🌦 Weather API

A simple Flask-based Weather API that fetches live weather data from the OpenWeatherMap API, caches results with Redis, and applies rate limiting to prevent abuse.

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🧰 Features

• 🌍 Get current weather by city name
• ⚡ Caching with Redis (12-hour expiry)
• 🚦 Rate limiting using Flask-Limiter
• 😎 Weather condition emojis for easy reading
• 🔐 Secure API key loading via .env

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🏗️ Tech Stack

• Flask — lightweight web framework
• Redis — in-memory cache for API responses
• Flask-Limiter — request rate limiting
• Requests — for external API calls
• python-dotenv — load environment variables
• OpenWeatherMap API — weather data source

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📦 Installation

1️⃣ Clone the repository

git clone https://github.com/yourusername/weather-api.git
cd weather-api

2️⃣ Create and activate a Conda environment

conda create -n weatherapi python=3.11 -y
conda activate weatherapi

3️⃣ Install dependencies

pip install flask flask-limiter requests redis python-dotenv

4️⃣ Install Redis (if you are using Anaconda Powershell and windows) check out this installation guide: https://medium.com/@baertschi91/redis-installation-guide-for-windows-67ca177e2836

conda install -c binstar redis-server
conda install -c anaconda redis-py

5️⃣ Run Redis on a powershell prompt in your conda environment

redis-server

6️⃣ On another powershell prompt you connect Redis using this

redis-cli ping

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🚀 Run the App

Sign in at OpenWeatherMap to get your free API key.

# .env
API_KEY=your_openweathermap_api_key

Running it on the command line or powershell

python app.py

By default, the app runs at:

http://127.0.0.1:5000

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🌤 Usage

Get current weather

http://127.0.0.1:5000/weather?city=<city_name>

http://127.0.0.1:5000/weather?city=london

Response:

{
  "city": "london",
  "temperature": "17°C",
  "emoji": "☁",
  "description": "scattered clouds"
}

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🧠 How It Works

• The user sends a request like /weather?city=london.
• The app first checks Redis cache using the key weather:london.
• If data exists → it’s served instantly from cache.
• If not → it fetches from OpenWeatherMap, parses, stores it in Redis (12-hour TTL), and returns JSON.

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Project Inspiration

Weather API Wrapper Service

Weather APP from Bro code