Brad Eck published epanetReader which is an R package for reading water network simulation data in Epanet’s .inp and .rpt formats into R. The package code is available on GitHub and can help with analysis and visualization of the network data and simulation results. Basic function are available for reading network data from INP files and results from RPT files. Plot functions are also available.
Brian Haulman of Tahoe Design Software sent me a message that they have released a new version of HYDROFLO (a piping system design software):
We have just updated HYDROFLO to major version 3. It has many new features and tools and is faster and more accurate. HYDROFLO can now handle numerous source and discharge conditions and remains one of the easiest to use, intuitive piping system design tools available to engineers on all levels. There are new Academic versions of HYDROFLO and PumpBase that are freely available to students and educators to use for non-commercial purposes. There are also new free 15 day trial versions of our commercial products. All of our software is intensively tested for International use with Unicode and Localizations formats under all Windows versions. HYDROFLO now communicates with PumpBase supplying it with a pump’s calculated operating parameters (TDH, flow, TSH, system curve and NPSHA). PumpBase can then send back the optimal pump curves given the selection criteria and fluid type and HYDROFLO can use the curves in it’s designs.
More information on HYDROFLO web site.
A pair of water main breaks in Dallas flooded streets and impeded traffic Tuesday morning. The most recent water main break occurred at Military … …read more
The Ice Bucket Challenge is a campaign to promote awareness of the ALS disease and encourage donations to research. It involves dumping a bucket of ice water on your head and challenging others to do the same. If you are challenged and rather not get wet you can donate money for research and other ALS related activities.
I have been dared by my daughter, Anat, who took the challenge and decided also to donate some of her money. I had no choice but to take the challenge and donate too, so here it is:
I challenge three people:
Guys, you have 24 hours to take the challenge or pay (or both). Good luck.
The water main break in Richmond has shut down service to about 30 homes. A break on the 8-inch main was reported in the 3100 block of Fairmede … …read more
EPANET-Z is a modified version of EPANET which displays online maps/imagery as a background. This is a very useful tool which expands the capabilities of EPANET. The program, from Zonum Solutions, is downloaded about 30 times a month from this blog only.
It is clear that in order to fetch the background images the program must communicate with the the mapping services (Google, Yahoo and Virtual Earth) so an Internet connection is needed for the program to work. These mapping services have their privacy policies which usually nobody reads (see Google’s privacy policy for example). However, what is the privacy policy of Zonum Solutions? Well, you can find them here. This policy is about the privacy issues of the website but what about the software application like EPANET-Z?
Back in 2008, when I started to use EPANET-Z I know that some data is transferred to the mapping services but I also knew that they serve images (EPANET-Z is like a web-browser showing images) and the water distribution network is drawn in the application on-top of these images. Last week a colleague told me that EPANET-Z is not working well and there is an error message showing. When I ran the program I saw the following error message:
As can be seen in the URL field of this message, the program is accessing a web page over at Zonums server. This web page (opens in a new tab) loads the background images to the browser embedded in EPANET-Z. I guess there are some technical reasons why the program is communicating with Zonums server and not directly with the mapping services but this raises some privacy questions such as: what data is being sent to the server? what is collected? who has access to this data?
As far as I was able to check via web traffic monitoring tools, the water distribution network data is not transferred to the Internet. The program will mainly send the server the map coordinates needed to be shown. On the server side some data is being collected via Google Analytics and anther web statistics service (I think it’s by Yahoo). For those interested in browser privacy check out the Electronic Frontier Foundation’s (EFF) browser uniqueness tool.
I have communicated with the software author and was told that indeed maps communication is done through Zonum’s website since the maps services API’s key must match the developers domain. This is usually true for the free use tier. Additionally, anonymous usage statistics are collected.
As for the bug which started all this, it seems that Yahoo discontinued their map services in the previous form so the program can not load Yahoo maps. The author replaced the Yahoo maps with Bing Maps by Microsoft so now when the user selects Yahoo maps it’s actually Bing maps that are being shown.
Looking into the future, the author of EPANET-Z told be that a new version of the program is scheduled in the next few month. I recommend that a full disclosure regarding the data transfer and collection will be made.
The bottom line is that I will be continuing using the program but everyone should make their own choices.
A water main break on Central Highway has left some customers with discolored water and closed a short stretch of the road for several hours, officials … …read more
Saturday night’s game at Coors Field between the Reds and Rockies was postponed because of a water main break outside Coors Field. According to … …read more
CAPITOL HEIGHTS, Md. (WUSA9) — WSSC crews are at the scene of a water main break in Capitol Heights where they have received reports of … …read more
Guam – Late last night GWA discovered that 2 water mains had broken in Mangilao. GWA Spokeswomen Heidi Ballendorf says Wednesday’s 5.4 … …read more
