NZAPStrike Launch

[Tornado Tim]

Hey All,
It gives me great pleasure to announce that NZAPStrike is online

I have been working on this for quite a while and I do hope it will be of use to weather fans around the Oceania region.

Features:

• Filter by Strike Amplitude.

• Search by Amplitude,Lat-Long,Date and time of Strikes

• Heatmapping of strikes

• Storm Tracking

• Map and Storm Annotation

• Approx Storm Severity ratings

• Location based storm alerts when lightning comes close*

• NZ Thunderstorm Outlook and Watch Overlay- Courtesy of Metservice

*=Depends if your running a browser that supports the HTML5 geolocation API.
Compatibility:
This Webapp utilizes HTML5 functions and will work best with a browser that can render and use these functions preferably with hardware acceleration.
Some browsers that are fully supported:
Internet Explorer 9+, Google Chrome, Firefox, Safari 5.1+
More about Compatibility: http://nzapstrike.net/compatability.php

It has been an awesome learning experience developing this product and I have plenty of more ideas that I will add to NZAPStrike in future. It just got to the point if I didn't limit how many features I stick out in a version I would never release it. Coming from an IT(web dev) and weather background, I really would like to continue down this path for career.

This webapp is free for the Public however some features have been removed for Non-Blitzortung members.
Why I have done this: Since making the Blitzortung Oceania network with Ricky, I wanted to ensure that there always remains an incentive to join Blitzortung Oceania and see the network expand and gain more accuracy.

Feedback is much appreciated as always.....

URL: http://nzapstrike.net
Best Regards

Tim G
NZAPStrike Administrator

[GraemeWi]

Good on you Tim!

Love the MS outlook / watch overlays. HTML 5 nicely used and very slick!

Looking forward to having a couple of storms to watch to see how it goes

Cheers,

G

[David]

Well done Tim, looks very professional! The thunderstorm outlook overlay is excellent.

[jamie]

Awesome well done. Can't wait for a storm

[spwill]

Thanks Tim

[Manukau heads obs]

Good work!
Just trying on my phone...not sure if working on that
Correctly?

[Tornado Tim]

Just trying on my phone...not sure if working on that
Correctly?

Have you got an Andriod Phone? didnt you say you got a Nexus?
I did some testing on some iPhone's and it works well on there, but its extremely hard to test for all phones.

Could you email me more specifics.....

[Tornado Tim]

Thanks guys for the comments

[Manukau heads obs]

Hi
It's am Android...works ok with my wd steel gauges html5 page

[Richard]

well done ,looks good alright.

[Powermad]

VERY cool. Well done!

[BeaconHill]

Hey team
First chance to use the NZAPStrike site in anger today (well it made me happy actually!)

Very impressed by:
The accuracy of it
The overlay of MetService Warnings (SPOT on in this case)
The "Overhead storm warning" - I could hear thunder to the west from central Wellington at the time.

Screen grab I took at the time.

IMG_0737a.jpg

Keep up the GREAT work!!

[Tornado Tim]

Good to see its working well for you
Hopefully plenty more thundery periods occur to give it a good test out.

[Manukau heads obs]

I suspect the problem was I had not clicked to set my location

and so the map was out of bounds

[Tornado Tim]

and so the map was out of bounds

I havnt set any boundaries on the map because I will add Europe's and the U.S.A's data at a later date.

Is it working now? I have had several people test the site on an Andriod phone (using the Andriod Browser)- Using a Nexus one and they said it works fine.

There is Google Chrome for Andriod, could you give that browser a try and see how you fair.
I am actually really surprised they dont supply the chrome browser with andriod phone's after all the parent company's of both is Google.

[Manukau heads obs]

I tested on firefox
and the map was out of bounds initialy...for me...
and to fiddle around until eventualy I had a repeated a number of times whole world globe showing....just then had to zoom in to fix
so I presume that was the same problem I had my phone....i.e it does not know my position..maybe I have that turned off somewhere?

[jamie]

on my firefox at home it asks me permisson to get my location each time. if i ignore it, then i get a wide view of all of NZ. If i say yes it stupidly thinks im in auckland.

the same option happens on my phone with safari. But this time is actually gets my location correct.

[Tornado Tim]

on my firefox at home it asks me permisson to get my location each time. if i ignore it, then i get a wide view of all of NZ. If i say yes it stupidly thinks im in auckland.

the same option happens on my phone with safari. But this time is actually gets my location correct.

Yes that's normal behavior.
If you dont have GPS on your computer or phone, it will resort to using WIFI geolocation, failing that a GEOIP reference will be used.

GPS is best (if you have it), Wifi is second best.
Geo-location will not work very well if your PC is on a wired LAN (which I suspect what is happening with you Jamie).

If the geo-location thing annoys you by asking all the time, you can put nzapstrike in your location "allowed/deny" list, so it wont ask you again (this is a browser dependent setting).

It is best if you keep it enabled, to get the geographic based warnings.

[Manukau heads obs]

GPS on my phone (the symbol) does show up when called up by an application
e.g the met service app (and that knew my location as I went around the SI)
but that does not seem to be coming on?

anyway, I can only use my wireless home internet on my phone now...I blew out my mobile bandwidth while away

[Tornado Tim]

What Andriod version are you using Brian? Ice Cream Sandwich etc?......

[jamie]

yea i should have said it doesnt bother me one bit.

I think its fantastic and i cant wait to use it on the road chasing!!!!

[Tornado Tim]

I think its fantastic and i cant wait to use it on the road chasing!!!!

I havnt enabled the constant tracking of location yet...... (aka chaser mode).....

Do people want this? It would be ideal if you were chasing, however it has the potential to drain your phones battery more quickly as it will communicate with your GPS more often.

On a laptop, this wouldn't matter as much, but still I want to cater to mobile phone users.....

[Manukau heads obs]

I have not updated my android OS for a while
so maybe that is the problem...
its
2.3.5

thats whats official supported (HTC)

[Tornado Tim]

I have not updated my android OS for a while
so maybe that is the problem...
its
2.3.5

thats whats official supported (HTC)

That should be OK
The OS isn't so much the problem, its Androids stock standard browser (it's a year old on your phone).
Could you try the Android Chrome browser for me and post back results.
At least with that app you will get a regular update and it wont be dependent on the phone manufacturer to release a new version of the OS to get a new browser version.

[jamie]

na dont enable it. no need. you only look at it ever 10 mins or so so it just does a reload and re laction find.