MyWeather

[littlewaywelt]

While it hasn't been tested yet (for obvious seasonal reasons), forecasted snowfall quantities should show up in the trend graph this winter. This doesn't completely match your suggestions though, so we'll take this into consideration moving forward.



I agree that alerts remain a critical feature we have yet to implement. At this time, we are waiting for Apple to finish completing their push notification functionality for iPhone applications. Until push notifications are ready, we really can't add this feature "the right way." It was originally thought that Apple was going to have push notifications ready for iPhone OS 2.1, but recent rumors have noted that may not be the case. We're anxiously awaiting this feature as much as anyone else though.

The advantage to seeing snowfall projection maps is that you know where it's going to snow heavily. That information isn't readily really there when you can only see a number for a named area in your list. A map gives you an idea of the size of the system. The same analogy is looking at a radar map vs seeing .5 inches of rain at 4pm.

I'd also very much like to see the last download/forecast and all data remain in the program. If I don't have a connection I'd like to see what was last there.

 

[greenmymac]

When can we expect to see another update for this Application?

 

[bobsegal]

Update to MyWeather

They did post a update this past weekend with some new features.
But one thing that still is not fixed is remembering the location and zoom level of weather radar. This is one thing that is need to make this app a great one.

Bob

 

[littlewaywelt]

Overall, a nice improvement, but still needs some work.

-pressure would be nice to be able to choose to see in inches of mercury rather than millibars
-still a bug on the trending which lists yellow current time, three hours ahead of actual time.
-also, when picking a contact address, if you list under business it shows up blank, leaving you to click each blank listing until you find the right address.
-still can't choose int'l locations.
-if a contact has multiple addresses it will default to the first - can't select the others.
-would love to see a detailed worded forecast like weatherbug as well.

 

[HaroldC]

It's better, but still doesn't address my biggest gripe with the program: On startup of the app, it always asks for your location.

I would like to see that as an option in the settings that the user can either turn on or off.

I use it only for the radar loop, as WeatherBug gives me all the important data (temp, pressure, wind, etc) without having to press any additional links/buttons.

 

[mikepj]

Certainly, there are still a large number of features that we just haven't gotten to yet. The feature request list is already past 25 items, and is growing pretty quickly. Obviously we'll have to pick and choose the most popular requests and target those first...

That said, I think 1.1 is a good start toward where we ultimately want to be. Thanks for all the feedback users have been posting on this forum.

 

[diesel]

mikepj,

the latest update is nice, especially in the performace department. the app seems to load my cities noticeably faster.

any plans on adding support for international cities? if you could allow us to add international cities, i.e. London, Tokyo, Seoul, etc. that would be fantastic.

also, please allow me to disable the current location thing upon startup. i don't need it nor want it. thanks.

 

[mikepj]

Glad you noticed the performance enhancements. I spent a couple of days just trying to get the application to launch faster. Now it launches about 33% faster than before. Other parts of the interface have been optimized as well.

International support is on our radar (no pun intended, okay, maybe it was...), and we plan to add support for locations outside the U.S. as time goes on. Before doing this, we have to make sure the data sources for forecasts, trends, etc are available, so this isn't nearly as simple as flipping a switch to add more locations.

We haven't decided what to do about the current location feature yet. The vast majority of our users use it, but some aren't as interested. If you are tired of seeing the pop-up dialog, there is a way to get rid of that. I think if you allow it to grab your current location twice in a row, it shouldn't ask you anymore (this is Apple's code working here, so we don't have control over it). It no longer asks to use the current location on my device...

 

[trihard]

Latest update

Mikepj,

The latest update is snappy, but there are a few key things that I hope are high on the list of to dos:

1) Persistent radar view or even better the ability to define and save multiple views so you can easily recall different levels of zoom and pan.

2) Radar opacity control...you cannot see what is under the dark colors as is.

3) Percent chance of rain in the precip trend as the trend alone doesn' t really help you know if it will happen or not.

4) Additional text option for the forecast. Summing up a day with 1 picture and 2 words just doesn't do it, especially on a day with changing weather.

Thanks for your hard work!

 

[rixm]

Thinking about purchasing at new price. Is data is accurate for 91101 and 92679?

Hi,

After wasting my money on Fizz (temperatures for both 91101 (Pasadena, CA) and 92679 (Trabuco Canyon, CA) as well as 92618 (Irvine, CA) are consistently off by 4, 6, 10 degrees at a time. Wind speeds are never even close (up to 20 mph off!!!!) I can walk outside at work (Pasadena, CA) on a dead calm day and Fizz will inform me that the windspeed is 22mph!! ...I guessing they have one sensor and it's attached to the back of a freight train.

Could some kind soul send me a day time reading (temp & wind speed) from MyWeather for 91101 and/or 92679 at some point? If they at least can get these 2 right I'd consider purchase but with getting burned on Fizz I'm hesitant to spend the money. I've seen a few comments on the app store of people complaining that data is not accurate and want to hear from the real world what the reality is.

Just fyi to all, Fizz's severe weather alert function is a mess! Multiple updates to the point you just ignore it...

They need to get the app together!

Thanks in advance!

BTW, for all the zips I've mentioned Apple's weather app is never more that 1-2 degrees different.

Rich

P.S I couldn't get the temperature lookup on their main website to display the temp for Trabuco Canyon and could not find Pasadena in the list.

 

[Randman]

Fizzweather is very, very good, and stable.

 

[rixm]

Fizzweather is very, very good, and stable.

Glad to hear that's your experience Randman. I don't believe I ever indicated Fizz was unstable.

I did however indicate that:

1) The source of weather data they are using is less than accurate in my experience (and I've tested many more locations than I've listed here. I've even tested Fizz against direct readings with a Kestrel handheld weather meter and had the same experience. Their support even indicated there were problems.

2) The severe weather alerts can be a real mess with multiple updates stating the same info etc.

3) Forgot this in the first post, but when I first installed Fizz, I entered multiple favorite locations and it would not maintain the sort order of same. This problem went away after I uninstalled the app and entered each of the 7 or 8 locations 1 by 1, exiting the setup screen after each and every one until they had all been entered in the order I wanted. This could have been a "one off" with my installation... We'll never know I suppose.

It's a "pretty" looking app I'll give them that, but "pretty" without being accurate is just useless to me.

Interestingly they just today posted a reply that they had corrected the forecasts for the areas I mentioned.


I'm going to monitor various places in the days ahead and let them know.

My biggest concern is as my family and I have taken a number of short weekend trips to various areas over the last month or so, every new location I've been to the weather data in Fizz has been off by a little or a lot (wind speed has always been off by enough of a margin that it's meaningless)

Time will tell.

Rich

 

[rixm]

Just checked temp for where I am currently and the good news is temperature in Fizz is spot on with Apples weather app and within 1-2 degrees of the 4 online sources I just checked. They are all off by a bit compared to what I just measured but I can accept that as variance since the sites were last updated, difference in where it's being measured locally vs where I am, the hill/valley nature of the area etc.

The bad news is those same sources report wind speeds from "calm" to 3,4 or 5 mph. Fizz says 12 mph. Walking outside it's currently dead calm.

Humidity, Fizz indicates 78% humidity, other sources are indicating 53-56%.

Again, these are my observations. Fizz may be spot on for where you live.

If they tout this as being an application suitable for US locations then they'll need to tighten up the accuracy of their data.

In my experience thus far, Apples simple weather app has been very close in every case so we know it can be done.

My apologies for jacking the thread off on this tangent regarding Fizz.

Cheers

Rich

 

[trihard]

What give with myweather?

What is up with this app? It hasn't been updated in a long time. I stopped using it because I had several big issues with it, including precip trend was never accurate, current precip was/is always 0 for me, even when it rains all day, and the forecast was also not very accurate (picture and text would say rain and no rain that day, or picture and text would say sunny and it was cloudy with rain). Also, hate that it doesn't keep your position on radar, and you constantly have to go in and zoom into wherever you are.

I was hoping they might fix these things, but since it has been so long since the last release, perhaps they have given up to? The weather app I have been using is the weather channel app, but it doesn't have animated radar.

 

[TechJunky]

I gave up too. I'm currently using accuweather's web app for animated radar, and weather underground's web app for forcasting & discussion (although it has animated radar as well). Both free and awesome.

apple.accuweather.com

i.wund.com

 

[mikepj]

Development has been ongoing. We took a brief detour to release MyWeather Mobile for Hong Kong and China, so that's why you haven't seen an update to the U.S. product in awhile. We're back working on the next version of the U.S. software, with some very nice improvements to the satellite imagery (including saving the satellite views for each location). A release hasn't been scheduled yet, but it's on the way.

Thanks for checking in.

 

[diesel]

Development has been ongoing. We took a brief detour to release MyWeather Mobile for Hong Kong and China, so that's why you haven't seen an update to the U.S. product in awhile. We're back working on the next version of the U.S. software, with some very nice improvements to the satellite imagery (including saving the satellite views for each location). A release hasn't been scheduled yet, but it's on the way.

Thanks for checking in.

i'm going to weigh in here mike and say that i'm a bit disappointed with the direction in which you have been taking your app. one of the biggest drawbacks to myweather is the lack of international cities. instead, it's pretty clear that you have chosen to walk down the path of providing "separate" apps for different countries/regions instead of expanding the base areas of your original app. as a freqent overseas business traveler, this has been a huge source of disappointment to the point where i feel that i "wasted" the $15 cost. Though i knew your app didn't provide int'l weather when i purchased it, i remember you mentioning that you were "working" on it so i made the purchase in the belief that you would eventually deliver on that. however.....as mentioned above, it doesn't seem like it will happen.

with that said, i no longer use myweather and have instead reverted to using the weather channel app which loads in a heart beat and provides a clean easy to view interface for current weather and future weather. another big reason for switching to the weather channel app and writing off the cost of you app, is the fact that often times i would find a discrepency in weather reports/forecasts between your app and the weather channel, and surprise surprise, the weather channel app has always been much more accurate so if basic weather forecasts can't be trusted in your app, it pretty much makes your app useless.

the only thing your app has that the weather channel app doesn't have at the moment is animated radar, though the weather channel video which can be viewed through their app does provide video images of the radar, still i do prefer a non video image of the radar as your app provides.

 

[mikepj]

Diesel: Thanks for the feedback. I'll be sure your sentiments are forwarded on to the rest of the team.

Let me step back for a moment to give you some background on the project here. While I am the developer for the MyWeather Mobile application, I do not actually work for the company MyWeather. As you may have noticed in my signature, I have my own company called Gaucho Software, and have released a couple of products for the Mac (one of them being a desktop weather application called Seasonality). In this situation, I am acting as a contractor for MyWeather to develop this iPhone product. What this means is that while the rest of the MyWeather crew have been very receptive to my opinions and ideas of where to take the product, I'm not the final decision maker.

That said, MyWeather has relationships with a company in China that provided the weather data for the Hong Kong and China product. Part of their agreement, as I understand it, is to have a separate application for that region. As far as I know, we are still planning to expand to other regions of the world in the same primary MyWeather Mobile product as time goes on. Again, since I'm not the primary decision maker here, these plans could change.

As for the forecast accuracy, all I can do in this situation is pass your observations along. I wasn't involved in designing the forecast modeling code being used, or the code to actually provide the forecast to the iPhone application. Meteorology, like Information Technology, is a very rapidly developing field. Even in the past 7-8 years, major forecast advancements have taken place. Forecast models will often do well in certain atmospheric situations and even certain locations, but not so well in others. MyWeather does have a good team of meteorologists and engineers working there though, so I can imagine the situation will only improve as time goes on.

 

[IJ Reilly]

So you're saying that MyWeather has its own forecasters and models?

That would be astonishing.

 

[orrelse44]

So you're saying that MyWeather has its own forecasters and models?

That would be astonishing.

I laughed at that too.

What is this model Myweather is using? If the U.S. government can't even fund further development of the MM5 project, I doubt highly your company has some proprietary forecast model out there. Please elaborate.

 

[opticalserenity]

I too would like to see an update to MyWeather. Part of what makes iPhone development so special is how updates can get pushed out. MyWeather can be made faster, and certainly could use a few feature additions. As an iPhone Developer myself, I understand that our customers want updates, and we work to bring that out.

Honestly, this app should have been $5.99 and maybe $9.99 but certainly not $15.99. Oh well.

 

[mikepj]

I laughed at that too.

What is this model Myweather is using? If the U.S. government can't even fund further development of the MM5 project, I doubt highly your company has some proprietary forecast model out there. Please elaborate.

Yes, MyWeather does have meteorologists on staff to develop forecasts as well as a customized forecast model. This is fairly common for larger companies in the meteorology industry. The model was originally developed by the University of Wisconsin, Madison, and was adapted by MyWeather to fit their needs.

I'm not sure why this is so hard to believe. There are several open weather forecast models to choose from such as the GFS and WRF.

The MM5 project is much different from what we are talking about here. The MM5 is a mesoscale model, not a synoptic scale model like these others. Mesoscale models are great for simulating thunderstorms and generating very short-term forecasts, but they don't provide anything beyond a short-term forecast and certainly not out as far as 5-7 days.

 

[iEdge]

forecast

I have been reading the threads regarding the forecast. It looks like MyWeather has taken action. I emailed customer service asking why. Below is their explanation.

"The forecast differences were contained to a few regions of the US. These differences in the forecast (or current conditions) are the result of three issues: 1) forecast model output, 2) the number of weather observation stations and, 3) hourly temperature display.

Issue #1 is resolved.
Issue #2 is in the queue and thousands of new stations will be added this quarter.
Issue #3 will be resolved in an upcoming version."

 

[trihard]

Version 1.3?

Anyone out there try updating to 1.3? It says that it now has:

"–View previous cached weather conditions including persistent radar/satellite positioning"

Can anyone else confirm this, because I don't see how to keep a persistent radar position.

Also it says they updated the icon, but it looks the same to me...

 

[mikepj]

"–View previous cached weather conditions including persistent radar/satellite positioning"

Can anyone else confirm this, because I don't see how to keep a persistent radar position.

The persistent radar/satellite positioning will only work on regular locations, and not the GPS MyWeather Location. Try adding a typical city location and just scroll the map to where you want the position saved.

As for the icon, it was supposed to be switched for version 1.3, but for some reason the App Store didn't switch the icon for us. This will probably be fixed in version 1.4.