weather

There are plenty of ways to get a weather report for your current location. When it comes to getting timely forecast that could potentially save you from getting caught in a downpour, one of the more reliable sources comes from The Dark Sky Company and Forecast.io.

By making the same API that Forecast.io uses available to developers, it gives any developer the chance to integrate weather forecasts into an any app. A new app, named Weathertron, was created by a couple of self-proclaimed "data visualization nerds" and has done just that.

Using the same data that … Read more

I spent a couple of years growing up in Los Angeles, and I can still remember the feeling I'd get in my chest on particularly smoggy days in the summer. It was so bad some days that my brother and I would have to cut our Wiffle ball games short. If you live in a part of the country where the air quality isn't great, use iPhone app Smoggy (99 cents) to get a reading of the air quality before heading out to exercise or sending your kids out to play.

The app lets you use your current … Read more

Yahoo! Weather is a fast, responsive, and ultimately very fun to use weather app from the online content guru. Designed to be sleek and easy to use, Yahoo! Weather presents all of the information you need in compact, pull-out menus that can be hidden for quick reference or pulled out for reams of information about the weather in any number of cities.

Yahoo! Weather opens with a static tile for your current location with the temperature and current conditions. If you slide the screen with your finger, however, you can reveal the forecast, details about the weather, wind speed, a … Read more

NOAA Hi-Def Radar delivers great-looking animated radar maps to give you a better look at weather systems close to you, but it's missing one important feature.

Having a traditional forecast in front of you is useful, but being able to see the path of an actual storm is sometimes the feature you need most. You can use the interactive radar maps in NOAA Hi-Def Radar to see when rainstorms are approaching, see where lightning strikes have occurred, and devise a plan if a severe storm is coming your way. The app tracks weather activity across the entire United States, … Read more

MyWeatherPic takes the everyday urge to talk about the weather and helps you share the exact conditions wherever you are with custom images. Using many familiar photo editing and sharing features combined with weather-tracking integration, the app is a unique and fun tool.

MyWeatherPic, at its core, is a camera. You open the app and the camera will activate in the upper half of the screen. Over the top of the camera's viewfinder is an overlay of the current weather and your location. Weather is in degrees Celsius to start but you can change to Fahrenheit or you can … Read more

Though the official 2013 hurricane season is from June 1 to November 30, the news earlier this week out of Moore, Okla., is a sobering reminder that dangerous weather comes in many forms, and you often don't know where the next disaster may strike. Even now, many states are being pounded by heavy storms as the cleanup from the tornado in Moore is still under way.

Recently, I collected a few weather apps that are great for a quick glance at the weather, but those apps won't help you much in severe weather conditions. For more-serious weather activity, … Read more

It wasn't very long ago that for a developer to make a successful weather app, it had to have the most information possible. This meant developers would compete to pack tons of graphs, maps, diagrams, written forecasts -- and even forums where people could talk about weather -- into busy, confusing apps that tried to cover it all. But what you ended up with were long, listlike menus when the only information you probably wanted was what the weather might be like for the weekend.

Don't get me wrong, the feature-packed weather apps have their place, particularly when … Read more

Last week, Apple announced that its App Store is approaching 50 billion app downloads. In celebration of the milestone, Apple is giving away a $10,000 App Store gift card to the lucky person who initiates the 50 billionth download.

As part of the celebration, Apple listed the top 25 apps -- both free and paid -- for iPhone and iPad. None of the apps listed is particularly surprising (especially to someone who studies the most-popular list every day), but one thing that did strike me is that a lot of the all-time best sellers still sit near the top … Read more

Yahoo Weather is a weather app that displays stunning Flickr photos as a backdrop to a wide range of weather information on your iPhone -- more than you get with Apple's weather app. There are certainly other options with more weather information, but for a quick look at what's happening in your area, Yahoo Weather is a good-looking and well-made app.

When you launch Yahoo Weather, you'll be asked immediately if the app can use your location so it can give you information on the weather around your area. From there you'll be presented with a … Read more