Hi All,
We've got another release just hitting the App Store about now.
Although only a point release, it does have some good stuff (I hope) :)
1. Follow Me Notifications. This is a notification which gives you the weather for a 24 hour period for your current place. It doesn't have to be a favorite. It might be you're on a day trip, on a long road trip, visiting a friend etc Weather Gods will try and detect when it thinks you are stationary, ignoring trains, planes and automobiles (and bikes), and deliver a 'follow me' notification. Please note - we only deliver one, you wont be spammed all day !!
The notification is split into four time periods, each lasting 6 hours. The time periods are labeled morning, afternoon, evening and overnight. Your arrival time determines the first time period. For example, let's suppose you arrive at your destination late afternoon on Tuesday. You're going to get a notification for your destination that starts with the weather for Tuesday evening, overnight Tuesday into Wednesday then Wednesday morning and finally Wednesday afternoon.
Each notification has the temperature for the time period, a short weather summary, and an optional longer piece of weather text - which wont always be there ... and tends to show up if there is something of importance with the weather for that time period. For example it might indicate strong winds, turning colder, hard freeze, local flooding etc
Follow me notifications happen automatically, providing they are switched on in the locations screens. There is a toggle switch next to the current location label.
You do need to have allowed Weather Gods to always use your location and enabled push notifications. The location tracking uses as little of the battery as possible and is the one Apple recommends for this kind of feature.
It's worth saying that they were difficult to get working and I'm still working on smoothing the edges and ironing out the bugs, so please bear with us.
2. we think we have nailed the watch complication. The previous version was pretty bad at updating on the watch face (sorry). Now, we aim to update every 30 minutes if possible. It seems to be working well and I would like to pass on my thanks to Cliff Isaksen who helped me with the testing ... and made sure I got on and fixed it :) :) Thanks Cliff!
3. you will find that almost all your locations now have an altitude value - except the Apple GPS location which is a bit patchy on providing this information - I'm still digging into why this might be. I'm hoping to use the altitude to straighten out the pressure observations in the app, which are barometric, and align them with the forecast part of the app which is mean sea level pressure. We need altitude as part of the conversion formula.
4. The weather wheel now includes the wind direction.
5. Smart weather conditions in the widget and the watch got a little bit smarter. You should find we prioritise a wind speed over a 'no gusts' label, amongst other things.
6. Added support for the 'Dark System Color' accessibility option - this is particularly useful if you prefer to run with the classic invert colors from iOS10 instead of the smart version from iOS11. If you switch on the Dark System Color option then you should have a Weather Gods app which inverts colors like the iOS 10 version.
7. We fixed a bug where the weather did not update after resuming from backgrounding the app.
8. We fixed some responsive bugs with the weather wheel navigation buttons.
9. Startup is a tad faster.
10. Finally, fixed a whole bunch of crashes which made their way (sadly) into 1.6 - I did say it was a massive change under the hood and wasn't wrong there!!
Please let me know how you find the follow me notifications - if they prove useful, then I can enhance them further - one idea is a follow me severe weather alert for a location you are visiting?
As ever, if you are enjoying the Weather Gods and haven't left a review then we would really appreciate a review on the App Store please. There is a direct link in Settings.
The next release 1.6.2 is a bit of a bug fix ... but I am hoping to work on a custom watch layout, specifically for voiceover.
Have a great day and I hope the weather is kind - in the UK we are experiencing a little bit of a cold spell and some snow (rare for us) - needless to say, my daughters are excited!!
Scott
Comments
I'd like that!
Hi Scott!! Can't wait to try this update!
I think the severe weather alerts would be fantastic!! I do have a question.
Could you set up the severe weather alerts for where you live? Thank you for all you do!!
Severe weather alerts
Hi Dawn,
Yes, it's my intention to have a similar function to the main notifications.
I try and take small steps with the app - 1.6. just went on too long. My first step will be just to get one showing up like a follow me notification, so I can work out the data, formats etc More difficult for me because the US seems to have 100s of severe weather warnings - we get about half a dozen in the UK :)
Once that one is figured then I can look to building them into our server and send them out when they get generated by the National Weather Service.
Let me have your thoughts on the follow me notifications should you decide to use them please?
Thanks
Scott
yes we do
Yes, we have a lot of severe watches/warnings/advisories for everything from a winter weather advisory, to a tornado warning! lol
I'll give you my feedback as I have everything set up for follow me and locations.
Apple Watch complication
High Scott,
It's nice that the Apple Watch complication is fixed and I am using it at the moment. Some suggestions about auto updating:
1. I want it to happen more often, for example 15 minutes. I know that it will decrease the battery live, but it can be made as configurable feature and every user to choose preferable time interval.
2. The finest solution for me is updating of the complication in every Apple Watch wake up. It means when I check the time, the complication to update itself. Because it may take a while, the complication can display indicator labeled "Updating.." or something similar, while it' receives data.
Apple Watch complication
Hi Stefan,
Just been discussing this with Cliff who has help immensely with the complication testing. We noticed it possibly stops updating towards the end of the day and think the reason is that Apple limit the complication wake ups to 50! Currently we are every 30 minutes or 48 a day.
However, there are other wakes up which happen as well e.g. when you load the dock and swipe through.
So, it's possible we are busting the 50 per day limit.
Every 15 minutes would definitely push us over the edge. It's also not possible to update when you lift your wrist - Apple want developers to avoid this entirely as they expect the 'glance' to be less than a few seconds. What happens is the watch will wake up WG when you are not using the watch and we have to update the complication as a background download - this is why it was really tricky to get working.
There are some other options which I'm exploring e.g. we can have the main app wake up the watch app and update the complication (allowed 50 of those) - however, I need to consider how that might work in practise.
Leave it with me ...
Thanks
Scott
Re: Apple Watch complication
High,
Thanks for the detailed response. I agree with you for the limiting factors which influence to that functionality.