Using the Weather package

The /whisk.system/weather package offers a convenient way to call the Weather Company Data for IBM Bluemix API.

The package includes the following action.

Entity	Type	Parameters	Description
/whisk.system/weather	package	username, password	Services from the Weather Company Data for IBM Bluemix API
/whisk.system/weather/forecast	action	latitude, longitude, timePeriod	forecast for specified time period

Creating a package binding with the username and password values is suggested. This way, you don't need to specify the credentials every time you invoke the actions in the package.

Setting up the Weather package in Bluemix

If you're using OpenWhisk from Bluemix, OpenWhisk automatically creates package bindings for your Bluemix Weather service instances.

1. Create a Weather Company Data service instance in your Bluemix dashboard.

Be sure to remember the name of the service instance and the Bluemix organization and space you're in.

2. Refresh the packages in your namespace. The refresh automatically creates a package binding for the Weather Company Data service instance that you created.

wsk package refresh

created bindings:
Bluemix_Weather_Company_Data_Credentials-1

wsk package list

packages
/myBluemixOrg_myBluemixSpace/Weather Bluemix_Weather_Company_Data_Credentials-1 private

Setting up a Weather package outside Bluemix

If you're not using OpenWhisk in Bluemix or if you want to set up your Weather Company Data service outside of Bluemix, you must manually create a package binding for your WWeather Company Data service. You need the Weather Company Data service user name, and password.

• Create a package binding that is configured for your Watson Translator service.

  wsk package bind /whisk.system/weather myWeather -p username MYUSERNAME -p password MYPASSWORD
  

Getting a weather forecast for a location

The /whisk.system/weather/forecast action returns a weather forecast for a location by calling an API from The Weather Company. The parameters are as follows:

• username: Username for The Weather Company Data for IBM Bluemix that is entitled to invoke the forecast API.
• password: Password for The Weather Company Data for IBM Bluemix that is entitled to invoke the forecast API.
• latitude: The latitude coordinate of the location.
• longitude: The longitude coordinate of the location.
• timePeriod: Time period for the forecast. Valid options are:
  • 10day - (default) Returns a daily 10-day forecast
  • 48hour - Returns an hourly 2-day forecast
  • current - Returns the current weather conditions
  • timeseries - Returns both the current observations and up to 24 hours of past observations, from the current date and time.
• host: Host for The Weather Company Data for IBM Bluemix

The following is an example of creating a package binding and then getting a 10-day forecast.

• Invoke the forecast action in your package binding to get the weather forecast.

  wsk action invoke myWeather/forecast --result \
  --param latitude 43.7 \
  --param longitude -79.4
  

  {
      "forecasts": [
          {
              "dow": "Wednesday",
              "max_temp": -1,
              "min_temp": -16,
              "narrative": "Chance of a few snow showers. Highs -2 to 0C and lows -17 to -15C.",
              ...
          },
          {
              "class": "fod_long_range_daily",
              "dow": "Thursday",
              "max_temp": -4,
              "min_temp": -8,
              "narrative": "Mostly sunny. Highs -5 to -3C and lows -9 to -7C.",
              ...
          },
          ...
      ],
  }