Ok for some time now I’ve been working to make weather available on the background of your computer.  NO MATTER what version of Microsoft’s OS you were using.  Unfortunately, the method to do it with Windows 7 was a very nasty and troublesome method.  I did post how I was able to do it in a previous link.

Since then I’ve continued working on scripting and searching for programs that could be used to support this.  Well I’ve boiled it down to a few Batch files and a couple executable files that I’ll be posting, very shortly.  This is by NO MEANS the final version of attempt at this project.  My hope and desire will be to compile all of this into ONE executable that could be started via an Icon or as a Startup item.

  1. Click the link to Download the WeatherBackground 1.0 zip archive.
  2. Unpack zip archive to your hard drive where you want to store it.  It should create a directory called weather that you will find the following files in.  Location.ini, Pause2.bat, Wallpaperchanger.exe, WeatherBackground.bat, wget.exe
  3. Edit Location.ini with any text editor and place the web address of the Image you want to place on your desktop.  This package is defaulted to the accuweather address for my region of Oklahoma.  You can do a bit of nosing around on websites and find many weather images that you can poll to your desktop.  Just replace the URL in this file with what you want.
  4. Now Edit WeatherBackground.bat with any text editor.  Near the bottom you will see pause2 /M:5 this is the timer that the routine follows for the updates.  I would HIGHLY RECOMMEND TO NOT MAKE THIS LESS THAN 5 MINUTES.  Doing so will get you banned from the sites and block you from obtaining updates.
  5. Click on WeatherBackground.bat and sit back and watch the weather maps come in.  Many locations do releases in 15 minute increments.