---
title: "Weather Cli"
---

# Project: Weather CLI

**Source:** `0-weather/`  
**Model:** `gemma4:26b`  
**Type:** Bash script

## The Prompt

```
write a bash script that uses wget to get the weather in new york city
```

That's it. One sentence. No clarifying questions, no spells — just a straightforward request.

## The Model's Reasoning

The model immediately recognized that `wget` alone can't render a weather webpage. It considered three options:

- **wttr.in** (chosen) — designed specifically for CLI weather, returns plain text
- **Weather APIs** (rejected) — requires API keys, adds friction
- **Scraping a site** (rejected) — fragile and difficult with just `wget`

It settled on `wttr.in` with the `?format=3` parameter for a single-line summary, then added error handling for missing `wget` and failed downloads.

## The Code

```bash
#!/bin/bash

# Define the location (New York City)
# Use underscores instead of spaces for the URL
LOCATION="New_York"

# The URL for the weather service
# wttr.in is a great service that provides terminal-friendly output
URL="https://wttr.in/${LOCATION}?format=3"

# Check if wget is installed
if ! command -v wget &> /dev/null; then
    echo "Error: 'wget' is not installed. Please install it to use this script."
    exit 1
fi

echo "--- Fetching Weather for $LOCATION ---"

# Use wget to fetch the data
# -q: quiet mode (hides download progress)
# -O-: sends the downloaded content to 'stdout' (the terminal) instead of a file
WEATHER_DATA=$(wget -qO- "$URL")

# Check if the download was successful
if [ $? -eq 0 ]; then
    echo "$WEATHER_DATA"
else
    echo "Error: Failed to retrieve weather data. Check your internet connection."
    exit 1
fi

echo "---------------------------------------"
```

## How to Run

```bash
chmod +x 0-weather/code
./0-weather/code
```

Or install it as a system command:

```bash
sudo mv 0-weather/code /usr/local/bin/weather
weather
```

## How to Customize

Change the `LOCATION` variable to any city:

```bash
LOCATION="Tokyo"
LOCATION="London"
LOCATION="San_Francisco"    # use underscores for spaces
```

For a full ASCII-art weather report instead of a one-liner, remove the `?format=3` from the URL:

```bash
URL="https://wttr.in/${LOCATION}"
```

## Key Lessons

- **The model knows about APIs.** It recognized `wttr.in` as the right tool for CLI weather without being told.
- **Simple prompts can work** when the task is well-defined and the solution space is narrow.
- **Error handling matters** even in tiny scripts — checking for `wget` and failed downloads makes it robust.
- **The model adds polish.** A one-sentence prompt produced commented, error-handled, production-ready bash.

**Next: [File Combiner →](/run-ai-locally/projects/file-combiner/)**