Weather forecast

Note

In version 3.8.2 Dashticz switched to the new weather block as described here.

Dashticz supports the following weather forecast providers:

Open Weather Map: https://openweathermap.org/
KNMI: https://weerlive.nl/

Before you can use the weather module, you must request an API key:

For OpenWeatherMap via https://openweathermap.org/
For KNMI via https://weerlive.nl/api/toegang/index.php

Dashticz automatically detects the correct weather provider, by validating the API key at each provider.

Basic usage

A basic weather block can be defined as follows:

blocks['weather'] = {
  type: 'weather',
  apikey: 'abc123...xyz', /Your API key
  city: 'Amsterdam',
}

Besides the daily forecast, you can also show the current weather or an hourly forecast.

Parameters

Block parameter	Description
type	`'weather'`. To select a weather block
width	`1..12`: Width of the block
refresh	`3600` Update once per hour. (default=3600, minimum=900, 15 minutes)
scale	Number between 0 and 1 to make the weather block smaller `1` Normal block width `0.5` 50% width
apikey	`'abc123...xyz'`. OWM api key
city	`'Amsterdam'`. City name. You can also use the OWM city id code.
country	`'nl'`. Country code.
name	`'My place'`. Name to use instead of city name on the dashboard.
lang	`'nl'`: Language to use for OWM data
provider	By default Dashticz will auto-detect the provider of the weather info. You can also choose a specific provider by setting this parameter, but this should not be necessary anymore. `owmfree`: Use OpenWeatherMap free account (since beginning 2023). `owm3`: OpenWeatherMap Onecall API 3.0. See Open Weather Map `owm`: OpenWeatherMap old account (API key requested before 2022) `knmi`: Use KNMI as provider
layout	Choose a layout for the weather block `0`: Daily forecast (=default) `1`: Hourly forecast (for OWM only) `2`: Current weather `3`: Current weather detailed `4`: Combination of 2,3,0,1
count	`5`: Number of forecast items to show (default=3). Only for daily and hourly forecast.
interval	Use every n-th forecast item. Only useful for owm3, because owm3 provides hourly forcast info `1`. Use every forecast item (=default) `3`. Set to 3 to get 3-hourly forecast (owm3)
decimals	Number of temperature decimals to show `1` One decimal (=default)
showMin	Show/hide minimum temperature (only for daily forecast) `false`: Hide minimum temperature `true`: Show minimum temperature (=default)
showRain	Show/hide rain rate (only for daily and hourly forecast) `false`: Hide rain rate `true`: Show rain rate (=default)
showDescription	Show/hide weather description (only for daily and hourly forecast) `false`: Hide weather description `true`: Show weather description
showWind	Show/hide wind info and wind dial (daily and hourly forecast only) `false`: Hide wind info `true`: Show wind info (=default)
showGust	Show/hide wind gust info `false`: Hide wind gust info `true`: Show wind gust info (=default)
useBeaufort	Set to `true` to show wind speed in Beaufort instead of m/s
skipFirst	Set to `true` to skip the first daily/hourly forecast card
monochrome	`false`: Show colored icons (animated weather icons only) `true`: Show monochrome icons (animated weather icons only)
showCurrent	Set to `false` to hide current weather (layout 4 only)
showDetails	Set to `false` to hide current weather details (layout 4 only)
showDaily	Set to `false` to hide daily weather forecast (layout 4 only)
showHourly	Set to `false` to hide hourly weather forecast (layout 4 only)
icons	Icon set to use. See below `'line'` Dynamic line icons `'linestatic'` Static version of the line icons `'fill'` Dynamic filled icons `'static'` Static icons `'meteo'` Alternative set of static icons

The weather module makes use of the following CONFIG parameters:

Parameter	Description
owm_api	`'<api-key>'` API-key provided by https://openweathermap.org/
owm_city	Your city or nearby city to use in OWM. You can also fill in the city id here. `'Utrecht'` `'2748075'`
owm_name	Name to use instead of city name `'Tuinwijk'`
owm_country	Your country to use in OWM `'nl'`
owm_lang	Set language for de description of the forecast (rain, cloudy, etc.). For available languages, see https://openweathermap.org/forecast5/#multi `''` (empty string, default) Use Dashticz language setting
owm_cnt	Number of forecast elements (3-hour intervals or days) to show `1..5`
owm_min	Show minimum temperature on 2nd row (only for daily forecast) `false` / `true`
static_weathericons	`true` Static weather settings `false` (default) Animated weather icons
use_beaufort	This config setting is used as default value for block parameter `useBeaufort` `true` Use Beaufort for wind speed `false` Use m/s for wind speed

Usage

In the next examples the config parameter owm_api and owm_city have been set globally, so they are not part of the weather block definitions.

To show the hourly forecast with an 3 hour interval:

blocks['weather1'] = {
    type: 'weather',
    layout: 1,
    count: 7,
    interval: 3,
}

To show the current weather, with a custom name:

blocks['weather2'] = {
  type: 'weather',
  layout: 2,
  name: 'My place',
}

To show detailed info on the current weather:

blocks['weather3'] = {
    type: 'weather',
    layout: 3,
    name:'Home is home',
}

Icons

Via the block parameter icons you can choose one of the predefined icon sets:

‘line’ (=default)

‘linestatic’

‘fill’

‘static’

‘meteo’

By setting the block parameter monochrome to true the icons will be displayed as monochrome.

This will give the following icons sets to choose from:

styling

All blocks have the css class weather assigned in combination with weather_0, weather_1, …, where the number indicates the layout number.

Further, all info items have css classes assigned. The names are self explanatory.

icon: Weather icon
day: Day item (‘Saturday’)
time: Forecast time (hourly forecast only)
city: City name
description: Weather description
temp: temperature
max: Max temperature
min: Min temperature
temp: Current temperature
feels: Feel-like temperature
rain: Rain rate
humidity
pressure: Barometric pressure
windspeed
windgust
winddirection

To capitalize the day of the week have to add the following code to custom.css:

.weather .day {
  text-transform: capitalize;
}

Open Weather Map

Via https://openweathermap.org/ you can request a new API key and subscribe to weather API.

At this moment (August 2023) two types of accounts can be created:

Free account

Onecall API 3.0

For the differences see https://openweathermap.org/price.

Main differences:

Onecall API requires you to provide your credit card info.

Onecall API provides 8 day weather forecast, free API only a 5 day forecast

Onecall API provides hourly forecast info, while the free API only provides 3-hourly forecast info

In the past it was possible to request a OWM 2.5 account as well.

Dashticz supports all three OWM APIs.

For the Onecall API 3.0 you have to provide a credit card number. However, the first 2000 API calls are free of charge. Further, on your OpenWeatherMap profile you can limit the number of daily allowed API calls, to prevent you accidentally make use of the service to often.

See https://home.openweathermap.org/subscriptions

If you want to use OpenWeatherMap One Call API 3.0 set provider to owm3 in your block definition.