Hacker News Reader

Comment by lbhnact | Hacker News Reader

weather.gov/5digitzip will take you straight to what you want and is just about as easy as an app for most folks.

Using well-designed government services feels like a good habit these days.

Try it on your desktop or mobile browser, easy as pie: http://weather.gov/10018

Checking the same zip code with weather.gov and weather.com yielded 122KB / 1.6s (weather.gov) and 1.1MB / 18s (weather.com).

So we entered the era where government sites are lightweight and responsive while commercial sites are bloated and slow.

In my experience government sites aren't usually slow or bloated, they just look shitty.

I wouldn't call "shitty" something with a nice layout and readability. "Not trendy" – yes.

I wouldn't call the stereotypical government site a "nice layout". It seems like more often than not my experience with government sites is that I have no idea how to find the data I need.

Try finding a campground in Washington in the early spring. Is it open? Do they take reservations? Are they required? Good luck.

Agreed that trendy and usable are unrelated.

I've used https://www.recreation.gov/

> I wouldn't call "shitty" something with a nice layout and readability.

Yeah, me neither.

Even better, get a custom two-day chart as a 26KB PNG:

http://forecast.weather.gov/MapClick.php?lat=33&lon=-84&Fcst...

Any way to narrow down the location further than the zip code? My zip code covers a large area touching the ocean, there's a dramatic weather difference between the coast and 5 miles inland.

From a command-line, try:

  $ curl http://wttr.in/5digitzip

(NB: SSL/TLS is enabled, w/ a self-signed certificate, so you can also use `curl -k https://`)

The REST API, https://graphical.weather.gov/xml/rest.php

I'm a huge fan of the "Hourly Weather Forecast" linked from that page; I just bookmark it. Everything I need.

http://forecast.weather.gov/MapClick.php?lat=40.7198&lon=-73...

I use the same page -- well, the same graphs -- a few times a day (usually when trying to decide whether to ride the Harley or drive the truck). I can find out everything I want to know in just a few seconds.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com