A Java desktop application I built to display the weather for a given location. Libraries I used include JavaFX, Jackson, and Apache HttpClient.
I really enjoy watching weather patterns and learning about meterology. I also find learning much more interesting when I can apply some real-world application or concepts to it. This project has been a way for me to practice and challenge myself in real time while I developed the program. It certainly isn't perfect, but I had a great time working through some of the challenges and plan to continue learning from it.
To build the application, open the project in NetBeans. Include the following libraries and run the application:
- OpenJDK
- Jackson
- Apache HttpClient
Initially, I thought I might add some basic input validation functions to ensure the user is entering valid zip codes or cities. I've been studying Java quite a bit lately, and I've learned some new concepts that I'd like to incorporate into the design as well. Here are some features that I would like to add or changes I'd like to make:
- Validate user input.
- Remove the hard coded API key.
- Add a 3 day forecast option by parsing the API response into an appropriate data structure.
- Clean up the source code to remove uneeded commented-out code (good code recudes the need for comments!)
- Convert the project into a Maven project to manage the dependencies and eliminate the need to use NetBeans.