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Eulogy for Dark Sky, a data visualization masterpiece (2023)

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171–180 of 187 posts

Re: Eulogy for Dark Sky, a data visualization masterpiece (2023)

#171

After darksky was shutdown I ended up using, https://www.yr.no/en . I've not seen it recommended here before and thought someone might enjoy it

For the ones who might be interested, Yr.no uses the ECMWF (European weather model) as their main data source. This model scores the best on benchmarks of the global weather models (available for the whole world), but AI models are catching up on some parameters. Still, there are local weather models available with a much higher resolution (these are regional and only have forecasts up to a couple days). Examples are…

I like graphs that compare various models, that gives you information on the confidence of the prediction, depending on how well they agree. For example https://www.wetterdienst.de/Deutschlandwetter/Berlin/Vorhers...

https://kachelmannwetter.com/ has data from dozens of models, but only in separate maps I think.

Re: Eulogy for Dark Sky, a data visualization masterpiece (2023)

#173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know that this is shameless self-promotion, but maybe this could interest you: https://sunsethue.com/ :)

Nice to see how much you've developed Sunsethue over the last two years! I remember I built myself some custom alert logic back with your API even before the public launch :) A year and a half or something later.. I recently started a project of my own trying to bring all "weather dependent" photo opportunities together in one place, if you wouldn't mind I would be happy to experiment with bringing Sunsethue data to…

Wow, looks like a very cool project! Feel free to experiment with the Sunsethue API! Send me an email if you'd need a higher quota to play around with.

Re: Eulogy for Dark Sky, a data visualization masterpiece (2023)

#174
post #163

Looking at the screenshots, Dark Sky does something bad that I think most other weather apps do badly as well. Specifically: each day has a range (low and high) but it's not clear whether the low is for the morning or evening, and they could be vastly different. You could have 10-15 one day then 0-10 the next day, and think "Ok, I'll go out tonight and bring a jacket but no hat since the lowest it'll get today is 10…

Hey, developer of a iOS App here. I created Pyxis (https://apps.apple.com/us/app/id6639617144) . The app is a location saving app but it also has weather forecast features.

I think the hourly forecast I created shows what you might be looking for. It shows the highs and lows by the hour.

I hope that solves the problem for you.

Re: Eulogy for Dark Sky, a data visualization masterpiece (2023)

#175

Fortunately someone recreated a clone at https://merrysky.net , which was featured [1] on HN some time ago. I've used it daily since. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34155191

Thanks for the mention! I'm the author of merrysky. Opened to feedback. What would you say you miss the most?

Dataviz suggestions from top of the page to the bottom:

- Location search & display: no English version, only localized names, which is hard to reason if you don't know native language.

- Summary: a) what does precip. in % mean and how it correlates with cm? b) pressure is only displayed in hPa, while some countries prefer mmHg; c) what does ozone index mean and why is it important?

- Next 24 hours: visual indication for temp variation through the day would be easier to reason than just by looking at numbers (as discussed in TFA).

- Next 7 days: a) unnecessary precision for y-axis (e.g. 10.9°C vs. 11°C); b) band overshoot actual values (e.g. if I see 10..−10°C, I assume that would be max/min temp, but in fact it is 8..−9°C, which is impossible to tell without hovering mouse over); c) no horiz. line through 0°C; d) no horiz. lines through y-axis ticks, which makes it harder to reason about values closer to the end of the graph; e) precip. in cm tells little, especially when band is alike (0.00..0.80 cm) - peaks on graphs look like a lot, in fact they are not? g) seeing blue precip. graph subconsciously means 'rain' to me, while in fact it would be snow; f) labels for y-axis are at the same time very small, rotated 90° and also take too much horizontal space from the graph.

- Map: moving mouse over next 7 days graph causes time shown on map to change that would make sense if map's timeline would cover all 7 days, but it only covers small part of today.

- Week: a) fog icons look like they have solid white square background, which seems to be off compared to other icons; b) low/high values are hard to reason about, especially when it says 'Low … at 11am' and there is no tick labeled '11am' (10am .. 12pm) - displaying a line through coldest/warmest hours with °C value next to it would be much easier to understand.

Also: displaying air quality prediction based on last year's AQ would be helpful.

Re: Eulogy for Dark Sky, a data visualization masterpiece (2023)

#176

After darksky was shutdown I ended up using, https://www.yr.no/en . I've not seen it recommended here before and thought someone might enjoy it

Do they provide a Celsius/Fahrenheit toggle? I can't find it.

Looks like you can't on their website, but they do have an IOS and Android App where you can change this

Re: Eulogy for Dark Sky, a data visualization masterpiece (2023)

#177
post #27

fwiw, on iOS, I like using WeatherGraph: https://weathergraph.app/ The developer is very responsive, lots of UI customization (both app and widgets) is possible, and pricing is reasonable.

They used to be very responsive. “Multiple locations are on the way” (bottom left corner) has been like that for years now. Still the best of all the weather apps though.

Hi, I know it took much longer than it should have, but I have multiple locations implemented now and am adding the final polish before release - here are few screenshots: https://imgur.com/a/2vMAJHB

I should be able to release it before the end of January.

Best, Tomas

Re: Eulogy for Dark Sky, a data visualization masterpiece (2023)

#179
post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They used to be very responsive. “Multiple locations are on the way” (bottom left corner) has been like that for years now. Still the best of all the weather apps though.

Hi, I know it took much longer than it should have, but I have multiple locations implemented now and am adding the final polish before release - here are few screenshots: https://imgur.com/a/2vMAJHB I should be able to release it before the end of January. Best, Tomas

<3 <3 <3

Re: Eulogy for Dark Sky, a data visualization masterpiece (2023)

#180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is neat, but I find the charts extremely hard to parse due to the color gradients and the similar shades, especially of blue and teal. I find the Merry Sky charts a lot easier to understand.

Perhaps I should add an option to disable gradients. There's a screen shot showing what it used to look like before gradients: https://github.com/Leftium/weather-sense

It's not clear how to switch to sane units of measurement.
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