Joel Wilson

Thanks Penny! I'm still around, just busy with work and other projects, but CIFMK is always in the back of my mind, and it definitely won't be going anywhere anytime soon. I forgot to mention that a Weather Underground employee finally got back to me. Apparently the likely cause of the wrong station being selected is in fact a mapping bug and they are working on updating their maps this year, so hopefully it gets fixed soon! A few things that are at the top of my CIFMK todo list are: better mobile support, "weather" page redesign, and auto-complete

Kite Romantic - yes unfortunately live data only exists where there are weather stations! Weather Underground partners with lots of people that set up their own stations which is pretty cool. If you have cash burning a hole in your pocket, maybe you can get one set up near your kite field. Nick - I haven't checked out yet! You aren't too critical; I love it! In fact, you pointed out what appears to be a little bug. I've posted about it on the Weather Underground's forum. Hopefully they come back with some good news!

Sorry for all the confusion Nick, and I of course mean well. I see what the problem is, and I don't know if it is a bug with wunderground or...what, but here it is: The default weather info given for Nags Head is from a station almost 40 miles away in Avon, even though there are much closer stations at the airports in Kill Devil Hills (great name) and Manteo, so I'm a little bit at a loss. Maybe it's the interesting geography there? I'll see if I can't contact them and get an answer or workaround, such as showing the closest station instead of the "in network" stations for all locations. I really do appreciate the feedback. I don't get a whole lot, so every bit helps tremendously.

Thanks for the feedback, Reef! Unfortunately, wind is a finicky thing. Trees, elevation, hills, houses, etc...they all can muck things up. The data for CIFMK all comes from the Weather Underground, and they get their data from different sources, so depending on which weather station is closest to your location, you will get the most current data they have. For example, they a ton of weather stations in their own network that can be giving updates very frequently (every few seconds), but they also pull from government weather stations that only update every hour. If the only station near you is the government station, the wind speed reading may be a little stale. I've done a lot of research into getting current weather data, and they seem to be among the best. See http://www.wunderground.com/about/data.asp It might be a fun exercise to compare what CIFMK says vs what you actually experience!

@Joe - yes they are real-time weather conditions! @Dayhiker - Thanks for the feedback! I had not thought of people using gliders before...definitely something to think about. Yes it seems wind surfers have lots of attention in the app arena, so I'm not too worried about them. Forecasting is something that is very doable, and I'd like to get in place. I do like the idea of setting up alerts - maybe send an email or text message when your location is windy enough (speed chosen by you or not). I've updated my "idea book"!

As a personal project and hobby, I created a fun web app for kite fliers to find out if the weather at a specific location is good for flying. I'm posting it here because I think some of you might find it useful and I enjoy hearing feedback (good or bad) so I can improve it. Let me know what you think! http://www.caniflymykite.com/