Show HN: Sundial – a new way to look at a weather forecast

by izaidi • 4 months ago

66 26 4 months ago

allears• 4 months ago

Nice display, but the forecast doesn't agree with NOAA.

izaidi• 4 months ago

The data's from Google (via their new WeatherNext 2 model) -- as I understand it they get their raw data from NOAA/NWS but their forecasting model is different. I'll see about using the NWS API for US locations.

Leftium• 4 months ago

https://open-meteo.com API is pretty good for weather forecasts, too.

david1-618• 4 months ago

This is fun to look at.

DanDeBugger• 4 months ago

Very cool and sick. Visually awesome and creative. Though the practicality of this spinning thing I wonder vs just the weather app.

Finnoid• 4 months ago

Very neat! I like that I get a better “feel” of the whole day’s weather from the ring than most weather apps.

But it takes a bit more thinking and interaction to understand how the weather develops. For example, I like to see how the temperature changes during the day and for that, I find a graph illustrates the hourly changes better than just numbers and colors, but the information is obviously available here too. Just requires but more thinking from the user.

Are you thinking adding other things like humidity and wind? If so, would you try to fit more information to the dial or add some popups or something else?

Unai• 4 months ago

Pretty cool idea and execution. This is the first weather app I can see myself using instead of whatever my phone or google puts in front of me; but I often need more data, mostly humidity and wind speed and direction. Also rain seems to be a boolean, but precipitation percentages would be much more clear.

Having both the dial and the more common horizontal table / graph would make it the perfect weather app for me. Maybe those could be integrated into the dial, like wavy rings?

In any case, nicely done!

cousinbryce• 4 months ago

This is great. Showing only even hours would be less text, maybe as an option. As I’m looking at it to plan late night activities it shows this mornings forecast where I kind of expect tomorrow’s. Maybe make a continual S curve that can be scrolled by touch? Maybe less elegant, maybe more?

adammarples• 4 months ago

Dates would be nice I got lost

manishfoodtechs• 4 months ago

In one word: WONDERFUL

1attice• 4 months ago

I love this, thanks! Using it reminds me of iPod, what with the rotary navigation of time

hbcondo714• 4 months ago

Nice! Great use of the mouse's scroll wheel to rotate the dial.

tzs• 4 months ago

Interesting. Looks like it is not taking into account DST in the US. The time shown for Seattle and New York for example is the non-DST time.

fanioz• 4 months ago

very nice and immersive

as1as• 4 months ago

That's a great design, I don't think the sunset time is accurate, do you have any plans to apply it?

thiscaspar• 4 months ago

Bookmarked, such a refreshing view at the weather.

For me, this simple version is enough 80% of the time, if i ever need more details i'll find the usual sources.

kseistrup• 4 months ago

I like the design end the concept. I would like to be able to choose 24h times, though – we don't use am/pm around here.

bdbdbdb• 4 months ago

I absolutely love this, it's beautiful. Kudos for the truly original ideas here in the UI. I love to see radial design patterns - everything is boring grids and rows and columns

world2vec• 4 months ago

Very pretty. Would be cool if the Moon followed the real Moon phases (if the sky is clear enough to see it). For example April 2nd is full moon and the sky is clear so the Moon in your Sundial should be full too.

kraftaa• 4 months ago

neat! and very visual, easier to see the weather by time, would love if such widget would be available for the mobile devices.

PayToExist• 4 months ago

This is beautiful! This would be great as widget or an app. Add 24h time for us non americans ;)

leawi• 4 months ago

I love this! Both creative and practical, in my opinion. Perhaps additional information (humidity, UV levels, etc.) could be optionally added as additional color-coded rings with numbers, like the temperature?

SkyGuard_Lead• 4 months ago

You nailed it with this! It is all dialed in (pun intended) and all elements display beautifully and in a natural way. Very well done!

iJohnDoe• 4 months ago

Surprisingly cool. Didn't know what to expect.

kozi93• 4 months ago

I love the design. Tried putting in my postcode and it got stuck in a loop, but worked after a refresh :)

BrandoElFollito• 4 months ago

This is very nice and a good idea, but it is different from how I think about the weather.

I have a dashboard at home that is predictible: linear, it starts at 8 in the morning, gives the weather every 3 hours until 22, then again at 8 the next day, with two data points across the day. Hours that are gone dissapear, but their slit stays.

The rationale is that weather estimation is vague and I need a general trend across that day (I take the mean around these 3 hour slots). I fon't care about the night. I loosely care about the general status for tomorrow.

The fact that the general timeline is static means that one can develop memory muscle to know what happens when.

I am always looking for ways to improve the visual but did not find do far better than this linear (visually), non-linear (time) representation

Show HN: Sundial – a new way to look at a weather forecast

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