Hello,

this is a plugin plugin that gives shows sun and moon position on the map and gives details about sunset and sunrise times as well as other sun and moon details. It is called windy-plugin-sun-position. To use the plugin on mobile, go directly to www.windy.com/plugins to open the plugin page (does not work in the app)

Version 0.3.0 adds moon details and options to disable astronomical details or blue/golden hour times

To open the display, right-click on the map (or tap and hold on mobile), then select "Sun Position". Then open a weather picker to see the sun dial and the details on the left.

Dial

The dial displays the current sun and moon azimuth on the map using a black line from the picker position. Additionally, dashed lines show the azimuth of sunrise and sunset and dotted lines show the azimuth of moonrise and moonset. Clicking on the sunrise, sunset, moonrise and moonset lines will set the current time to the respective time.

Detail pane

The detail pane on the left shows the time of astronomical, nautical, and civil dusk and dawn; start and end of blue and golden hour and solar noon. Moonrise and moonset times are also added to the timeline. Below, a diagram of the sun and moon altitudes over time is displayed. Below that, details about the current sun and moon position are shown.

On the top of the detail pane it is possible to enable and disable individual displays. The telescope toggles visibility of astronomical sun details (astronomical and nautical dawn and dusk). The camera toggles visibility of blue and golden hour times. The moon toggles visibility of moon details.

Changelog

V0.1.0

Original release

V0.1.1

Fixed timezone issues:

• Displays times in timezone of position selected (instead of local timezone of user)
• When Windy setting to display all times in UTC is selected, displays all times in UTC

V0.2.0

• The hook has been changed from the Overlay layers menu to the context-menu.
• Displays only times that exist: If the sun does not go far enough below the horizon, astronomical dawn and dusk might not exist and the entire night is astronomical twilight. In this (and more extreme) cases the non-existent times are hidden
• The plugin now works on mobile (thanks @rittels for the help)
• Fixed some delay issues that resulted from the timezone-lookup

V0.3.0

• reworked detail phase
• included details about the moon
• fixed blue hour times
• redesigned current sun position display
• added options to disable moon, astronomical details and photography details separately
• added footnote with links to plugin pages

V0.3.1

• desktop sidebar hotfix (broken by change on windy)

V0.3.2

• fixed plugin loading issue (broken by change on windy)
• changed timezone lookup to tz-lookup package
• added query string

V0.3.3

• fixed plugin loading issue (broken by change on windy)

V0.3.4

• fixed issue finding location (broken by change on windy)

Hi @stitch ,

I have just published a new version (v0.1.1) that fixes this problem. Now, times are displayed in the timezone of the position selected. If you want to see the times in UTC, you need to enable the "Display all times in UTC" option (zuluMode) in the windy settings.

Jochen

I've now released version 0.3.3 that fixes the loading issues. Sorry for the delay.

I have just released version 0.3.0 of the plugin! This update adds details about the moon position. The moon position is shown on the map similar to the sun position. Additional dotted lines show the moonrise and moonset directions. The detail pane also includes the moonrise and moonset times and some details about the current position of the moon. The moon display can be hidden by clicking the moon button the top of the details pane.

Furthermore, I have added options to hide some sun details, grouped by Astronomical and Photography. Astronomical shows astronomical, nautical and civil twilight times and Photography shows blue and golden hour times. Both groups can be enabled together, showing all times as before the update (nautical twilight was wrongly labeled blue hour before the update, while blue hour really is part of the civil twilight).

I've just released version 0.3.1 to fix the sidebar issue caused by windy changes.

I have just released version 0.2.0 of the plugin. It hides the times that do not exist in the detail pane and now supports the mobile page (see changelog in the post on top). To facilitate mobile usage the hook to access the plugin has changed from the Overlay menu to the context menu. Simply right-click the map (or tap and hold on mobile) and click on "Sun Position" to open the plugin

I have just released version 0.3.2 of the plugin. The plugin was broken because the pluginDataLoader changed. I only used the pluginDataLoader for a timezone lookup. As that wasn't a good solution anyway I am now using the tz-lookup package instead. So hopefully it wont break as easily in the future.

Furthermore this update makes use of the query string: For example you can now directly open https://www.windy.com/plugins/windy-plugin-sun-position?photoSun=true&astroSun=false&moon=false to get only photography sun details.

Plugin version 0.3.6 fixes the loading issues caused by changes to windy. Sorry it took this long.

This is now the 5th time in 4 years I had to update the plugin because some change to windy broke it. If this trend continues, I can't guarantee that I'd be willing/able to do this in the future - especially if the info about the breaking changes comes from users complaining that it doesn't work anymore; some less polite than others. Unless things change, this is no longer an ecosystem I want to spend time contributing to.

So if someone else wants to take over the maintenance of this plugin - or rewrite it - they are more than welcome to do so; otherwise this might be the last update. Thanks for the support until now though!

@marco-1v Ehm, I am not sure how that could happen. Maybe some caching problem? That seems to be more of a bug inside windy. Try to specify the version by entering windy-plugin-sun-position@0.2.0 as the plugin name

Besides that, I have made a mistake such that is shows that it is on version 0.1.1 while it is actually on version 0.2.0 (and 0.1.0 if it is actually on version 0.1.1).

Alright, I see your points.

(1) That makes sense, but maybe the module could have a simple logic that checks if an older version is already enabled and disables that one, so the newest version that is a dependency of any installed plugin is used.

(2) Right, but that doesn't include the possibility to keep the svg together with another plugin. Ideally, I would like to have a function onOtherPluginUsesPicker() that is called before another plugin wants to draw something at the picker; triggered by that plugin calling plugin_coordinator.usePicker(). Also, a parameter with the other Plugins name would make sense in these callbacks so you can whitelist other plugins that are compatible.

(4) Cleaning up the csv is a bit annoying. I still think that having a module for standard plugin csv stuff (windy object z-levels, bottom panes on mobile etc.) would make sense and simplify plugin development.

I'll take a look at the module code tomorrow again and maybe try out some of these things myself :)

Plugin version 0.3.6 fixes the loading issues caused by changes to windy. Sorry it took this long.

This is now the 5th time in 4 years I had to update the plugin because some change to windy broke it. If this trend continues, I can't guarantee that I'd be willing/able to do this in the future - especially if the info about the breaking changes comes from users complaining that it doesn't work anymore; some less polite than others. Unless things change, this is no longer an ecosystem I want to spend time contributing to.

So if someone else wants to take over the maintenance of this plugin - or rewrite it - they are more than welcome to do so; otherwise this might be the last update. Thanks for the support until now though!

I've now released version 0.3.4 that fixes another loading issue that resulted from changes on windy.

I've now released version 0.3.3 that fixes the loading issues. Sorry for the delay.

@idefix37 @JHMARSHAL Sorry about that. I haven't kept track of windy the updates. I'll fix the plugin when I find the time to do so (hopefully soon).

@rittels

No, the golden hour is defined as sun elevations between 6 degrees above and 4 degrees below the horizon. So the golden hour does start before the sunset and also continues until after sunrise. The entire time range in orange is the Golden Hour. Also, in very high latitudes the entire day might be "golden hour" as the sun never reaches higher than 6 degrees above the horizon.

(Also see the screenshot in the original post, it was always this way ;) )

I have just released version 0.3.2 of the plugin. The plugin was broken because the pluginDataLoader changed. I only used the pluginDataLoader for a timezone lookup. As that wasn't a good solution anyway I am now using the tz-lookup package instead. So hopefully it wont break as easily in the future.

Furthermore this update makes use of the query string: For example you can now directly open https://www.windy.com/plugins/windy-plugin-sun-position?photoSun=true&astroSun=false&moon=false to get only photography sun details.

@Oilyan @vsinceac I'm not sure what the problem is. I just tried it again and for me, it still works for me (both on PC and on mobile). You should be able to find the option to open it in the context menu (right-click on the map on PC; long tap on the map on mobile). You can move the picker afterward as well, just make sure not to clock on a city label as that opens the weather forecast and closes the plugin pane.

Alright, I see your points.

(1) That makes sense, but maybe the module could have a simple logic that checks if an older version is already enabled and disables that one, so the newest version that is a dependency of any installed plugin is used.

(2) Right, but that doesn't include the possibility to keep the svg together with another plugin. Ideally, I would like to have a function onOtherPluginUsesPicker() that is called before another plugin wants to draw something at the picker; triggered by that plugin calling plugin_coordinator.usePicker(). Also, a parameter with the other Plugins name would make sense in these callbacks so you can whitelist other plugins that are compatible.

(4) Cleaning up the csv is a bit annoying. I still think that having a module for standard plugin csv stuff (windy object z-levels, bottom panes on mobile etc.) would make sense and simplify plugin development.

I'll take a look at the module code tomorrow again and maybe try out some of these things myself :)

Seems like good idea.

A few things to consider:

• The fact that the plugin version has to be specified is a bit annoying as it would require new plugin versions every time this module is updated. Also, if I understand the code correctly it is not loaded again once it is loaded once (irrespective of version) so if one plugin loads an old version and then another plugin requires something from a newer version, it would break.
• It would be good to have a standard way to close/disable a plugin other than just closing the pane. In my case in the sun-position plugin, it would be good to be able to keep the dial at the picker open while the pane is closed. However, you should still be able to close it somehow...
• A minor bug: On mobile, the load button is grayed out but still says "Load" instant of "Loaded"

I think it is a good idea to have a community-driven module that handles these things (whether included in windy directly or as dependencies of other plugins). It could also include some CSS changes needed on windy stuff so that plugins are less likely to interfere with each other. For example, my sun-position plugin includes

#device-mobile #bottom {
	z-index: 2; // makes timeline appear on top of the pane in mobile
}

to make sure the timeline is in front of the bottom pane on mobile. Other plugins with fullscreen panes might want to be displayed in front of the timeline, so having a fixed z-index everyone can count on (that is larger than 0) would be good. I am sure other plugins have some of these "hacky" things as well...

As a final note, could you put these modules into their own GitHub repo? That would make cooperation on additional features easier. (And having them in a fork of windy-plugins doesn't quite make sense.)

Two things that would be great for the alert system:

• More layers. As a photographer I would like to get a notification when only high clouds (and no low or medium clouds) are present. Simply adding cloud-base as a condition would be great
• Daylight dependent timing. It is currently a bit annoying to set an alert to only trigger during daytime as it is changing over the year. Also, a setting "at sunrise" and "at sunset" could be helpful.