Open-Meteo is the weather doorway Basky uses for ultraviolet. When you allow location, Basky asks for the live UV picture where you are; when you decline, the app stays usable with a generic fallback. Either path ends in the same philosophy: a conservative, personal safe-sun window — never a surveillance product wearing sunscreen cosplay.
This glossary-style guide explains why Basky chose a real UV lookup, what “coordinates only” means in practice, and how that data becomes minutes. Wider product story: how Basky works. Forecast vs now: UV forecast explained. Index meaning: what is the UV index.
Why a real UV source matters
The UV index is an international, erythemally weighted measure of sunburn-relevant ultraviolet. It changes with sun angle, ozone-related atmospheric fields, clouds, season, and place. Approximating it from “how bright my selfie looks” would be theater.
Basky needs:
- A live number (or best available nowcast/lookup) for timing a window.
- A day curve when offering gentle “best light around …” hints.
- A path that works without forcing an account.
Open-Meteo fits that lane: weather data in, UV out, so Basky’s Exposure Engine can stay focused on Fitzpatrick personalization and conservative dose math.
What Basky does with the number
| Step | Who does it |
|---|---|
| Provide UV for a place/time | Open-Meteo (when location allowed) |
| Combine UV with Fitzpatrick type | Basky |
| Apply ~60% MED conservatism | Basky |
| Clamp to roughly [5, 90] minutes | Basky |
| Refuse to reward over-exposure | Basky |
| Optional daylight check-in when UV is resting | Basky |
Open-Meteo does not know your skin type and does not run your streak. Basky does not pretend to be a weather research lab publishing novel UV science. No invented “Basky studies” — just a clear division of labor.
Privacy: coordinates for weather, not for identity
Basky’s promises are deliberate:
- No account required for the core ritual.
- No ads.
- No tracking product layered on top of sunshine.
- Location optional.
When you allow location, the meaningful payload is where to query UV — latitude and longitude for the weather lookup. That is different from building a dossier, selling a movement history, or tying your patio minutes to an advertising identity. Basky’s stance is: wellness tools should not need your whole life story.
If you are comparing UV index apps, ask who needs an account and who treats location as weather plumbing. Basky’s answer aims to be the boring, kind one.
What if you say no to location?
Decline is supported. A generic fallback keeps Today usable so you are not locked out of the habit for protecting privacy. Tradeoff: less local precision — coastal marine layers, mountain elevation, and street-by-street cloud edges may not match as tightly.
You can enable location later when you want the index to follow a hike, a beach day, or an altitude weekend. Permission is a dial, not a trapdoor.
Forecasts, hints, and honesty
Open-Meteo-backed fields also help Basky sketch the diurnal hill behind captions like “best light around 1:00 PM.” Those hints are weather context — see UV index by hour and best time of day for sun — not medical schedules.
Models drift. Clouds move. When forecast and live disagree, duration follows live UV. That honesty is part of anti-shame design: the sky changed; you did not fail.
What Open-Meteo UV is not
- Not a vitamin D blood test — Basky’s estimate, if shown, stays friendly and capped with safe-dose logic.
- Not a tanning coach — Basky will not optimize for color or more-is-better sun culture.
- Not a subscription gate — core is free; Basky Forever is optional one-time cosmetics.
- Not a replacement for sunscreen, shade, clothing, or clinicians.
For how long you should stay once the number arrives, see how long can I stay in the sun.
A short trust checklist
- Allow location only if you want local UV precision.
- Read the live index and your personal minutes.
- Bask briefly; stop kindly.
- On Low days, check in — low UV still counts.
- Remember who does what: Open-Meteo for sky data, Basky for gentle personal limits.
Why not a built-in phone “weather UV” only?
Phones and OS weather tiles vary by vendor and region. Basky standardizes on an explicit lookup path so the Exposure Engine always knows what it is computing against. Open-Meteo provides a clear weather/UV input; Basky provides Fitzpatrick personalization, conservative MED fraction, clamps, and the anti-shame ritual around check-ins.
That separation also clarifies responsibility. If the sky model updates, the minutes can change. If your skin type setting changes, the minutes can change. Neither change is a moral event.
Minimal data, maximal clarity
Basky’s privacy story is easier when the app does not require an account graph. Coordinates → UV lookup → local computation of a window is a short pipeline. No need to upload streak screenshots to a social network to “make sun count.” No need to watch an ad to reveal today’s band.
Coming-soon iOS positioning stays the same: free core, optional one-time Basky Forever cosmetics, no subscription hanging over the sky.
Accuracy expectations, kindly stated
Weather UV is an estimate of environmental conditions, not a spectrometer taped to your forearm. Courtyards, balconies under glass, and deep shade differ from the open-sky assumption behind an index. Basky tells you what the sky lookup says; you decide how your micro-environment modifies the day — usually by ending early, not by adding bonus minutes.
When hiking or traveling, enabling location keeps Open-Meteo queries aligned with your actual coordinates, including elevation-aware contexts the models support. Decline remains valid at home on the couch.
How this page fits the guide set
If you want the human meaning of the number, read what is the UV index. If you want bands, see the UV index scale. If you want timing, see UV index by hour. This page is only the doorway: whose weather, why privacy, how fallback works.
Now on iPhone. General wellness guidance, not medical advice; does not replace sunscreen.