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Named Cumulus Packages and Why the Binaries Stay Offline

Catalog of named Cumulus packages—graphs, banners, logs, checks, dayfile, WAP—and why this host describes each job instead of rehosting ZIPs.

Back to Cumulus weather software guides

The /projects/downloads path on the Cumulus host was a catalog of named packages: a server check, a JPGraph graph pack, GD banners and avatars, a realtime log, a dayfile parser, WAP, web tags, RSS, and related helpers. Each name marked a job against Cumulus files. This article keeps the catalog as documentation. It does not attach ZIP files, tracker links, or recovered PHP.

That choice is the difference between this URL and /projects/downloads on tnetweather.com. The main-host page is a provenance essay: license, version, hash, source, and why unlabeled archives fail. This page is the Cumulus-side list of what each package was for. Both refuse to be software mirrors. They refuse for the same rights reason and they teach different lessons.

Modern TNET Weather does not distribute these binaries and does not maintain Cumulus.

Historical context

Community Cumulus sites needed PHP that understood realtime.txt, dayfile.txt, or processed web tags. The historical TNET Cumulus project page listed those helpers with versions and download links. The Cumulus Wiki TNET Cumulus Scripts page still enumerates the family (last checked 13 August 2026). After the original project pages went offline, Saratoga Weather’s legacy scripts continued to list a subset—CU-dayfile parser, CU-GD-banner, CU-GD-avatar, CU-jpgraph-graphs—under Saratoga’s own notices (last checked 13 August 2026). The Wiki marks those four with a note that they survived there.

A catalog that only said “download” aged into a broken button. A catalog that says what the package consumed and emitted still works as a research object. That is the job of this URL now.

The named packages

The following names are historical identifiers. Descriptions are functional. They are not install guides and not a promise that a file on some other site matches the bytes that once sat here.

Cumulus Server Check

A heartbeat for the website, not for the climate. It asked whether Cumulus uploads (realtime.txt or other web files) had actually arrived and whether the packet clock was still moving. A silent FTP failure leaves a page that looks live. The deep note is checking that Cumulus uploads arrived.

Cumulus JpGraph Graphs Package

Server-side PNGs of temperature, pressure, rain, and related traces, drawn with JpGraph. The pack needed a series, usually a homemade log of realtime.txt snapshots. The deep note is plotting Cumulus observations with JPGraph.

Cumulus PHP-GD Banner, Avatar, and Thermometer

Identity images: given a current packet, draw a small PNG a forum or sidebar can hot-link. The engineering is GD or TrueType availability, unit labels from the packet, and cache headers. Child URLs on this host keep those names. This catalog only records the job: derived graphics from an observed line.

Cumulus RealTimeLog Script

Append a timestamped copy of realtime.txt on a schedule so a later graph or analysis has more than one line. Interval versus file growth is the tradeoff. See accumulating realtime snapshots. Rotation and retention are a different package-shaped problem at log rotation.

PHP (No Database) Dayfile.txt Parser

Read dayfile.txt—one row per day of max, min, rain, and related fields—and emit a climatological table without a SQL server. Provenance for monthly summaries lives in the dayfile, not in noon screenshots. See dayfile as a daily climate appendix.

Cumulus WAP Dynamic Page

A constrained viewport: emit a tiny deck from the current packet for phones that handled WML better than a full HTML site. Historically interesting as bandwidth design. The named child path remains /projects/wap.

Cumulus TNET Webtags Include Script

Expose processed web-tag values as a PHP include so templates on the host can print numbers without asking Cumulus to rebuild every page. The contract is snapshot-at-process-time. MX documents current tags on the Webtags wiki page.

Cumulus RSS Feed

A machine-readable snapshot of current conditions. Useful only with timestamps, units, and a stated update interval. An RSS item without a clock is a rumour.

Cumulus GetMetar Include Script

Pull an aviation METAR for comparison or display. A METAR is an official aerodrome observation code. A PWS packet is not. Combining them on one page requires labels. This catalog does not treat a METAR include as a Cumulus internal.

Cookie-notice helper (EU cookie)

A documentation wrapper for sites that set preference cookies (units, language) while European cookie rules asked operators to explain storage on the visitor’s machine. Engineering tension, not legal advice: cookie consent on personal weather sites.

Other names appeared on neighboring reference paths (wiki notes, RSS variants, gallery samples). If a name is not in this list, treat it as unverified until a child URL or an independent catalog such as the Wiki page supports it. Do not invent packages to fill a table.

Why the binaries are not rehosted

Acquisition of a domain does not transfer copyright in Cumulus, in JpGraph, in GD-using PHP, or in community scripts. Wayback captures are evidence of what once ran, not a grant to ship it again.

Several independent facts have to be true before a responsible host attaches a file: a license that permits redistribution, a version that identifies the release, a source that is not “found on a weather site,” and integrity that a later hash can check. The main-host downloads article is the checklist for those facts. This Cumulus catalog adds a fifth: stack identity. A ZIP labeled only “graphs” might be Weather Display sparklines, MX JSON charts, or the 2008 JpGraph pack. Serving the wrong bytes at a Cumulus URL would be a provenance failure even if the license were clear.

Unclear rights are the normal state of recovered forum attachments. Unclear means describe the job and point operators to living upstream or to official software. It does not mean “post the ZIP for backup.”

PHP that interpolates request parameters, writes cache directories, or renders images from unsanitized paths is also a security object. An old graph pack can be a useful figure and still be a poor thing to execute on a public host in 2026.

Where to get software you can actually run

  • Cumulus / Cumulus MX: current behavior and downloads from the maintainers, documented on the Cumulus Wiki and MX GitHub (last checked 13 August 2026). TNET is not that channel.
  • JpGraph: from jpgraph.net, under that project’s terms.
  • Surviving TNET-named Cumulus scripts: Saratoga’s legacy page currently lists four, with an explicit use-at-your-own-risk notice. That is Saratoga’s archive, not a TNET mirror.
  • Rewrite: if you need the function and the grant is missing, write new code against the current file contract.

This hostname’s /projects/downloads URL stays a catalog so incoming Wiki and forum links still resolve to the names they meant.

Practical reading of an old download list

  1. Match the package name to a file contract (realtime.txt, dayfile.txt, web tags, METAR).
  2. Note the Cumulus flavour the name implied (legacy Cumulus 1 versus later MX). A 2008 pack does not automatically read MX JSON.
  3. Look for a license in the copy you already have, not on this page.
  4. Ignore click-tracker URLs and download counters. They are not measurements.
  5. If you only need to understand the workflow, stop here. The child articles exist for that.

TNET research bridge

A named package is a claim about an instrument chain: which file, which version, which output. TNET’s data sources, quality controls, and methodology note is the modern place that kind of claim is treated for public records used in connection research. This catalog does not attach those records, and that research page does not ship PHP.

The projects map groups the same names as engineering problems. The subdomain homepage explains why the catalog lived on a Cumulus host. The Cumulus legacy hub lists related pages.

Sources