Show HN: iOS14 weather (METAR) widgets for pilots • Hacker News Board

Re: Show HN: iOS14 weather (METAR) widgets for pilots

#11

Post by siralonso » Thu, Oct 15, 2020, 9:46 AM UTC

JCBird1012 wrote: post #4

Congrats on the new PPL! I love the app so far - but it would be amazing if the widget was location aware and could grab the METAR for the nearest reporting airport (that might be some work, but doable) Thanks again and put all that App Store proceeds to good taildragger time! ;)

Thanks! Onwards to the instrument rating.

That's a great idea RE: nearest reporting airport - I've put it on the list to explore for the next version.

Haha, roger wilco on the taildragger time.

Re: Show HN: iOS14 weather (METAR) widgets for pilots

#12

Post by siralonso » Thu, Oct 15, 2020, 9:50 AM UTC

lawrenceduk wrote: post #9

Just to be a pain... as an instrument-rated pilot could the widget have the cloud heights on it visually? Maybe the top of the widget is 5,000 feet or something.

Not a pain at all - I did explore this, but I wasn't really happy with the result - which may have been because I was trying to cram it in with the existing information. Having an alternative layout that is more cloud-centric instead of wind-centric might be the ticket. I'll see what I can do. Thanks!

Re: Show HN: iOS14 weather (METAR) widgets for pilots

#13

Post by siralonso » Thu, Oct 15, 2020, 9:53 AM UTC

dzhiurgis wrote: post #5

Not including age of information / timestamp seems risky

Good callout. I've got a feature coming to show age on the widget face, but for now you can tap the widget to view the full version, which includes the age and timestamp.

Re: Show HN: iOS14 weather (METAR) widgets for pilots

#14

Post by siralonso » Thu, Oct 15, 2020, 10:01 AM UTC

atarian wrote: post #7

Looks cool! As a non-pilot, I would be really interested in learning what this does.

Thanks! METARs [1] are standardized weather reports that pilots use to evaluate current conditions. They're often reported from stations located at airports, and include (among other things) wind direction, cloud bases, temperature/dewpoint, current altimeter setting, etc. They look like this in raw text form:

KMDS 150935Z AUTO 30009KT 10SM CLR M02/M06 A3007 RMK AO2

This app parses METARs into a visual representation, and displays it in a widget on your home screen. Useful for keeping tabs on current conditions!

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/METAR