Tech Column: Beautiful Weather

by Bill Adler

Some people like complex, robust, sophisticated and nuanced beers. For others, anything cold in July that has bubbles will do.

The same thing goes for weather information: Some like it complicated with all the details; other people like their weather plain and simple. There are a zillion website and apps that offer up the weather forecast accompanied by as many details as there are raindrops during a downpour.

If you like your weather the way you like your burgers, uncluttered with things that can detract from the main event, take a look at WTHR, a minimalistic weather app that tells you what you need to know --temperature, sky conditions, and a quick look ahead-- in a beautiful design: http://wthr.co. Similar to WTHR is Weather Neue, a minimalistic app for iPhone http://bit.ly/Q7Z4pL and Android http://bit.ly/Q6pEAS, which gives you substance and a lot of style, without flashing doodads and cutesy clouds. WTHR and Weather Neue are so handsome that you might want to leave the app on all the time.

Beautiful Live Weather, http://bit.ly/NGsoTm, is a weather widget that shows the actual weather conditions. It's eye candy for Android. 1Weather for Android, http://bit.ly/Mx10YR , is another brilliant, minimalist app.

If you're looking for a weather app that's halfway between minimal and cluttered, take a look at Weather 2x, www.mcleanmobile.com/Weather2x, a stunning weather app for the iPad. Weather 2x shows the weather, but its main attractiveness comes from the sharp, clear weather images that fill the screen. Who says the the numbers themselves need to be the main focus of a weather app? Living Earth, www.livingearthapp.com, for iOS, will also dazzle.

Sure, there's a lot of complexity to the weather. But you don't have to see it all in one place.

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Bill Adler is the co-publisher of the Cleveland Park Listserv, www.cleveland-park.com. He is the author of "Boys and Their Toys: Understanding Men by Understanding Their Relationship with Gadgets," http://amzn.to/rspOft. He tweets at @billadler.

Bill Adler's weekly tech column will be on hiatus next week and will return on August 7.