Former Apple engineers launch new Acme Weather app: 6 features that make it different from others

Creators of Dark Sky that sold their popular weather app to Apple in 2000 are back with yet another weather forecast app. Called Acme Weather, the app claims to offer a more reliable forecast than existing weather apps.

Announcing the Acme Weather via a blog post, the company said “Our biggest pet peeve with most weather apps is how they deal (or rather, don’t deal) with forecast uncertainty. It is a simple fact that no weather forecast will ever be 100% reliable: the weather is moody, fickle, and chaotic”. With Acme Weather, the forecast is supplemented with a range of alternate predictions for better accuracy. “Rather than pretending we will always be right, Acme Weather embraces the idea that our forecast will sometimes be wrong,” the blog post stated. In this article, we list 6 features that make Acme Weather app stand out from others

Alternate Predictions

The company says that most of the time, the app’s weather forecast will be a reliable source of information, adding “Weather is unpredictable, and forecasts are sometimes wrong”.

Instead of a single guess, Acme Weather will display alternate predictions: multiple forecast lines reveal how confident the prediction is and what else might happen.

Community Reports

The app will allow its users to submit a report of the current conditions, which are displayed on a map for all users to see. “Current conditions often evolve quickly during storms, radar is imperfect and can fail to detect precipitation during light rain, snow versus freezing rain can be volatile, etc.

To address this, we’ve built a feature that allows any user to submit a report of the current conditions near them,” the company said.Users will be able to choose from a pre-selected list of weather condition icons. Acme Weather will also notify its users if there are recent community reports in their area.

Acme Weather’s ‘Beautiful’ Maps

Maps on Acme Weather will include radar and lightning, rain and snow totals, wind, temperature, cloud cover, hurricane tracks, and more.

The most relevant maps appear automatically inside the main forecast tab.

Down to the Minute

Acme gives you down-to-the-minute precipitation forecasts for precise location, with a map that shows exactly when the rain or snow will hit.

Advanced Notifications

Acme has notifications for rain and snow, government severe weather alerts, nearby lightning, community reports, and daily summaries. Additionally, users will be able to custom notifications tailored to what they care about.

Acme Labs

The company has also created experimental tools inside the app to highlight interesting things happening where you are, such as rainbow alerts and beautiful sunsets.