On Thursday, October 17, 2019 at 11:15:00 AM UTC-7, David VE3STI wrote:

> I have used the RPi because it is a power miser, it is small and it is 
> cheap enough to be bought new and 'dedicated' to a single purpose. 
>

Yup.  Most pi users do the same, as do people with similar tiny/low-power 
non-RTC systems (like me - I run on a Seagate Dockstar, which is 
essentially a stripped down PogoPlug).

There have been MANY discussions about weewx/pi/etc. and databases needing 
accurate time here in the past.  Almost too many to recount.

But the short 'software' solution is:

   - disable anything that tries to keep track of the software time either 
   periodically, or when you do an orderly shutdown
   - run ntpd or equivalent in your boot sequence if your system will be 
   connected to an Internet time source
   - 'test' your system's powerout behavior.   Every computer comes up at a 
   predictable date+time when it is powered on, if you do not have a RTC.   
   See what that value is.

Note: systemd (grrrrrr) 'also' seems to have something like the user-space 
'fake-hwclock' that is also in debian(ish) operating systems.  You need to 
disable systemd helping too much (grrrrrr!).

Again, do a few controlled tests.  See what time is.  Yank the power.  See 
what date+time it boots to.   Reboot the box.  See what it does 'then' re: 
date+time.   Basically baseline your system. 

Weewx shouldn't start up if the date+time of weewx.conf is newer than the 
system clock, if I remember the code correctly, so you should be safe from 
reboots.

FWIW, I do 'not' have a RTC on my Dockstar nor do I have a UPS for several 
reasons.  I 'do' have the battery in the Davis VP2 console however, so 
theoretically I should be able to run the console on battery there for a 
long long time.  I only had one power out for more than a couple minutes in 
the last 10 years I've had this in place, we were down for about 2 days, 
but the datalogger stayed ok and weewx recovered just fine for me back then 
when power came back up.

Of course your mileage might vary.  RTC is good.  RTC+UPS is better.  All 
comes down to your budget etc.

-- 
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups 
"weewx-user" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email 
to [email protected].
To view this discussion on the web visit 
https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/weewx-user/230e9226-adad-4a38-903f-f6fe48e17ed0%40googlegroups.com.

Reply via email to