vB Weather Mk. 2
 

This is a post of a much-revised hack originally posted (by myself) here. I am posting this as a new hack because MSNBC, who the raw weather data is provided through, has changed their source provider (from AccuWeather to The Weather Channel), which required a retooling of the data parsing code, as well as completely new databases. I have also made obsolete the weather_functions.php file, moving the functions to admin/functions.php, simplifying the ability to show current weather data on any page (if desired). Finally, in what I'm sure will be welcome news to many people who have installed the original, I've completely rewritten the instructions, making them, as far as I can tell, much simpler. :)

If you are unfamiliar with the original: This hack provides current weather conditions and a five-day forecast to your members. Each member can select from over 34,000 cities, by narrowing down from region (like continents), country, and subdivision (like states). Each member can also select to see temperatures in Fahrenheit or Celsius, as well as metric or standard measurements for the other data.

A demo is available on my test board: http://www.jjr512.com/testboard/. I have set up an account for anyone to use to test it out (username: test; pw: test). If you are not logged in, you will see default weather on the home page (default is set to New York City), and cannot change settings (I forget if you can view a detailed forecast, though; you may be able to). If you do log in, you can change the settings for the test account, to see how it works.

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If you have installed any previous version, you should completely uninstall it. Read the instructions and work backwards from there: Delete all templates added, remove changes to any existing templates (I forget if there were any or not), delete all new tables from the database, delete all new files added by the old hack. All have been changed to some extent, some more than others, and it would be easier to work from a clean slate. Especially since some of the template names have changes, so if you don't delete the old ones, they'll just be sitting there doing nothing at all. It is also vitally important to delete (or "drop") the tables--I believe there were six--you added for the original version. The new ones have different data and, for some, a different structure, so do not just empty them. Remove them totally.

Good luck! :)

Change Log
v1.1a: Current Version: Corrects a small error where an incorrect variable was used in the code to show the local time of the last update. If you already have v1.1, you only need to do the fix described in Post #82 below.
v1.1: Changes display of last update time to be the correct time in the user's own local time zone; previously, it was always Eastern Time (GMT-5) (Upgrade instructions are in Post #79 below). Also breaks the weather_city.sql into six smaller pieces (useful only to new installations; existing installations need not worry about this).
v1.0a: Adds instructions on how to add location to current weather on forums home page (changes to code added to index.php and forumhome_weather template).
v1.0: Original Release

Thank you, sir. I will get it up and test it. There is no Des Moines, Iowa listed now. Did you forget the capital of Iowa? :)

And is there any easy way to drop the tables with just a query or two?

Des Moines is there. It's between Derby and Dewar. :)

You can drop a table with a query. I believe the syntax is: DROP TABLE tablename;.

Hi, jj, your instructions state in the beginning:

I cannot find weather.php in your zipped file anywhere.

dood, this has gotta be one of the SICKEST hacks in recent days!!
ooooooooooh, I cannot WAIT to install it!
YOU EVEN HAVE New Westminster as a location in Canada!!

JJR512 sick man, SICK! :)

Is it me, or is weather.php in the zip, but I cannot see it? :) I assume we can't use the old weather.php from version 3b.

thats what im going to try :D

JJR512 would it be too much trouble to make say.. 3 preset weather locals (ie. Vancouver, Seattle, Toronto) and even if the user hasnt selected any of them for their own use, they could click a link to take them to that places weather?

JJ stated that he has changed all the variables, so I doubt that the old weather.php file works, since it's used for the 5-day forecast. But let me know if it does work. :)

This hack is useless until he adds the new weather.php file to the zip file