Weather: On a Strictly Need to Know Basis | Hacker News Reader

Weather: On a Strictly Need to Know Basis

imsoocd.com

19 pointsstuartjmoore21 comments

While I like the general point of the article (just tell me what I care about), there are those of us for which the particular example doesn't exactly work. I walk ~ 3 miles a day to and from work in Chicago. I have a thermometer outside which has a digital display inside of both the temperature and a digital "weather boy" whose clothing indicates how to dress. I check this every (winter) morning. The weather boy is ok, but is not nearly specific enough: a few degrees in either way can easily mean replacing a sweatershirt layer with something warmer, adding a scarf, wearing long underwear, etc. At this point, the pure number is far more important to me than any cute graphic could be.

I'm with you on wanting the full info. Though to be fair, you also really need to know humidity and wind to make the decision.

What if the weather forecast is usually wrong? I live in a coastal area where the weather is forecasted over a hundred miles away on the mainland which is typically wrong (despite local instruments).

Would be cool if the app allowed you to adjust for your own sense of what the weather will be. For example the forecast today was for snow, but out here on the water all we got is rain which is typical. Would be nice to be able to skew forecasts based on your own crazy formulas.

this is why i made http://goingtorain.com years ago because i rarely care what the exact temperature is going to be, just whether it's going to rain.

similarly, i made a clock called pixelclock (http://jcs.org/notaweblog/2005/06/28/pixelclock/) because all i cared about at work was whether it was time for lunch or time to go home.

sometimes things are better left vague.

OT - I linked to goingtorain in one of my newsletters [1] last year, and every now and then I still have people mention that they continue to use it. Thanks muchly!

[1] http://www.shirlawsonline.com/blogs/278-wet-season

http://umbrellatoday.com/ is similar and you can get text messages in the morning when rain is forcasted.

I don’t need to see numbers [data], I need to see clothes [information]. Do I watch out for ice, or can I be the care-free, reckless driver I always am? Do I bring an umbrella? How many or few layer do I need? These are the things I want to know. ∞

Or maybe, rather than 10 pieces of information which may or may not be right or complete, I can just get 2 pieces of data and draw my own conclusions.

I understand the general point of the post (I think), but this example just doesn't do it for me. It bugs me for a number of reasons:

- can it ever be always right, or at least right more often than I am? What if I'm sick and need to bundle up more - do I have to give it health updates? What if it's the first sunny, warm day after a long period of cold days, and I FEEL like running around in a t-shirt? I still have to make these decisions myself, but now I no longer have accurate raw data.

- it assumes that every time I go outside it's for the same purpose (probably going to work?) That makes me sad.

- it triggers my mistrust of making things too easy. Oh, what a wonderful world where none of us know what 60 degrees means (or 15, for us Celsius fans), and where we have to depend on a computer to tell us how to dress.

Skeptical of the premise that temperature and weather is not worth the bother to learn. We learn this stuff so we may effectively communicate with others. Someone who was reliant on this app to tell them to wear a sweater would not be able to function in these two common situations:

"Did you hear it'll be in the 60's and sunny tomorrow? Nice change after this week of temps in the teens, huh?"

"This is your pilot speaking. Weather at our destination is forecast to be in the lower 40's with scattered showers."

It also fails if I might be going to work by car, or might be biking. Chance of rain is 30% -- I'd not worry about an umbrella in the car -- but if I'm biking to work, I would want to make sure to have rain gear in the panniers. The exact percentage, plus how I'm traveling, and where I'm going, all factor into what I wear, and an app can't know.

What I would like to see is a UI that packs more weather info, ideally hourly forecasts, into a small, easily scanned space.

Well, since we're all piling on with our clean, simple, straight-to-the-point weather websites, I'll give the one I use.

http://thefuckingweather.com/

It reminds me of Ollie from Family Guy.

My favorite: "It's fucking cold!"

A friend of mine is doing some interesting things -- mostly for women right now -- very similar to this: http://www.theweatherstylist.com

Counterpoint: If you want more information, in the USA (or at least parts of it) you can see your tax dollars at work with NOAA's weather graphs, like this: http://forecast.weather.gov/MapClick.php?textField1=42.9612&...

Just in case you want to know things like "will it probably start raining before 3pm" or "how windy will it be at 6:30pm".

http://www.theweatherstylist.com will make sure you are stylishly prepared for the weather heading your way!

http://obama-weather.com/ also started out as a weekend project, but looks pretty usable now.

A guy from the UK created a site that now works worldwide, although I'm not sure if it's as important for a lot of people ;-)

http://isitgoingtoraintoday.com/

well, it's easy in the UK, you basically accomplish it with "<h1>Yes</h1>" ;)

This is a great idea and will make for a fun weekend project. Thanks for the idea.

Another site along the same lines (though it could do with a major tidy up)

http://www.doineedajacket.com/dinaj.asp?dinaj=EICK

    Microsoft VBScript runtime  error '800a01a8'

    Object required: 'oC'

    /dinaj_referer.asp, line 225

i can't tell, is it saying the object is the jacket and it's required?

This would be really useful, especially it it learned your habits over time.

Well when I was a kid I used to always say "Hey why do I have to wipe my own ass." and now theres a app for that! Gods sake open a window and look outside!

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