It’s a simple question with a few parameters… I do not want the cookie monster crazed sites that ask you what type of allergy medicines you take or if you like gardening more than cooking. I’m looking for a straight-up weather site that will be accurate and will sit nicely nestled in my taskbar so I can see it at all times, and have it warn me if “The Big One” is on the way. Thats all I wish… Any Ideas?
I like Weatherbug but I hear it is a cookie machine, that pops up all over the place when starting the computer.
Oh did I mention I’d like it to be free? Any Ideas?
The Weather Channel has a widget that they say has no spyware, but probably has some ads: http://www.weather.com/services/desktop.html They also have an ad-free version that you have to pay for.
My favorite is a FireFox extension, ForecastFox Enhanced… Sits in the statusbar and shows current info, forecast info, pops up with current weather changes, and a great radar available just by parking your mouse over the icon…
Another vote for Forecastfox: it’s highly customizeable and doesn’t clutter my desktop.
If Firefox ain’t your thang, I recommend getting the Yahoo Widget Engine and using their desktop weather widget. I keep my home computer on all of the time, and I use it there as quick way to check the current temp without having to start the browser.
(Google Desktop is similar to Yahoo’s widgets, and they have a weather thingie, but I haven’t tried it.)
I have the one from the weather channel. I like it. There are ads, but they’re pretty unobtrusive. It has tabbed browsing with a tab for today’s weather (current temp, high, low, humidity, etc), twelve hour forcast, severe weather info, and different maps. It also tells you the pressure and wind speed/direction. When it’s minimized, it’s a little blue box near your clock that tells the temperature. My only negative with it is that it blinks red when there is a severe weather warning. The blinking goes away when you click on it though, but it still bothers me.
That was the really early versions of Weatherbug that came bundled with Gator. Newer versions aren’t much of a problem except the one I had had a conflict of some sort so its embedded ads wouldn’t load properly and caused problems. I ended up uninstalling the thing and I still get the occasional spam from them!
I am not a big fan of yahoo but I love their weather widget. It is the most attractive one I have seen and although it sits on the desktop, it just floats under everything and looks pretty cool.