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Apple themselves use it to count the number of flights of stairs you climb. Google uses it in Android phones for faster GPS and for indoor location mapping. I'
by cryptoz 11y ago
Apple themselves use it to count the number of flights of stairs you climb. Google uses it in Android phones for faster GPS and for indoor location mapping.
I'm using it to forecast the weather by crowdsourcing billions of live atmospheric pressure measurements at Sunshine (https://thesunshine.co https://thesunshine.co).
Other use cases are for migraine headache prediction/prevention and other health-related issues. The primary and most exciting use case however is weather forecasting!
Edit: Basically, barometers are useful for any altitude-related task, as their error margins for relative altitude changes are very small. Additionally, if you can filter out the altitude data as noise, you're left with atmospheric data, which has immense applications when crowdsourced at scale.
- andy_ppp 11y agoI was really excited about your app but it's not available in the UK app store yet...
- cryptoz 11y agoComing to the UK soon! We're constrained by geography in part due to where we run our weather models, but the UK is coming soon I think!
- kobayashi 11y agoIt's also used for emergency phone calls. When 911 calls are made, the barometric pressure is also relayed to give the emergency operators an idea of how high someone is, which is especially useful if the call is made from inside a building.
- Falcon9 11y agoIs it really? That's awesome.
- kobayashi 11y agoIndeed, it really is.
- krzyk 11y agoHow does it work? Isn't 911 just a voice call?
- cryptoz 11y agoE911, or Enhanced 911, is much more than just a voice call. For some time, E911 calls have sent sensor data from smartphones to the 911 dispatch, such as latitude and longitude. Soon, the FCC is going to mandate all barometer-carrying smartphones to send the barometric pressure when an E911 call is made. https://apps.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/FCC-15-9A1.pdf https://apps.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/FCC-15-9A1.pdf
- sbierwagen 11y agoWhat, really? I would figure GPS coords+altitude would be more useful than raw barometric pressure.
- kobayashi 11y agoBelow is the FCC hearing on the matter. The barometric pressure is used to determine the altitude. https://apps.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/FCC-15-9A1.pdf https://apps.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/FCC-15-9A1.pdf
- hyperduc 11y agoYour app looks great on paper so I downloaded it from the app store. It requested me to allow location access, even while in the background. This is a deal breaker for me for battery life and privacy, so I will not be able to use it. Edit: Upon checking in settings, I can choose "while using the app only". I understand you probably prompted with "while in the background" to improve your crowdsource data. I'm glad I will still be able to use it, thanks for allowing this!