Hacker News

Hengefinder: Finding When the Sun Aligns with Your Street

44 points by evakhoury 24 hours ago | 14 comments

lefra 3 hours ago

It would be nice to be able to access the website on a smartphone (even if the experience is suboptimal), instead of denying access.

HPsquared 2 hours ago

Smartphones have the huge advantage of direction sensors (3D magnetometer and gyro). I remember using apps like Google sky map (or something like that) way back in 2011 to look at satellites and planets.

pierrec 2 hours ago

Interesting, I've planned similar shots before and used different tools that serve a similar purpose. The Photographer’s Ephemeris has nice visualizations: https://photoephemeris.com/

NASA's Horizons ephemeris is also pretty good at preparing data for this. I've used it with a little script to check when the sun/moon will be in a given box. This hengefinder looks neat and really streamlined for its purpose though.

normie3000 58 minutes ago

I lived a long time in a city near the equator with a prominent east-west street. Commuting west to east in the morning and east to west in the evening meant frequent hengings. The roads don't feel particularly safe when you can't see anything. The town planners might have considered this.

normie3000 56 minutes ago

Additionally I have visited Stonehenge and it's sterilised and disappointing being unable to walk amongst the stones. Thank you for your attention to this matter.

4ndrewl 3 hours ago

Stonehenge of course, famously not a henge.

tdb7893 2 hours ago

Apparently the word "henge" comes from the name Stonehenge but Stonehenge has the ditch on the wrong side of the bank to technically be a henge.

For any other curious people: https://www.english-heritage.org.uk/visit/inspire-me/what-is...

4ndrewl 27 minutes ago

Ye - also the henge is the circular ditch, not the stone circle or whatever in the centre

thisisauserid 2 hours ago

Manhattanhenge is cool but people standing in the middle of street for it is pretty nuts.

idbnstra 2 hours ago

it’s nuts that more streets in manhattan aren’t pedestrianized

donalhunt 3 hours ago

Mobile app not available in your country. :(

metalman 2 hours ago

then use a stick™

hint, watch the sticks shadow

other hint, can use almost anything that casts a shadow, as a stick substitute.

* even more hints availible with stick™ pro

sonofhans 2 hours ago

I’d like to subscribe to stick™ pro! I tried a piece of string and it waved around in the wind and didn’t work, so I think I may need a paid service for this.

fuzzfactor 2 hours ago

It would be good to also have the option for alignment with sunrises in addition to sunsets.

For instance in Houston the sunrise aligns with Texas Avenue around the June solstice.

Consequently, there are no sunset alignments for the downtown skyscrapers.