. It can go away by clicking around the menus, but does always seem to come back. Only happens in B/W mode.

Thanks for reading, and again it just might be on my particular system.

Peace!

Matthew

Matthew,

> May I report one thing that comes up for me regularly... now, this could be my particular system, as it is accelerated. When I use OA-R to switch to B/W (a great feature), very often the navigation history runs down the screen along with whatever text from the web page I am on. It can go away by clicking around the menus, but does always seem to come back. Only happens in B/W mode.

You win no prizes, but you are the first to report the bug that I mentioned. I have another bug in the HTML Tool to work on first, but an update is not too far away...

Cheers - Ewen

> You win no prizes, but you are the first to report the bug that I
> mentioned. I have another bug in the HTML Tool to work on first, but an
> update is not too far away...

Well since you're in there, could you throw in an option for always B/W?

Peace man,

Matthew

Matthew,

> Well since you're in there, could you throw in an option for always B/W?

The Settings window is a bit crowded already to add it there, and surely it only takes moments to press Open Apple-R for those pages that need B&W.

Cheers - Ewen