PYKL# on new Samsung phone

[Tom Mull]

I recently got a newer Samsung phone and they were able to move PYKL3 over. I know PYKL3 is no longer supported.

When I try to run PYKL3, I get "Your device is not properly opening the GIS SQL database. Please reboot your device and try again." When I reboot, I have the same issue.

If I tap OK I get "Error. Detected error in GIS database. Please restart program and data file will be downloaded again."

If I tap OK. I get "Map Download progress 100.0. Initializing". But it never seems to finish initializing.

Anyone have any idea how to fix this problem? Thanks.

Tom

 

[Terry Leonard]

Same problem. It works on my samsung galaxy tablet but not zfold 4. Weird. Great app
It worked on note 20 ultra last summer

 

[Joe Olson]

I've got the same problem. I'm wondering if anyone found a solution?

 

[James K]

I have a Samsung smartphone..
Mostly use my tablet for weather/radar (with the 'wX' app (but I also did put it on my phone for those occasional times..))

I had PYKL3 on an older tablet, maybe I'll try it on the phone just out of curiosity.

 

[James K]

Tried it on my phone, and get the same error as you guys
I think it has something to do with the mapping functionality?? .. either its not actually getting the downloads/info, or something in Android is preventing access to its files.

I was going to test and see if it still works on the old tablet, but I can't even get that to turn on tonight

(if it did work there, I was also gonna look & see if both devices are attempting connections to the same servers.)

 

[James K]

Ok, so I figured out why my old tablet wouldn't turn on...the cord I had it plugged into wasn't providing power (tried another & let it fully charge, now it powers up just fine)
I played with the app a little bit more tonight.

That issue fixed, I could do the 'test' I wanted to!

I tried running PYKL3, and it still loads and appears to run fine, but: radar for my default location shows an old image, and won't update.
If I try to select a different location it goes to that spot, and at the bottom it says "Map Download progress 100.0", but never loads the map/radar.
So I'm guessing that there is something it's looking for on the net that no longer exists.

The other thing I wanted to do was compare (attempted) connections between the 2 devices:
(can only see if a connection was attempted, and wheather or not that attempt was network blocked or allowed (all were allowed))

On the old Acer tablet, these connections I believe are all for PYKL3 (some are done more than once)
www .pykl3radar.com
radar .weather.gov
data .caprockweather.com
tgftp .nws.noaa.gov
pykl3radar .com
pykl3 .allisonhouse.com
www .spotternetwork.org

On the Samsung phone, its these connections.
pykl3radar .com
data .caprockweather.com
radar .weather.gov
tgftp .nws.noaa.gov
www .pykl3radar.com
pykl3 .allisonhouse.com
www .spotternetwork.org

So doesn't look like the phone is blocking any outgoing connections.

When loading on the phone, I also noticed, it blinks an error real quick about...
Invalid package name:
com.MyPYK.Radar.Full This error may
also indicate that you have not signed into
Google Play

And if I long-press where the map/radar would be, I get this:
Error
Program has thus far been unable
to download required supplemental
files. Please ensure network
connectivity exists before restarting.

---
So, I know as much as its trying to make outgoing connections, but wheather or not its actually connecting and finding the file(s) it needs, I can't say..
Oh, and I tested those sites it makes connections to, they all exist (but I can only see the server, not full URL on connection attempts)
www .pykl3radar.com (is ofcourse the PYKL3 website)
radar .weather.gov (NWS radar)
data .caprockweather.com (blank page that only says "CaprockWeather Data Server (Bratsk)")
tgftp .nws.noaa.gov (has multiple sub-directories some of which contain files)
pykl3radar .com (same as the 'www' version)
pykl3 .allisonhouse.com (asks for username & password . I've never had an account there, so don't know what's on it)
www .spotternetwork.org (is ofcourse the Spotter Network website)

-----------
Maybe some of that will be helpful to someone if trying to figure out the issue??

 

[Joe Olson]

Thanks for the work on this James. I believe when you first run Pykl3 on a new install it goes out and grabs all the files that it needs -- including the map data that it is then, subsequently, unable to load. As you note, the connections seem to work and the files download. After download, if I look in the Pykl3Radar/database directory I see a file named gissql.corrupt. I don't know if that is supposed to be there or if it indicates that somehow the needed file is being corrupted. Either way, I don't know a next step from there.

The only discernible difference between my previous install on a Samsung S10 where it worked fine and my current install on a Samsung S23 is the version of Android (11 vs. 13). I keep thinking there is some security setting in version 13 that is preventing Pykl3 from opening the GIS SQL database. But I have not found anything yet. I'm going to keep messing with it though. If I figure it out I will post it here. Curious what versions of android you are running where it does/does not work.

 

[James K]

@Joe Olson:
Welcome.

Phone is Android 10
Tablet old is Android 4

I copied the full 'Pykl3Radar' directory off both my tablet & phone onto my computer.
The 'gissql.corrupt' file you mentioned, that's in the stuff of my phone as well.
On the tablet, it has a 'gissql' that's allot bigger 8mb vs 1kb

..so I had a look at them in notepad:
gissql is data of some sort.
gissql.corrupt is actually a HTML file
(I stripped out the codes so it appears as plain text here)
301 Moved Permanently
Moved Permanently
The document has moved [] https :// pykl3radar. com/GIS_0f/gissql [] here

I didn't go through everything, but looking at a few other files from the phone, they all have a similar thing - HTML files with a moved link.
Where on the tablet they are 'real'

I believe there's the problem, looks like they moved stuff on their server (this would also explain why it loads but won't update radar images on the tablet)
Out of curiosity I went to the given URL in my browser and was able to download the file just fine (has a 8mb size too).

One interesting thing I noticed is most of the files on the tablet have a 2009 date. I didn't even own that tablet in 2009, and didn't put Pykl3 on it til probably 2020 or so. (everything on the phone is 2023)

 

[James K]

In the 'logs' sub-directory, there is a "pykl3.log" which is a plain text file:
Looking through that, there is a whole list of: "(WarningPlotter) Exception thrown ..." errors at the bottom (from both phone & tablet)

The 'Pykl3Radar' directory looks like its just the app's data directory, I don't see a way to get to the actual apps directory itself (have a feeling that's one of those things you'd need to root your device for)

 

[Joe Olson]

> Out of curiosity I went to the given URL in my browser and was able to download the file just fine (has a 8mb size too).

James, what URL are you referring too? I wonder if I can grab the files and put them on my phone manually if that would work?

 

[James K]

@Joe Olson:
In this case I was referring to the "data" with in the gissql.corrupt file, its just HTML code with a link that goes to this URL:
pykl3radar.com/GIS_0f/gissql
(clicking that should allow you to download)

It looks like most of the files have this type of thing... HTML with a link rather than the actual data they should contain.
It might actually work to go through and grab the files & put them on your phone. But it'd take awhile since there's quite a few & you have to do them one at a time.

(I'm half tempted to take the old files from my tablet & put them on the phone (then grab the last few bad ones from the internal URL's)) just to see what happens. lol.

 

[Tom Mull]

I recently got a newer Samsung phone and they were able to move PYKL3 over. I know PYKL3 is no longer supported.

When I try to run PYKL3, I get "Your device is not properly opening the GIS SQL database. Please reboot your device and try again." When I reboot, I have the same issue.

If I tap OK I get "Error. Detected error in GIS database. Please restart program and data file will be downloaded again."

If I tap OK. I get "Map Download progress 100.0. Initializing". But it never seems to finish initializing.

Anyone have any idea how to fix this problem? Thanks.

Tom

I went back to the place I got the phone to see if they could get PYKL3 working. They said the newer phones have newer technology, and since PYKL3 is no longer supported and updated, it won't work on newer phones.

 

[Jason Boggs]

Drop your money and get Radar Omega. It's just as good or better than pykl3.

 

[James K]

I went back to the place I got the phone to see if they could get PYKL3 working. They said the newer phones have newer technology, and since PYKL3 is no longer supported and updated, it won't work on newer phones.

Makes sense, though I'm sure someone who "truly knew their stuff" could make it work. .lol.
Unfortunately I think unless someone was to take over the original project & revamp the code, PYKL3 is done for.
---
Any of that would be beyond my skills, but I was going to play with it a bit for fun/curiosity just to see if I could get anything at all to work,
Simply haven't had time.

 

[Mark Gressman Jr]

I don't know if this is of any help to you guys, but I ran across this post a while back.

Great pykl3 replacement for me

I hope this is okay. since the pykl3's shutdown and death. I decided to write my own radar app but I ended up found wX app and decided to mod it big time and added in so many features found in pykl3/radarscope/other radar apps. personally, I do not need AH or any other paid services to see...

stormtrack.org

I haven't tried it myself so I can't comment on it.

 

[Tom Mull]

I don't know if this is of any help to you guys, but I ran across this post a while back.

Great pykl3 replacement for me

I hope this is okay. since the pykl3's shutdown and death. I decided to write my own radar app but I ended up found wX app and decided to mod it big time and added in so many features found in pykl3/radarscope/other radar apps. personally, I do not need AH or any other paid services to see...

stormtrack.org

I haven't tried it myself so I can't comment on it.

I have wX. It is not as robust as PYKL3.

 

[Mark Gressman Jr]

I believe that thread is about a user who rewrote the code for wX, and turned it into something similar to Pykl3. I haven't used Pykl3, or tried the modified version of wX to know if it's worthwhile though.

I use Radarscope for radar, and wX for everything else when it comes to mobile weather. Gonna be purchasing GRAE for the laptop shortly, although there is another product called WSV3 that I'm still considering. Unless you can find someone with coding experience to dig into the Pykl3 issues, the best you can do is keep trying to run it, and hope someone gets it up and running.

For what it's worth, the Radar Omega suggestion seems good too. There are few apps out there that have mostly the same features for a price... but again, I don't know how they stack up against the features Pykl3 had, or what your requirements are. Sorry I couldn't be of more help.

 

[James K]

I believe that thread is about a user who rewrote the code for wX, and turned it into something similar to Pykl3. I haven't used Pykl3, or tried the modified version of wX to know if it's worthwhile though.

I've used the modified wX.
I used to have it on my tablet, but over time the various functions of it slowly quit working...I eventually had to give up & instead install the standard version instead.
There were a couple features it had that I preferred over the standard version, but overall its basically the same.

 

[James K]

Ok..
I played around with it today, and definitely believe someone who knew what they were doing could make it work.
I think the maps issue truly is the file/data locations where its looking have changed, rather than "it won't work on modern devices" . (that would have to be updated in the code - something I obviously don't have access to .lol. (I'm not a coder, but if it was just a matter of updating URLs or something simple in the code I could do that))

Fact is, while not useable in its current state, it can still show radar (this screenshot was just taken from the storms tonight, on a fairly new Samsung phone)
(the SPC outlooks part still works too)