New BOM Website

[octave]

1 minute ago, old man emu said:

Wind and temperature at BOM weather stations. Can't say anything about rainfall as it's not present today. 

Do you mean the current wind at a given location?

[old man emu]

Just now, octave said:

Do you mean the current wind at a given location?

Yep. Current wind, temp, humidity etc that was available on the old version. 

[octave]

1 minute ago, old man emu said:

Yep. Current wind, temp, humidity etc that was available on the old version. 

It is definitely available. 

Temp at the moment is 17.3

In my location, the current wind is 7 knots wsw, currently climbing to 9 knots at 1PM (and predicted hourly)

Humidity 49% predicted hourly, looks like it will get more humid tonight 84% at 11PM

 

https://www.bom.gov.au/location/australia/victoria/central/o2577556437-north-geelong#today

 

 

[octave]

For those who prefer a map. I am not a huge fan of the colour coding; however, you can click on any place name and get the information in text form

 

[nomadpete]

They seem to have copied WINDY.COM for their wind map.

 

I like WINDY for an overview and forecast. The map shows present wind at weather stations, isobars and fronts.

 

For rain radar, I have a link that takes me straight to BOM radar at my nearest radar.

[onetrack]

I've found the radar map, but it's effectively hidden from the weather forecasting page, and it appears the only way to find it, is to search for "radar".

 

https://www.bom.gov.au/weather-and-climate/rain-radar-and-weather-maps

 

There's no loop controls on the radar images, unlike the old site, where a large range of controls on the radar imagery is possible.

 

https://reg.bom.gov.au/products/IDR703.loop.shtml#skip

 

Edited Friday at 11:58 AM by onetrack

[rgmwa]

The new radar images don’t seem to have the clarity of the old ones for some reason.

[octave]

1 hour ago, onetrack said:

There's no loop controls on the radar images, unlike the old site, where a large range of controls on the radar imagery is possible.

 

The map loops automatically. Instead of buttons, you can play or pause or drag the progress bar. Instead of the 64km, 128km, etc buttons, you have the ability to zoom smoothly between the minimum and maximum zoom.  Instead of clicking the arrows to move to the next radar station, you can just drag the map all the way across the country if you wish. This dragging seems less clunky than clicking to move from one radar station to another. The drag and zoom is more like Google Earth or Google Maps.  To me, at least, this is much more usual.     

 

I guess it's down to personal preference. Having followed this on Reddit and other places, there does seem to be a lot of hysteria.  It is clear a proportion of people bagging haven't really used it for more than a couple of minutes 

 

Here is a screen capture of me briefly using both radars (a bit too compressed in order to upload).  Moving around the map is just smoother than the clunk clunk of click buttons.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

[rgmwa]

I don't have an issue with scrolling to a location. What annoys me is that having done that, the Perth area in my case, and zoomed in to the scale and place I want and activated useful layers like roads and railways, I can't save that setup as a favourite to open up each time. I can save the radar site as a favourite but it opens up at the main page of Australia and I have to go through the whole process again. With the old site,  I can save the 128km Serpentine Radar as a default.

[octave]

What I don't like about the old radar site is that I don't seem to be able to make it full screen on my phone. Moving from one radar station to another is very clunky.  The old radar site is not displayed with general weather information. When viewed on a phone, you need to select, for example, 64 km and then drag the image bigger in order to get any useful information. 

These are screenshots of how the old and new radars open on my phone (no tweaking of either of them). I know which one I think is best.  I can make the older radar larger but I have to use two fingers on the screen to drag it larger. 

 

 

 

Edited yesterday at 04:29 AM by octave

[rgmwa]

Maybe it's just me, but I can't find any way to get the new map to open at the settings and scale I want by default either on the phone or on the computer. 

[octave]

25 minutes ago, rgmwa said:

Maybe it's just me, but I can't find any way to get the new map to open at the settings and scale I want by default

Isn't it incredibly easy to zoom in or out? Here is me opening up the site.  When this radar opens, it covers most of Victoria. This gives me a good overview of the rain in the state and which way it is moving. I can then, with a couple of clicks, zoom in to my local area. This seems quicker than going to the old radar siite and deciding between, for example, 256km or down to 64km. On the new radar, the images from all of the radars in Aus are sort of stitched together, allowing for smooth zoom rather than click and reload.

 

 

 

Edited yesterday at 05:14 AM by octave

[rgmwa]

You've just demonstrated what I mean - too much clicking and scrolling to get to that last view. On the old site, it opens where I want it.  I don't need to see what's happening in Sydney as well.

 

[octave]

We had an outdoor event today, and the weather was iffy. I wanted to know what the weather was like within a 3-hour timeframe.

Here is an old radar shot from my nearest radar station (I live in Geelong and the nearest station is near Melbourne. Notice how Geelong is in the left hand bottom corner. This radar picture does not give me enough information about what is coming from the west. I must then click on 128km instead of 64km or perhaps even 256km. This shows more area to the west, but zoomed out.  I want to be able to see 64km scale but with my location in the centre

 

 

 

 

 

This works better for me. By the way, how do you get the old radar to be full screen?    Also, it looks like some crappy weather is coming in from the west.  

 

 

 

Edited yesterday at 05:47 AM by octave

[rgmwa]

44 minutes ago, octave said:

 By the way, how do you get the old radar to be full screen? 

 

Like you said earlier - use two-finger zoom to enlarge on the phone. Doesn't work on the computer. I agree the old maps have their restrictions and zooming is convenient. The terrain mapping on the old site is nicer than the bland and dull new one. Either way, we'll be stuck with the new system when they turn the old one off. Hopefully they will take notice of the things people don't like about the new site and improve it. 

 

... if by full screen you mean the whole of Australia, go to `National' at the top of the old map.

Edited yesterday at 06:26 AM by rgmwa

[octave]

1 minute ago, rgmwa said:

Hopefully they will take notice of the things people don't like about the new site and improve it. 

Agreed. 

 

 It is quite common for people to be outraged when the UI on a site changes; however, down the track, they get used to the new site, and then if there are more changes, they want the last site back (not the original one).  I can almost guarantee that in 6 months, people will be comfortable with this site and will resist any further changes.

 

I do accept that some may have particular complaints with some aspects of it but the quotes in the media often make false claims and tend towards hysteria.     Some of the quotes are incredible, "whoever is responsible must be sacked," or claiming that features are not available when they are.

 

As an example, you have certain preferences for the UI on the radar site. I don't imagine you will stop using the radar site because of its new UI, and likewise, if they were to change it back, I would happily use the old one, although I might miss some of the new features.  The changes, at least to me, are not a deal breaker. 

 

 

[onetrack]

Well, the outrage continues and especially amongst rural users. It's not like the story is a beatup in mainstream media, the dislike is coming from numerous sources. And the BOM is noted for making some pretty bad decisions - and not the least, related to weather forecasts!

 

I can recall many years ago, the Weather Bureau, as it was then known, made a point of bragging about how they'd achieved a weather forecast result of 48% accuracy. Then some wag came out with the comment, that if they'd totally reversed their forecast each day of the preceding year (i.e., instead of forecasting rain, they forecast sunny and no rain - and vice versa) - then they would have been able to claim a 52% forecast accuracy rate!

 

https://pulse.auctionsplus.com.au/news/public-frustration-grows-over-bureau-of-meteorologys-new-website-launch

[facthunter]

 I AM NOT AMUSED. What worked for me yesterday doesn't work today.  I don't know who or what it's target audience is. WEATHER results from WINDS. Where they come from, Their velocity  and what type of airmass is involved. ie Tropical Maritme being the Most energy filled. A high environmental Lapse rate gives INSTABILITY.  Storms possible. Highs are dryer descending air and colder at Night. TEND to form over Land  but can BLOCK weather systems.etc Meteorology was one of my favourite subjects. People used to ask my opinion of the coming weather. Now I'm flat out getting enough basic information to get the Picture, today, let alone what might be coming.   Nev

[octave]

My understanding is that every shred of data that was available is still available. Things may be accessed differently but they are still there.  Any new interface does take a little time to get used too.  I have had so many conversation on Reddit where people have complained about a missing feature that actually does exist. Nev are you after synoptic charts? 

[octave]

By the way the new radar page does contain more information than the old one. On the new one place labels are clickable to open general weather information. On the old map place names are non clickable, you have to go to another page. I don't much care whether people prefer the old or new. It is worth considering that if you think the new sites is worse in every aspect you surely must consider that you might be a tad biased. Whilst you may think I am foolish I have at least spent considerable time exploring the new site. 

[facthunter]

MSL Isobars is Just one small Part of it.  Nev

[onetrack]

The MSLP charts are still located on the old website apparently, they can't be found on the new website. I don't know if they're planning to incorporate them into the new website.

 

https://www.bom.gov.au/australia/charts/synoptic_col.shtml

[octave]

There is a link to the old site

 

https://www.bom.gov.au/australia/charts/

 

This is going to be incorporated into the new site. Everything on the old site will be on the new site.

 

 

[onetrack]

Well, I'm definitely not a fuzzy icon type of person. Rather than trying to figure out what these dubious "international understanding" icons mean, at least they've given us the option of a "text only table" (on the RHS), which style of forecast, makes a lot more sense to me.

 

https://www.bom.gov.au/location/australia/western-australia/lower-west/bwa_pt053-perth

 

Edited 17 hours ago by onetrack

[spacesailor]

" I don't imagine you will stop using the radar site because " .

someone will give it away .

I still miss the old " short wave " radio forcast , that could be ' teletyped ' onto paper.

just showing my age . LoL .

spacesailor

 

PS.  :  the 'new' UHF marine radio can't make the distance to give the authorities, 

a heads up you need their ' clearance '.

now what's my " VHF " licence number !.

Edited 13 hours ago by spacesailor
PS added