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Show HN: WeatherSense – The feature missing from all other weather apps

2 points by Leftium ↗ HN
https://weather-sense.leftium.com/

The feature missing from other weather apps: showing the past few hours/days of weather for reference. Visualizing the relative change from what you experienced yesterday is more intuitive than just seeing bare numbers. Especially when in units you are not familiar with (C/F).

The UI/layout is inspired by MerrySky.net, which itself was based on the OG: DarkSky. My version tries to present more information in less space, without looking too busy.

Every 5 years or so, I've been rewriting this app. The evolution of the tech stack is documented here: https://blog.leftium.com/2025/05/weathersense.html

Please share your questions and comments!

4 comments

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gus_massa
> showing the past few hours/days of weather for reference

Nice!!!

Some feature request anyway:

* IP location put the map like 100 miles away from my home. It would be nice to click to select a new location. (I don't like to allow the browser to give the the automatic version.)

* What are you using to show the maps? The roads are too rounded and look like some matural thing. I expect quite straight roads with a consistent width.

Leftium
Here you go: https://weather-sense.leftium.com/?gus_massa

- I chose the stylized watercolor map style[1] because I thought the detailed map data distracted from the star of the show: the precipitation radar. With the location marker and 10km rings for scale, I almost don't need the map at all.

- However, I can see how the detailed map would be useful when the IP location is not accurate.

- Changing the location via input field is on the todo list, but I never thought about click to select new location. Some thought would be needed as to how to differentiate between click/tap to pan... thanks for the suggestion.

- Note the "locate" button on the map is usually much more accurate. When that fails, you can manually enter a location (only via URL param, for now...)

[1]: https://stadiamaps.com/explore-the-map#style=stamen_watercol...

gus_massa
> Here you go: https://weather-sense.leftium.com/?gus_massa .

:)

> stylized watercolor map

Now it make sense to see wavy lines. I still think that it's better to show an accurate map under the radar image. Perhaps grey/translucid so it's not distracting, but it's easy to identify the features. When I see a map, I know by heart the shape of the main avenues and cost of my city and I can understand it. (Moreover, when there is a disaster announcement in another city and they claim the flood area was 3milesx5miles, I try to imagine that rectangle over my city to understand it.)

My mother is a retired meteorologist [1], so I'm somewhat used to climate maps and satellite images. After retirement she used to go to the webpage of the National Meteorology Office where she worked, so she could peek the maps [2].

> when the IP location is not accurate

I'm in Buenos Aires (city), but the map is centered in Buenos Aires (province). The city is the old port, that is obliviously in the coast, so the center is far away. (We should have changed the duplicated the names, but blame backward compatibility :) .)

Yesterday was sunny and and today is cloudy. I'll try again when it rains. Does the raining info cover all/most of the world or only USA. Here we have precipitation radar but I don't know if the info is shared.

[1] A few repeated anecdotes https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26165906 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40204281 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42679661 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10875882

[2] https://www.smn.gob.ar/radar (I think the radial lines are precipitation and the colored clouds are clouds. (???)) You can even see it like a movie. Just click the 12 and then the "play" black triangle.