New Met Éireann Website (beta)

I don't understand the disabilities message somebody posted here. I was diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder at a very young age yet I don't have much problems with navigation on the new site.

Sure, it's hard to navigate the first time. But like, the majority of sites are. You have not seen it before. If you were here when the old site was brand new for the first time, it would be as hard to navigate or get used to just like the new one. You can easily get used to it by giving it time and learn where everything is.

I have named my problems with the site such as some missing stuff and small errors. Navigation on the old site was one of my problems, I got lost at times and feel that they have cleaned up their act personally with the new site in this case.

So coming from a guy with a disability, I haven't a clue what you mean by the new site being difficult to navigate more than usual.

I'm usually a person who struggles to adapt to changes, I hate them. However, that's not the case with this site. I don't have a problem with them changing, I was one of the people who was wanting them to overhaul the site. They just need to up their game and fix the problems with the new site.

EDIT: Obviously I'm talking from a computer perspective, I cannot speak for the mobile app. I stay far away from all weather apps.

the app just freezes my android phone totally unusable

I found yesterday's weather. It wasn't hard.

https://www2.metweb.ie/latest-reports/observations/yesterday

sryanbruen wrote: »

I don't understand the disabilities message somebody posted here. I was diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder at a very young age yet I don't have much problems with navigation on the new site.

Sure, it's hard to navigate the first time. But like, the majority of sites are. You have not seen it before. If you were here when the old site was brand new for the first time, it would be as hard to navigate or get used to just like the new one. You can easily get used to it by giving it time and learn where everything is.

I have named my problems with the site such as some missing stuff and small errors. Navigation on the old site was one of my problems, I got lost at times and feel that they have cleaned up their act personally with the new site in this case.

So coming from a guy with a disability, I haven't a clue what you mean by the new site being difficult to navigate more than usual.

I'm usually a person who struggles to adapt to changes, I hate them. However, that's not the case with this site. I don't have a problem with them changing, I was one of the people who was wanting them to overhaul the site. They just need to up their game and fix the problems with the new site.

Good to hear that it works well for you. That doesn't mean that it works well for everybody, and certainly not for everybody with a disability. From my own quick reviews of it, I'd guess that many people with sight loss and many people with intellectual disabilities would have difficulties with it - but a good round of targeted user testing would confirm that either way.

gabeeg wrote: »

The new homepage has 10 accessibility issues. Most images are fine, but there are 9 in use that should have "alt text" so that people with screen readers can tell what they are.

The old homepage had at least 35 known accessibility issues. A myriad of different problems.

The new website uses a far better colour scheme for those suffering colour blindness. There may be some issues with the map (which isn't actually covered by the directive), but the colour scheme used is fully WCAG AA compliant.
In fact the starkness that some people have complained of is probably a direct result of a commitment to web accessibility.

So all in all I would have to say you're dead wrong

All in all, I would have to say that your understanding of web accessibility is poor to middling.

I'm not sure what tool you used to identify your '10 issues' but you might want to look again. Webaim's WAVE toolbar identifies 77 fatal issues, which is a very poor outcome for any newly developed site.

http://wave.webaim.org/report#/https://www2.metweb.ie/

But even if the result was 10 issues, why the hell should a brand new site paid for with public money be showing with 10 issues. It should work for everybody.

I'd also remind you that most accessibility issues are not picked up by automatic checkers. Last time I looked, about 1/4 of the WCAG guidelines could be tested using automatic checkers, leaving 3/4 of the guidelines that can't. There are many accessibility issues that will only show up in a detailed review by an experienced auditor and/or in user testing by a broad range of users, including people with different types of disabilities.

An auditor would ask questions like 'how is the information in the main map (rainfall radar/rainfall forecast/wind/temp/pressure) made available to a person with sight loss who can't see the map'. They would ask 'Why are many of the headings in ALLCAPS which is difficult for many people to read, especially people with dyslexia'. They would ask 'how is a person with sight loss supposed to navigate through the different options on the top map (Forecast overview/wind/temperature/pressure) given that there is no form label to explain what these fields relate to). They might ask how instructions like "Hover over weather type to display text meaning" can be followed by people with sight loss, or people who use certain types of assistive technology as their pointing device, or people who can't use a pointing device at all.

So all in all, it looks like a fairly poor job was done in accommodating the 1 in 7 people in Ireland that have some form of disability.

JCX BXC wrote: »

Maps are much more zoomable, offer more frequent timings and are more accessible.

As for people being "not computer literate", I think this new site is much much much easier to use for someone using it for the first time. The old site was very user unfriendly, with chunks of information plastered everywhere under folders with certain simple things taking ages to locate.

Perhaps, the only problem here is people don't like to adapt to things anew?

Exactly. While there are teething issues with its introduction, to say they should scrap it and go back to before is just nonsense and is typical of the way we react to change on this country. The bones of the new site has many new and better features than the old one. "Who needs 5-minute radar over 15-minute?" Statements like this annoy me as they're just a desperate attempt to find a fault to back up an argument to resist the change. Whatever about getting the colour shades sorted, anyone who says 5-minute is worse than 3 times that just doesn't have a clue.

I think it's clear we all have different passionate opinions which is wonderful

But I do not reject change I reject change when what has been changed in my own opinion is FAR worse than what was there that had just these things that could be changed and it would be excellent

Radar like it's Twitter or even left alone
Temperatures with decimals
Wind speeds in kph option

I'd leave the rest

But that's just me

Slate me if ye like. It's all great to see so many people passionate about the number 1 most exciting topic in the world.

My kids, are teen and pre teen and they are still using the old site as is myself. They and myself find it much easier to interpret the weather using the old site and they look at the atlantic maps and the past 6hr rain radar which seem to be absent on new site.

On the whole the layout of new site is fine, it's the content that we are most interested in is inferior.

Oneiric 3 wrote: »

People are quite capable of accepting change when that change is for the better, but in this case, it clearly isn't. As I said a few days ago, embracing change just for change sake just isn't enough and no foundation for anything.

There was nothing wrong with the old site. Any 'new' features, of which I can count to be about 1 or 2, could have been incorporated into the old site, without added sacrifice of the 3 hour maps or the Atlantic charts. I went on the new site once today to check the 'current conditions' and having had to scroll passed the parasitical Dublin Airport hourly reports, the current data itself takes at least two scrolls to try and get full picture, such is the enormity of it. On the old site, all the data was there on one screen, making it easier to compare and contrast all the reports from across the country. I am beginning to wonder if this new site is designed to be as off-putting as possible?

The old site was absolutely horrible to use on anything other than desktop. The mobile version was extremely limited and pretty much useless for anything other than checking the radar and forecast. Forcing the desktop site just loaded the full page on your screen so all the text and links were tiny. The new site is far from perfect but the responsive design makes for a far more useable site on mobile and tablet.

The new radar has 5 minute updates, higher resolution, zoomable map and most importantly it uses the NI radar so for the first time ever its actually useable for people in the north west. For people to suggest all that isn't an improvement is nonsense.

Gaoth Laidir wrote: »

Exactly. While there are teething issues with its introduction, to say they should scrap it and go back to before is just nonsense and is typical of the way we react to change on this country. The bones of the new site has many new and better features than the old one. "Who needs 5-minute radar over 15-minute?" Statements like this annoy me as they're just a desperate attempt to find a fault to back up an argument to resist the change. Whatever about getting the colour shades sorted, anyone who says 5-minute is worse than 3 times that just doesn't have a clue.

Is there anything that can actually be argued in favour of getting rid of the Atlantic Charts, the 5-day map forecast and the classic map graphics with the cloud / sun symbols on them a la the 9 O'Clock News?

Again, this isn't actually about changes to the layout - actual content has been removed altogether and has not been replaced with anything which conveys the same information. For instance: On the new site, there is literally no page whatsoever which will show you the lows, highs, and fronts for the Atlantic - IE, what's coming up next for Ireland after a few days. We will be forced to use some foreign website now to get that information. How is this in any way a change which can be defended or justified?

The only really annoying things for me are the fact it is hosted outside Ireland, no reason whatsoever for it and the radar colour scheme.

The amount of feedback here saying the new radar colours were awful but yet they went ahead anyway, not much point asking for feedback and then ignoring it.

I miss the weather maps feature i.e with fronts, and the weather overview with [ for example] only two symbols for the whole of munster is pretty feeble.

ringroser11 wrote: »

I miss the weather maps feature i.e with fronts, and the weather overview with [ for example] only two symbols for the whole of munster is pretty feeble.

Same for Connacht, and worse still, only one for Ulster.

my3cents wrote: »

A small point on the rainfall radar. Why should I have to move the large blue spot thats a very similar blue to the rainfall indication colours away from my location to check if its raining there?

I've come to the conclusion the colours on all the maps are created to look good rather than be as functional as possible.

Yep back earlier in thread this was raised a lot, the colour scheme is just not good for distinguishing rainfall intensity e.g. the current image from the much older scheme:

Oneiric 3 wrote: »

So, people who are rightly pointing out the flaws of the new site, of which there are many, are talking 'nonsense'. This in itself is nonsense. Isn't it deadly that the new site is favourable for mobile and tablet etc, while the 'desktop' experience has been sacrificed to the extent it that it genuinely does like something out of the early 90s, with its large fonts and horrible, archaic colour scheme?

For what it is worth, I tried using it on mobile, and as others have said, when trying to scroll down on the main page to see the forecast, you instead get to drag the cluttered rainfall map all over the gaff, of which on the old site, there was nothing wrong with, both in terms of design and colour scheme. Of course it is fab that the Belfast radar has been included, but this could have been included on the original radar too.

No, that was never my point and I've explained that again. I'm not sure how having a 5-minute radar now including the Belfast data is worse than a 15-minute one without it. That, to me, is nonsense.

Gaoth Laidir wrote: »

I'm not sure how having a 5-minute radar now including the Belfast data is worse than a 15-minute one without it. That, to me, is nonsense.

Well, to me it's not nonsense. My main gripe about the 5 min. radar intervals is that it seems to have made the previous 6 hrs.viewing time-span redundant and it is now only possible to see a short 3 hrs. 'look-back'.

Not useful if someone wants to check something like an overnight precip event. A 6 hr. timeframe with 5 min. intervals would probably prove very long and cumbersome, and though the 5 min. updates may be a desirable feature for many, it's a pity it necessitates a reduction in the viewing time range from 6 to 3 hrs.

No doubt different folks have different needs and priorities but still it's a pity that some previous useful features have been omitted in the update.

I'd also have thought the back & forward buttons on the radar wouldn't have been too much trouble to retain. Almost every other met. website has that feature. It's pretty much standard.

(Edit) The Belfast radar cover is indeed welcome, I have to agree.