Anywhere you live or travel, the weather is an important
factor of life, work, recreation, chores around the house, and vacation trips to far-away
places.
Creating a PC-based weather station that reports to the Internet requires, of course,
a weather station that can connect to a PC, and an hour or two of time to install, connect,
and configure. I found all manner of moderate-to-expensive weather station
systems from Davis Instruments (www.davisnet.com), La Crosse Technology (www
.lacrossetechnology.com), Oregon Scientific (www.oregonscientific.com), and others,
but for a quick, economical start I was glad to find the 1-Wire Weather Instrument
Kit V3.0 from AAG Electronica (www.aagelectronica.com) for $120. Some assembly is
required with the AAG weather station, so you may find the prebuilt units more to
your liking. We??™ll assume our weather station is assembled and ready to install.
Step 1: Verify Your Weather Station to PC Connections
Since the measuring unit of a weather station is best placed at some height outside
your home, you should make sure the software and cable connections function correctly
before stringing a cable and climbing on the roof to secure the measuring unit.
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116 Project 17
Download (if necessary) and then install the driver and application software for
your weather station. The AAG weather instrument comes with a short cable and an
interface adapter to connect to your computer??”make the connection between the
measuring unit and your PC, and then test the software (see Figure 17-1).
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