phpweather-devel — General development talk and discussions.

Re: (no subject)PHP Flash

[peter h. <pet...@vi...>]

hi
Henrik

There is a good book "PHP for Flash" by Steve Webster (pub:Friends of Ed), 
although I am currently working through "PHP for the WWW : Visual 
Quickstart, Guide" by Larry Ullman (pub Peachpit Press).

PHPWeather was also my introduction to PHP. I downloaded Martin's "tar" a 
few months ago and then yikes; realised that here was a language that I had 
never seen before.

I hadn't a clue how to implement PHPWeather and searched for "An idiots 
guide to putting it on a HTML page", to no avail. Everyboby seemed to 
undesatnd C+ and UNIX languages and I felt completely out of my depth. I 
too am an artist and well you probably know the path, learn HTML->learn 
Director->learn javascript->learn flash5.

I began to learn PHP to implement PHPWEather, but now realise that if I 
learn PHP I can also build dynamic web/flash apps. Many thanks to Martin, 
for the introduction. The good news is the syntax for PHP is well developed 
and the on line PHP Manual PDF format) is excellent. Learning PHP will 
definitely improve your actionscripting :)

So I too am on a steep learning curve and would be grateful for any other 
recommended PHP manuals/authors.

ps I can't find a definition of "tar" can someone enlighten me ?

peter

 >At 13:29 07/03/2002 +0100, you wrote:
 >HI there

I LOVE your program

I would very much like to get the into flash, to work with them ad
graphich, ehhh, but the problem is i
dint know php.'

I tried to load all the variabels into flash, but none og them are useful,
would you mind helping me ?

regards

/Henrik
Denmark

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:: peter hagerty
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:: liverpool


  

Re: (no subject)

[Martin G. <gim...@gi...>]

HE...@dr... writes:

> HI there
> 
> I LOVE your program

Thanks :-)
 
> I would very much like to get the into flash, to work with them ad
> graphich, ehhh, but the problem is i dint know php.'

Are you talking about Macromedia Flash?
 
> I tried to load all the variabels into flash, but none og them are
> useful, would you mind helping me ?

Yes, but I'm not what you're trying to do... Do you want to use PHP
Weather together with Flash on a website, or is it something else?

-- 
Martin Geisler                       My GnuPG Key: 0xF7F6B57B

See my homepage at http://www.gimpster.com/ for:
PHP Weather => Shows the current weather on your webpage.
PHP Shell   => A telnet-connection (almost :-) in a PHP page.

(no subject)

[<HE...@dr...>]

HI there

I LOVE your program

I would very much like to get the  into flash, to work with them ad
graphich, ehhh, but the problem is i 
dint know php.'

I tried to load all the variabels into flash, but none og them are useful,
would you mind helping me ?

regards

/Henrik
 Denmark

Imported PHP Weather 1.x

[Martin G. <gim...@gi...>]

Hi everybody

As some of you might have noticed, then I've been playing with CVS the
last couple of days.

I've made a module called 'web' which will contain the webpages for
phpweather.sourceforge.net and a module called 'phpweather-1.x' which
contains version 1.60 of PHP Weather.

So, if anybody has an idea for a light design for phpweather.sf.net,
then I would love to hear about it. When the pages are updated in CVS,
they will be checked out into /home/groups/p/ph/phpweather/htdocs
automatically, so it should be easy for us to maintain this.

Also, if someone finds new and exciting bugs in PHP Weather, then it's
easy for them to fix it directly in CVS.

-- 
Martin Geisler                       My GnuPG Key: 0xF7F6B57B

See my homepage at http://www.gimpster.com/ for:
PHP Weather => Shows the current weather on your webpage.
PHP Shell   => A telnet-connection (almost :-) in a PHP page.

Re: patches to use PHPWeather as a plugin for PhpWiki 1.3.3

[Martin G. <gim...@gi...>]

Carsten Klapp <car...@ma...> writes:

> Hi Martin,

Hi Carsten - and others :-)
 
> With a little stumbling around I finally managed to use PHPWeather
> as a plugin for PhpWiki! I'm thinking of including the plugin with
> the distribution of PhpWiki (http://phpwiki.sf.net/phpwiki/) as an
> example of how to write plugins, and of course because PHPWeather is
> so cool too.

That's really great!
 
> There were a couple problems I encountered along the way, so I think
> I will want to wait a bit before submitting my plugin to PhpWiki's
> CVS. Patches included at the end of this message, based on code I
> pulled down from the PHPWeather CVS today.
> 
> * PhpWiki uses the PEAR library for database access, which already
> declares db classes with the same names as the ones PHPWeather's
> database code wants to use. I fixed this by prefixing the affected
> classes and functions with PW_. This is probably a good idea if you
> want to allow your custom DB functions to coexist with other web
> apps which rely on PEAR. (PhpWiki recently has an ADODB interface
> for it's sql, but it still ships "out of the box" with PEAR as the
> default for sql.)

I see. I think you're right about this - we ought to prefix all our
functions with a common string and I guess 'pw' is the logical choice,
even though it doesn't remind me of PHP Weather.
 
> * Need a method to return the weather data as an array or just as
> preformatted html string, so the calling app can position it on the
> page where it wants to. For PhpWiki I just quickly modified the
> pretty_print() to collect the output into a variable instead of
> printing it and return that.

Ahh, yes - that should have been changed a long time ago. When I
started the script, I didn't think that much about it.

Thanks for the patch!

-- 
Martin Geisler                       My GnuPG Key: 0xF7F6B57B

See my homepage at http://www.gimpster.com/ for:
PHP Weather => Shows the current weather on your webpage.
PHP Shell   => A telnet-connection (almost :-) in a PHP page.

off-topic

[Vaclav R. <va...@ph...>]

I don't know if this question has appeared before, but...
does anybody tried to include TAF decoder into phpweather?

Vac

Re: Funny chars in metar?

[Ray v. B. <r_v...@ho...>]

>I'm sorry, but I'm not able to make an exact reference as I do not have the
>relevant document, being the WMO publication No. 306, Manual on Codes (ICAO
>Annex 3 only states how to create a METAR). I talk from 30 years of
>experience with OPMET codes.
>
>I don't know where your item 12.5 comes from...
...snip...

Section 12.5 comes from the Federal Meteorological Handbook No. 1
(found it via the www.gimpster.com site at:
http://tgsv5.nws.noaa.gov/oso/oso1/oso12/fmh1/fmh1ch12.htm)

Maybe section 12.5 is one of the exceptions as described in section 12.1 
(find it below):

  "12.1 General

   The coding standards in this chapter conform to WMO Code Forms
   METAR FM 15-IX Ext. and SPECI FM 16-IX Ext. and the United States
   Exceptions filed with the WMO. These exceptions reflect national
   observing practices which differ from practices outlined in the WMO
   Manual on Codes No. 306."

I'm not argueing that the '/////' is not a valid construction, I'm just 
curious where it comes from and I guess I want to know if there are more of 
these constructions.

Martin created phpweather based on the document the is linked above. If that 
is not the whole story (or partially the wrong story), IMHO the script 
should be adjusted to comply to the exact metar definition.

Greetz,

Ray


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SV: SV: Funny chars in metar?

[Funder, J. O. <jh...@NA...>]

I'm sorry, but I'm not able to make an exact reference as I do not have the
relevant document, being the WMO publication No. 306, Manual on Codes (ICAO
Annex 3 only states how to create a METAR). I talk from 30 years of
experience with OPMET codes.

I don't know where your item 12.5 comes from, but I'm sure that omitting eg.
the windgroup will cause a lot of trouble in all systems decoding the METAR
except phpweather - this is because phpweather just identify each group
without any form of validation. When we use these data for aviation purposes
we also check the validity of the contents of the METAR. This includes that
a windgroup must be found, a cloudgroup must be found (CAVOK and SKC
regarded as cloudgroups). Checking that the dewpoint is lower than the
temperature aso. aso. - I could go on for ages.

.....and by the way, I have never seen a METAR without a windgroup.

rgds
Johnny Funder


-----Oprindelig meddelelse-----
Fra: Ray van Beek [mailto:r_v...@ho...]
Sendt: 28. februar 2002 09:40
Til: jh...@NA...; php...@li...
Emne: Re: SV: Funny chars in metar?


>The ///// indicates that the item could not be measured for one reason or
>another (typically instrumentfailure).


In some way, it seems logical, *BUT* this is not according to the metar 
specification:

   "12.5 Coding Missing Data in METAR/SPECI

    When an element does not occur, or cannot be observed, the
    corresponding group and preceding space are omitted from that
    particular report."

Do you have a specification that describes the use of '/////' ?

If is specified, I think that the script should be modified to add support 
the '/////' notation.

Greetz,

Ray




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Re: SV: Funny chars in metar?

[Ray v. B. <r_v...@ho...>]

>The ///// indicates that the item could not be measured for one reason or
>another (typically instrumentfailure).


In some way, it seems logical, *BUT* this is not according to the metar 
specification:

   "12.5 Coding Missing Data in METAR/SPECI

    When an element does not occur, or cannot be observed, the
    corresponding group and preceding space are omitted from that
    particular report."

Do you have a specification that describes the use of '/////' ?

If is specified, I think that the script should be modified to add support 
the '/////' notation.

Greetz,

Ray




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SV: Funny chars in metar?

[Funder, J. O. <jh...@NA...>]

Hi,

The ///// indicates that the item could not be measured for one reason or
another (typically instrumentfailure).
9999 has NOTHING to do with the wind - it means that visibility is 10
kilometers or more.
'Light and variable' wind is indicated with (eg.) VRB02KT.

rgds
Johnny Funder


-----Oprindelig meddelelse-----
Fra: Lee Marzke [mailto:lm...@ad...]
Sendt: 28. februar 2002 01:31
Til: Ray van Beek
Cc: php...@li...
Emne: Re: Funny chars in metar?


9999 is an often used abbreviation for Wind light and variable.
Don't know about the rest.

Lee Marzke  <le...@n9...>

At 10:45 AM 2/27/02 +0100, you wrote:

>Hi all!
>
>Ever seen a metar like the one below?
>
>EHEH 270855Z /////KT 9999 SCT028 ///// Q//// BLU BLU
>
>The wind dir/speed, temperature and pressure have been affected, but I 
>can't find the appropriate definition in the Federal Meteorological 
>Handbook No. 1.
>
>Does anyone know what this means? Is this a valid metar code?
>
>Ray
>
>
>_________________________________________________________________
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>
>
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--
=========================================================
Lee Marzke,  <le...@n9...>
North Wales, PA
N84176 (PA-28) at Brandywine, N99
=========================================================

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Re: Funny chars in metar?

[Lee M. <lm...@ad...>]

9999 is an often used abbreviation for Wind light and variable.
Don't know about the rest.

Lee Marzke  <le...@n9...>

At 10:45 AM 2/27/02 +0100, you wrote:

>Hi all!
>
>Ever seen a metar like the one below?
>
>EHEH 270855Z /////KT 9999 SCT028 ///// Q//// BLU BLU
>
>The wind dir/speed, temperature and pressure have been affected, but I 
>can't find the appropriate definition in the Federal Meteorological 
>Handbook No. 1.
>
>Does anyone know what this means? Is this a valid metar code?
>
>Ray
>
>
>_________________________________________________________________
>Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com/intl.asp.
>
>
>_______________________________________________
>PHPWeather-devel mailing list
>PHP...@li...
>https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/phpweather-devel


--
=========================================================
Lee Marzke,  <le...@n9...>
North Wales, PA
N84176 (PA-28) at Brandywine, N99
=========================================================

Funny chars in metar?

[Ray v. B. <r_v...@ho...>]

Hi all!

Ever seen a metar like the one below?

EHEH 270855Z /////KT 9999 SCT028 ///// Q//// BLU BLU

The wind dir/speed, temperature and pressure have been affected, but I can't 
find the appropriate definition in the Federal Meteorological Handbook No. 
1.

Does anyone know what this means? Is this a valid metar code?

Ray


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Re: Bug

[Martin G. <gim...@gi...>]

"Ray van Beek" <r_v...@ho...> writes:

>> Judging from your temperature table-cell in the bottom of your
>> page, are you working on some sort of thermometer? You know: a
>> little glass one with red mercury rising with the temperature. I
>> think that would be a great addition to the other icons.
> 
> I wasn't working on that. But I think that would be a great idea. I'll
> start on that right away. I let you know when it is ready...

It was only a suggestion - I didn't mean to put pressure on you. But
since you like the idea, I'll look forward to see your work :-)

-- 
Martin Geisler                       My GnuPG Key: 0xF7F6B57B

See my homepage at http://www.gimpster.com/ for:
PHP Weather => Shows the current weather on your webpage.
PHP Shell   => A telnet-connection (almost :-) in a PHP page.

Re: Bug

[Ray v. B. <r_v...@ho...>]

>I'll fix that in the next release. We should also have your beautiful
>icons with in that release - the current weather and wind icons look
>great. (See http://www.devolder.nl/cgibin/phpweather/table.php)
>
>Judging from your temperature table-cell in the bottom of your page,
>are you working on some sort of thermometer? You know: a little glass
>one with red mercury rising with the temperature. I think that would
>be a great addition to the other icons.

I wasn't working on that. But I think that would be a great idea. I'll start 
on that right away. I let you know when it is ready...

Ray

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Re: Bug

[Martin G. <gim...@gi...>]

"Ray van Beek" <r_v...@ho...> writes:

>> But if $weather_str is left as the empty string, then it shouldn't
>> be able to sneak 'Current weather is' into the report :-)
>> $weather_str is copied directly to the output, it's not prefixed
>> with 'Current weather' or anything like that.
> 
> ..snip...
>   if (isset($data['weather'])) {
>     $weather_str = sprintf($strings['current_weather'], $data['weather']);
>  } else {
>     $weather_str = '';
>  }
> ..snip...

Ahh - now I see it. The test should be if (!empty($data['weather']))
so that the empty string is considered false...

I'll fix that in the next release. We should also have your beautiful
icons with in that release - the current weather and wind icons look
great. (See http://www.devolder.nl/cgibin/phpweather/table.php)

Judging from your temperature table-cell in the bottom of your page,
are you working on some sort of thermometer? You know: a little glass
one with red mercury rising with the temperature. I think that would
be a great addition to the other icons.

-- 
Martin Geisler                       My GnuPG Key: 0xF7F6B57B

See my homepage at http://www.gimpster.com/ for:
PHP Weather => Shows the current weather on your webpage.
PHP Shell   => A telnet-connection (almost :-) in a PHP page.

Re: Bug

[Ray v. B. <r_v...@ho...>]

> > I have seen similar texts. For example, take the next metar:
> >
> >     EHEH 231555Z 27013KT 9999 FEW018 03/01 Q0996 BLU
> >
> > It doesn't specify any precipitation or other weather phenomena.
> > Therefor, the $weather_str stays empty, leading to the missing text.
> > Maybe this should be changed to omitting the entire line ('Current
> > weather is .')?
>
>But if $weather_str is left as the empty string, then it shouldn't be
>able to sneak 'Current weather is' into the report :-) $weather_str is
>copied directly to the output, it's not prefixed with 'Current
>weather' or anything like that.

...snip...
  if (isset($data['weather'])) {
    $weather_str = sprintf($strings['current_weather'], $data['weather']);
  } else {
    $weather_str = '';
  }
...snip...
At some point the script test the existence of $data['weather']. Alltough 
the string itself is empty, it has been set previously:
Somewhere at the beginning of the process_metar() function. As you can see, 
some other strings are set as well:

...snip...
  $decoded_metar['temp_visibility_miles'] = '';
  $cloud_layers = 0;
  $decoded_metar['remarks'] = '';
  $decoded_metar['weather'] = '';
...snip...

I found this by temporary adding two printf lines in the first snippet 
above. It shows that the isset() function finds that the the 'weather' 
string has been set (empty). This results in printing the 'Current weather 
is .' line.


Greetz,


Ray





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Re: Bug

[Martin G. <gim...@gi...>]

"Ray van Beek" <r_v...@ho...> writes:

> I have seen similar texts. For example, take the next metar:
> 
>     EHEH 231555Z 27013KT 9999 FEW018 03/01 Q0996 BLU
> 
> It doesn't specify any precipitation or other weather phenomena.
> Therefor, the $weather_str stays empty, leading to the missing text.
> Maybe this should be changed to omitting the entire line ('Current
> weather is .')?

But if $weather_str is left as the empty string, then it shouldn't be
able to sneak 'Current weather is' into the report :-) $weather_str is
copied directly to the output, it's not prefixed with 'Current
weather' or anything like that.

-- 
Martin Geisler                       My GnuPG Key: 0xF7F6B57B

See my homepage at http://www.gimpster.com/ for:
PHP Weather => Shows the current weather on your webpage.
PHP Shell   => A telnet-connection (almost :-) in a PHP page.

Re: Bug

[Ray v. B. <r_v...@ho...>]

>From: "Rui Fernandes" <nov...@ne...>
>To: <php...@gi...>
>Subject: Bug
>Date: Fri, 22 Feb 2002 12:17:24 -0000
>
>Dear friend,
>
>I've found a bug in the script. When I asked the information for London, it 
>came:
>
>54 minutes ago, at 11:20 UTC, the wind was blowing at a speed of 10.3 
>meters per second (23.0 miles per hour) from West in London / Gatwick 
>Airport, United Kingdom. The temperature was 13 degrees Celsius (55 degrees 
>Fahrenheit), and the pressure was 1,001 hPa (29.56 inHg). The relative 
>humidity was 76.7%. There were scattered clouds at a height of 914 meter 
>(3000 feet) and scattered clouds at a height of 1280 meter (4200 feet). The 
>visibility was >11.3 kilometers (>7 miles). Current weather is . 
>(...missing...)
>
>I can't find the problem. Can you solve it?

I have seen similar texts. For example, take the next metar:

    EHEH 231555Z 27013KT 9999 FEW018 03/01 Q0996 BLU

It doesn't specify any precipitation or other weather phenomena. Therefor, 
the $weather_str stays empty, leading to the missing text.
Maybe this should be changed to omitting the entire line ('Current weather 
is .')?

Ray



EHEH 231555Z 27013KT 9999 FEW018 03/01 Q0996 BLU



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Bug

[Rui F. <nov...@ne...>]

Dear friend,

I've found a bug in the script. When I asked the information for London, =
it came:

54 minutes ago, at 11:20 UTC, the wind was blowing at a speed of 10.3 =
meters per second (23.0 miles per hour) from West in London / Gatwick =
Airport, United Kingdom. The temperature was 13 degrees Celsius (55 =
degrees Fahrenheit), and the pressure was 1,001 hPa (29.56 inHg). The =
relative humidity was 76.7%. There were scattered clouds at a height of =
914 meter (3000 feet) and scattered clouds at a height of 1280 meter =
(4200 feet). The visibility was >11.3 kilometers (>7 miles). Current =
weather is . (...missing...)

I can't find the problem. Can you solve it?

Best regards,

Rui Fernandes

Re: Gimpster.com: Home > PHP > PHP Weather > Support

[Martin G. <gim...@gi...>]

Carsten Klapp <car...@ma...> writes:

> Hi,
> 
> PhpWeather is really cool!
> 
> I started writing a PhpWeather plugin for PhpWiki, so it can call
> PHPWeather. I have a suggestion which might make PhpWeather easier
> to include in other web sites.

Cool! I've been looking a little at the WikiWikiWeb concept and I like
it - the idea that everyone is able to correct and improve the pages
by editing them is great.
 
> In order to arbitrarily embed the output from PhpWeather at a
> specific location on the page, it would be helpful if the entire
> weather code could be wrapped up in a single function, so the user
> would only have to worry about 1 include. The function would also
> return the result as a string rather than using print to try to do
> the output itself.

Yes - you're right. It's kind of wrong that the report is output
instead of being returned as a string.
 
> Such a function could be called something like this:
> 
> <?php
> // my great php application
> $icao = "CYYZ";
> $language = 'en';
> $format = 'metar';
> $name = "Toronto Pearson Int\'l Airport / Ontario, Canada";
> 
> require_once('phpweather.inc');
> $weather = PHPWeather($icao, $format, $language, $name);
>
> //...
> 
> ?>

The above approach looks good...
 
> The whole phpweather.inc probably could be rewritten using classes
> too, but I haven't had time to delve inside the code yet, PhpWiki
> keeps me busy.

I've already rewritten PHP Weather with classes - see the code in CVS
here:

  http://sourceforge.net/cvs/?group_id=23245
 
-- 
Martin Geisler                       My GnuPG Key: 0xF7F6B57B

See my homepage at http://www.gimpster.com/ for:
PHP Weather => Shows the current weather on your webpage.
PHP Shell   => A telnet-connection (almost :-) in a PHP page.

Re: First attempt on weather icons

[Martin G. <gim...@gi...>]

"Ray van Beek" <r_v...@ho...> writes:

> Hi all!
> 
> Please check out my first (partial) attempt to iconize weather info.
> It only does the sky cover and precipitation. Wind direction is to
> come next.

I can see that it is there now - great work! I looks *really* nice.
But the links to the code (images.inc) doesn't work.
 
> Find it at: http://www.devolder.nl/cgibin/phpweather/table.php
> 
> Please forgive my php-programming. I'm sure this can be done much
> better and more efficient, but I wanted to get the thing running
> first.

That's also the approach I take when programming PHP - we can always
optimize the code later.

-- 
Martin Geisler                       My GnuPG Key: 0xF7F6B57B

See my homepage at http://www.gimpster.com/ for:
PHP Weather => Shows the current weather on your webpage.
PHP Shell   => A telnet-connection (almost :-) in a PHP page.

Re: Gimpster.com: Home > PHP > PHP Weather > Support

[Carsten K. <car...@ma...>]

Hi,

PhpWeather is really cool!

I started writing a PhpWeather plugin for PhpWiki, so it can call 
PHPWeather. I have a suggestion which might make PhpWeather easier to 
include in other web sites.

In order to arbitrarily embed the output from PhpWeather at a specific 
location on the page, it would be helpful if the entire weather code could 
be wrapped up in a single function, so the user would only have to worry 
about 1 include. The function would also return the result as a string 
rather than using print to try to do the output itself.

Such a function could be called something like this:

<?php
// my great php application
$icao = "CYYZ";
$language = 'en';
$format = 'metar';
$name = "Toronto Pearson Int\'l Airport / Ontario, Canada";

require_once('phpweather.inc');
$weather = PHPWeather($icao, $format, $language, $name);

// somewhere, deep in the web site...
printf("<table summary="Local weather via PHPWeather"><tr><td>%s</td></tr>
</table>", $weather);
?>

// inside 'phpweather.inc'...
<?php
// PHPWeather wrapper function

/**
  * This is a convenience wrapper function for PHPWeather
  */
function PHPWeather($icao, $format = 'pretty', $language = 'en', $name = '
') {

     include(sprintf('locale_%s.inc', $language));

     switch ($format) {
         case 'pretty':
		    return pretty_print_metar($icao, $format, $language, $name);
		    break;
         case 'metar':
		    return get_metar($icao);
		    break;
	}
	//...etc
}

?>

The whole phpweather.inc probably could be rewritten using classes too, 
but I haven't had time to delve inside the code yet, PhpWiki keeps me busy.

Carsten
CC: replies to <car...@ma...> (I'm not on the mailing-list).

First attempt on weather icons

[Ray v. B. <r_v...@ho...>]

Hi all!

Please check out my first (partial) attempt to iconize weather info.
It only does the sky cover and precipitation. Wind direction is to come 
next.

Find it at: http://www.devolder.nl/cgibin/phpweather/table.php

Please forgive my php-programming. I'm sure this can be done much better and 
more efficient, but I wanted to get the thing running first.

Greetz,

Ray

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Re: Iconize weather info and something else

[Martin G. <gim...@gi...>]

"Max Hammond" <ma...@fl...> writes:

>> And it would be preferable if the script could try and guess when
>> to turn if off.
> 
> get_browser() depends on browscap.ini being properly defined and
> kept up to date, and won't help with people who've disabled js.
> Since browscap does not get installed by default with PHP, I think
> we're asking for trouble by using it.

You're right - I've actually never used get_browser(), it just seamed
like a nice builtin way of detecting the browsers capabilities - until
you pointed out that it isn't a default feature.

> Sure, give people an option, but I don't think we should be using
> get_browser() at all.

Agreed. Perhaps the easiest way of doing things would be to simply
write 'Please wait... (If you have disabled JavaScript or nothing
happens, click here)' where the last part is a link to the page with
the JavaScript-thing turned off.

> This is something for application designers to worry about, whereas
> phpweather is a library rather than an application.

Very true. I've had the exact same thought about PHP Weather: it
should be regarded as a library which people can use to build all
kinds of functionality on.

I did realise this when I made the first code, and that means that the
library-functionality is mixed with the application-level code. The
code in CVS is much more separated - the class metar_parser doesn't do
anything except parsing METARs.

But the class is still rather tightly coupled with other classes -
it's probably a mistake that it is a descendant of data_retrieval, as
metar_parser isn't an improved data-retriever - it's whole other
thing. PHP Weather is my first attempt at using objects, and I wanted
the hierarchy to end with class phpweather, so that people could do
something like this:

  $weather = new phpweather(array('icao' => 'EKYT'));
  $weather->print_pretty();

It still looks nice IMHO, but it can also be done without making
phpweather a descendant of metar_parser. 

The ideal situation would be, that the core of PHP Weather is
metar_parser. One should then be able to connect the metar_parser with
different output-modules, such as: localized textual output, numeric
output, WAP output, image output and so on.

> It would make more sense IMO to start building this kind of
> functionality into the CVS tree. I think that a lot of what's in CVS
> is nearly ready for release, so we should be concentrating on making
> a release out of it, rather than tweaking the old stuff. The
> functions in CVS (eg browsing to the airport of choice) are more at
> the application level than the current releases.

I agree - I've just been afraid to do the switch, as it seams that
people are very fond of the old version. It's probably a
chicken-and-egg problem: people doesn't switch to the new version
before it's almost complete, and I don't release the new version
before people start using it... :-)

So, let's work on getting a release of the new code, so that people
can stop using the old ugly code.

-- 
Martin Geisler                       My GnuPG Key: 0xF7F6B57B

See my homepage at http://www.gimpster.com/ for:
PHP Weather => Shows the current weather on your webpage.
PHP Shell   => A telnet-connection (almost :-) in a PHP page.

RE: Iconize weather info and something else

[Max H. <ma...@fl...>]

> >> We should also be careful not to send the JavaScript to people who
> >> use older browsers - PHP has a function that can help with this
> >> (get_browser()).
> >
> > I'm not convinved that it's worth the bother. When 0.01% of people
> > are using browsers that won't understand this kind of javascript,
> > it's probably not worth it. 5 years ago, yes, you had to take into
> > account the fact that a good handful of people would be using
> > netscape 2, but even then, we were designing for the shiny new
> > Netscape 3, with all it's advanced features.
>
> Yes, but people might have javascript turned off, even in their new
> fancy browser. So, there should still be a way to get the normal
> report.
>
> > There is a reason for doing a browser-detect though, or at least
> > finding a way around the problem: some people use screen readers, or
> > parsers like betsie to present easy-to-read versions of a page. They
> > won't like javascript.
>
> I don't know betsie, but you're right: there has to be an option to
> turn this javascript-thing off. And it would be preferable if the
> script could try and guess when to turn if off.

get_browser() depends on browscap.ini being properly defined and kept up to
date, and won't help with people who've disabled js.  Since browscap does
not get installed by default with PHP, I think we're asking for trouble by
using it. Sure, give people an option, but I don't think we should be using
get_browser() at all. This is something for application designers to worry
about, whereas phpweather is a library rather than an application.

It would make more sense IMO to start building this kind of functionality
into the CVS tree. I think that a lot of what's in CVS is nearly ready for
release, so we should be concentrating on making a release out of it, rather
than tweaking the old stuff. The functions in CVS (eg browsing to the
airport of choice) are more at the application level than the current
releases.

Max