Desktop X Weather Widgets not functioning

Lost functionality

Monday, March 11, 2019 by Chasbo | Discussion: OS Customization

My DX weather widgets stopped working. This has happened before in years past. I don't know of a solution. 

First Previous Page 1 of 3 Next Last
AzDude
Reply #1 Monday, March 11, 2019 12:49 PM

Hello,

Sorry to hear you are having issues.

Desktop X is a discontinued app and wasn't supported 

in Windows 8 or 10 , and not supported anymore.

I'm running win10 so can't check it

maybe someone can chime in running Win7 who might

can help .

What version of windows are you running ?

 


AzDude
Stardock Community Assistant

 

ALMonty
Reply #2 Monday, March 11, 2019 2:39 PM

JcRabbit of Winstep reported "Yahoo also made changes to their weather feed at the end of January that broke existing applications/websites using it." I don't know if DX uses Yahoo, but I just thought I'd throw that out there.

RedneckDude
Reply #3 Tuesday, March 12, 2019 10:25 AM

Confirmed. Weather worked last week, now isn't working on Windows 10.

Yes, Mike. DesktopX isn't supported on 10, but it does work, and the weather was working a week ago.

 

Chuck, it isn't a Stardock thing, the weather feed has either been killed, or changed, by the weather feed supplier.

Chasbo
Reply #4 Tuesday, March 12, 2019 11:16 AM

RedneckDude

Chuck, it isn't a Stardock thing, the weather feed has either been killed, or changed, by the weather feed supplier.

Thanks Jim. I figured that because it's happened before.

Just when I started getting back into doing those widgets again in DX!     

RedneckDude
Reply #5 Wednesday, March 13, 2019 12:01 AM

There's always DX media players, etc...

RedneckDude
Reply #6 Wednesday, September 4, 2019 5:43 PM

For the record, I have found one weather gadget that still works!

 

https://www.wincustomize.com/explore/desktop_gadgets/45/

 

 

RedneckDude
Reply #7 Thursday, September 5, 2019 7:55 PM

Jan Oscar
Reply #8 Thursday, September 5, 2019 8:23 PM

RedneckDude

For the record, I have found one weather gadget that still works!
       

RedneckDude
Reply #9 Thursday, September 5, 2019 11:51 PM

I figured someone would want to know.  I'd make some built on the scripting for this, but it is a gadget and therefore I can't reverse engineer it.

 

I may try to reach the author, but I doubt being successful.

Vad_M
Reply #10 Friday, September 6, 2019 7:08 AM


My DX weather widgets stopped working. This has happened before in years past. I don't know of a solution.

This is because The Weather Channel has changed the rules for accessing their RSS feeds. But no one here did anything to solve this little problem... Why? Because this task requires your desire and some efforts. If there is neither one nor the other, the widgets will never work...  

So here is a solution:

Replace the TWC url in your script with one of these two lines:

"http://wxdata.weather.com/wxdata/weather/local/" & "ZIPCODE" & "QUERY"

"http://xml.weather.com/weather/local/" & "ZIPCODE" & "QUERY"

Where ZIPCODE is as a code of your location (for example for Minnesota, Eagle Bend that value is USMN0215) and the QUERY is something like this:

"?cc=*&dayf=10&unit=S" for 10 days forecast

or

"?hbhf=48&unit=S" for hourly forecast.

Finally, the right query string should look something like this::

"http://wxdata.weather.com/wxdata/weather/local/" & "USMN0215" & "?cc=*&dayf=5&unit=S"

or

"http://xml.weather.com/weather/local/" & "USMN0215" & "?hbhf=48&unit=S"

After these simple changes, any "dead" widget will come to life and begin to work as it should.

 

Chasbo
Reply #11 Friday, September 6, 2019 8:42 AM

Thanks Vad_M.  I don't have DesktopX installed on this machine. Over the weekend I'll install and play with this.   

Vad_M
Reply #12 Friday, September 6, 2019 10:07 AM

Chasbo

I don't have DesktopX installed on this machine.

By the way, I heard here that DesktopX does not work on Windows 10. I'm not sure about DX Themes (I never used them), but it still works fine for developing widgets / gadgets without any problems.

I'm on Windows 10 1803, 64 bit. DesktopX Installer: file name DesktopXPro_3.50_setup.exe, file version 9.1.1.0 (created with Setup Factory), DesktopX Builder version 3.5 (not 3.9, and even more so 4.0, which is a crap).

It was a great program, and I'm really sorry that Stardock stopped supporting it... So now I have to use Visual Studio for the same things.

RedneckDude
Reply #13 Friday, September 6, 2019 11:10 PM


By the way, I heard here that DesktopX does not work on Windows 10.
DesktopX works fine on Windows 10. I still make themes on 10.

 

I do use the unreleased 4.0 Pro.   I have tried 3.5 and nothing scripted will run.

Vad_M
Reply #14 Saturday, September 7, 2019 7:14 AM

RedneckDude

I do use the unreleased 4.0 Pro.

Hi Jim,

Where did you get this installer?  Can you post more details?

I've tried to install DesktopX_Pro_setup.exe (the file version is 9.0.2.0, SHA1 timestamp: 12 June 2011, 23:31:41) several years ago, but it was buggy...

By the way the SHA1 timestamp of my DesktopXPro_3.50_setup.exe is ‎13 ‎November ‎2013, 19:20:12. So, this installer was created much later than the previous one (which showed the version of installed DesktopX - 4.0).

RedneckDude
Reply #15 Saturday, September 7, 2019 1:06 PM


Where did you get this installer? 
I got the installer before it was sunsetted.  I was hired by Stardock to create 3 themes to be released with the release of DesktopX 4.0, which never materialized.

RedneckDude
Reply #16 Saturday, September 7, 2019 1:08 PM


By the way, I heard here that DesktopX does not work on Windows 10.
I should state that I turn off UAC. I have never tried running DesktopX with UAC on. I always disable UAC as soon as I install Windows, to me, UAC is nothing but a nuisance.

Vad_M
Reply #17 Saturday, September 7, 2019 6:12 PM

RedneckDude

I got the installer before it was sunsetted.

Thank you. I understood why DX 4.0 that I was trying to use did not work...

RedneckDude
Reply #18 Sunday, September 8, 2019 9:40 PM

I can't get this fix to work, I must be doing something wrong.

Vad_M
Reply #19 Monday, September 9, 2019 12:50 PM

RedneckDude

I can't get this fix to work

No problem! Please, post here the part of your code where the URL is used. I will fix it in a few minutes.  

RedneckDude
Reply #20 Monday, September 9, 2019 3:30 PM

Function Object_OnLButtonUp(x,y,dragged)
If dragged = False Then
x = DesktopX.ScriptObject("weather_image").location
If IsNumeric(x) = False Then x = Object.Text
x = InputBox("Please enter the zip code or location that you would like to display the weather for:" & vbNewLine & "e.g. 48152 or York,England", "Select location ...", x)
If IsNumeric(x) = False Then
Set http = CreateObject("Microsoft.XmlHttp")
Randomize
str_RANDOM_URL="&rnd=" & rnd()
http.Open "GET", "http://xml.weather.com/search/search?where=" & x, False
http.send ""
' Store data in a string
weatherdata = http.responseText
If InStr(weatherdata, "loc id") > 0 Then
weatherdata = Right(weatherdata, Len(weatherdata) - InStr(weatherdata, "loc id") - 7)
weatherdata = Left(weatherdata, InStr(weatherdata, "type") - 3)
x = weatherdata
End If
End If
If x <> "" Then
DesktopX.ScriptObject("weather_image").location = x
DesktopX.ScriptObject("weather_image").Object_OnTimer6001
End If
End If
End Function

Please login to comment and/or vote for this skin.

Welcome Guest! Please take the time to register with us.
There are many great features available to you once you register, including:

  • Richer content, access to many features that are disabled for guests like commenting on the forums and downloading skins.
  • Access to a great community, with a massive database of many, many areas of interest.
  • Access to contests & subscription offers like exclusive emails.
  • It's simple, and FREE!



web-wc01