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Bug 672804 - [pull request] Add a Yahoo! Weather forecast provider
[pull request] Add a Yahoo! Weather forecast provider
Status: RESOLVED FIXED
Product: libgweather
Classification: Core
Component: general
unspecified
Other Linux
: Normal enhancement
: 3.6
Assigned To: libgweather-maint
libgweather-maint
: 329136 (view as bug list)
Depends on:
Blocks:
 
 
Reported: 2012-03-25 14:24 UTC by Giovanni Campagna
Modified: 2012-12-02 18:56 UTC
See Also:
GNOME target: ---
GNOME version: ---



Description Giovanni Campagna 2012-03-25 14:24:59 UTC
Yahoo! Weather provides weather information for all countries, which is a clear benefit over current US+AU+UK situation. I therefore implemented it (it's a pretty simple format anyway), you can find a branch at https://github.com/gcampax/libgweather/tree/yahoo-weather

Caveats:
 - YW needs a WOEID (WhereOnEarthID), which is not in the Locations.xml database. I added one for Milan for testing, but obviously more are needed. It could be the process can be automated (woeid are generated by the GeoPlanet service), or we could finally move away from Locations.xml and use geocode-glib instead.
 - YW is free, but only for non commercial use. I tried looking for a public domain service, but I found none, and the wiki has it, UK and AU offices are free for non commercial use too.
 - Only GWEATHER_FORECAST_LIST is implemented. The other modes are a hack really, and cannot be used to build a decent UI.
 - Only two days (today + tomorrow) of forecasts are provided. This impacts on weather app designs, as well as the evolution weather calendar, because they expect one week. It must be said, predictions longer than three days are very often inaccurate anyway.

Please note: the branch contains some other fixes, so please review and merge them even if you don't want YW.
Comment 1 Dan Winship 2012-03-25 15:15:15 UTC
(In reply to comment #0)
>  - YW is free, but only for non commercial use. I tried looking for a public
> domain service, but I found none

yr.no? (bug 563488)
Comment 2 Bastien Nocera 2012-03-26 09:40:51 UTC
I don't think we want to hit geocode-glib every time we want to look up a new location, but using geocode-glib to populate the locations.xml would be useful.
Comment 3 Vincent Untz 2012-03-26 09:46:50 UTC
(In reply to comment #0)
>  - YW is free, but only for non commercial use.

This is a blocker, as it will be an issue for nearly all of our downstreams. If we want to use YW, then we need to talk to Yahoo! about commercial use.
Comment 4 Bastien Nocera 2012-03-26 12:37:00 UTC
(In reply to comment #3)
> (In reply to comment #0)
> >  - YW is free, but only for non commercial use.
> 
> This is a blocker, as it will be an issue for nearly all of our downstreams. If
> we want to use YW, then we need to talk to Yahoo! about commercial use.

Commercial use is commercial use of the data given, not using the data "normally" in a commercial setting. I had the same question regarding their "not for commercial use" geocoding service, and was given the answer that using it in Free Software would be fine.
Comment 5 Bastien Nocera 2012-03-26 12:39:42 UTC
(In reply to comment #0)
<snip>
>  - Only two days (today + tomorrow) of forecasts are provided. This impacts on
> weather app designs, as well as the evolution weather calendar, because they
> expect one week. It must be said, predictions longer than three days are very
> often inaccurate anyway.

Is this only for some locations, or all of them? They seem to offer 5 day forecast on other platforms. I personally find it useful, even with the caveats.
Comment 6 Vincent Untz 2012-03-26 12:46:17 UTC
(In reply to comment #4)
> (In reply to comment #3)
> > (In reply to comment #0)
> > >  - YW is free, but only for non commercial use.
> > 
> > This is a blocker, as it will be an issue for nearly all of our downstreams. If
> > we want to use YW, then we need to talk to Yahoo! about commercial use.
> 
> Commercial use is commercial use of the data given, not using the data
> "normally" in a commercial setting.

I guess I don't really understand how to make the difference between the two. Is this clearly written down somewhere? Alternatively, can was ask our lawyers to evaluate this?
Comment 7 Dan Winship 2012-03-26 12:51:08 UTC
(In reply to comment #6)
> > Commercial use is commercial use of the data given, not using the data
> > "normally" in a commercial setting.
> 
> I guess I don't really understand how to make the difference between the two.

Yeah, like, if the weather app appears in a screenshot of RHEL, then does that constitute commercial use of the data on the part of Red Hat?
Comment 8 Bastien Nocera 2012-03-26 15:19:48 UTC
(In reply to comment #7)
> (In reply to comment #6)
> > > Commercial use is commercial use of the data given, not using the data
> > > "normally" in a commercial setting.
> > 
> > I guess I don't really understand how to make the difference between the two.
> 
> Yeah, like, if the weather app appears in a screenshot of RHEL, then does that
> constitute commercial use of the data on the part of Red Hat?

Snarfing the weather data to show it in a web page surrounded by adverts is "commercial use". As to the commercial use of screenshots, I never really understood the need of "copyright approval" to have somebody print screenshots of your application.

Anyway, IANAL, but I know that we can use the geocoding from Yahoo within GNOME, just not to build a geocoding service, or make the data ours.
Comment 9 Vincent Untz 2012-06-04 07:25:11 UTC
*** Bug 329136 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Comment 10 Giovanni Campagna 2012-12-01 15:11:08 UTC
I decided it's not up to me if non commercial is fine or not with a specific application, so I decided to expose the decision to application, with a bitmask of services to enable.

This is now implemented in wip/forecasts branch, and soon in master.
Comment 11 Giovanni Campagna 2012-12-02 18:56:37 UTC
This is in master now.