Support
Help for Sun Window, a Garmin widget that shows whether the sun is in today’s window.
Contact
Questions or bugs: email hello@verden.watch. Please include your watch model and its software version, where you were (the country is enough), and what Sun Window showed at the time.
How to read it
The glance in your watch’s glance list shows one word: OPEN or CLOSED (NONE TODAY only where the sun does not rise). Open the app for the picture: today’s sun path, the part inside today’s window drawn thick, and a dot for the sun now (filled while the window is open). On a day the window is the time above 45 degrees, a dashed line marks that height. On a day the window is the two midday hours the picture shows the day’s arc with that window thick at the top and no dashed line. Under it are the word, one line that says why it is closed, and today’s times. Some older watches have no glance list; there Sun Window is in the widget list and opens straight to the app.
The settings
There is one: Accent colour, a short list (Sky, Mint, Amber, Pink, Violet or White). Change it in the Garmin Connect app (open Sun Window’s settings there) or from the app’s own menu on the watch. It only colours the thick part of the sun’s path and the dot; it never changes what a state means. On the Forerunner 55’s eight-colour screen the list is Sky, Mint, Amber and White. The black-and-white Instinct has no colour setting.
Common questions
The glance says “Open once”.
Sun Window has not found where you are yet. Open the app once and wait for the picture; your watch’s last known place is usually enough and arrives at once. After that the glance shows the state by itself.
It says “Finding your place”, then “No place yet”.
Your watch has no usable position right now. Press START to ask again, ideally outdoors or at a window. Sun Window never guesses a place.
It says “Low sun”.
Today’s highest sun stays under 45 degrees, the normal state for much of the winter in the north (at the latitude of Vilnius the sun reaches that height only from about mid April to late August). The window is then the two midday hours around the sun’s highest point.
It says NONE TODAY.
The sun does not rise today where you are (polar night).
It says CLOSED, “Low UV” or “Cloud cover”.
Your watch’s own weather reports a low UV index (on a day the sun climbs well above 45 degrees) or heavy cloud (on every other day), so an open window shows as closed. Which of the two applies is set for the whole day, not by the sun’s height at the moment. If you think the watch’s reading is wrong, that is the watch’s weather, notSun Window’s.
It says “No weather”.
The watch gave no weather reading, or its weather does not report UV index and cloud cover (many older watches), so the sun’s path alone decides and the window is never closed for the sky. On a low-sun day it says “Low sun, no weather” (“No weather” where the screen is too small). Nothing is hidden or guessed.
I travelled and it looks wrong.
Sun Window updates your place whenever you open the app. After a trip, open it once; the glance is right again after that.
How long does the app stay open?
When you open it from the glance the watch closes it by itself after about two minutes without a button press.
What does it store?
Your place, rounded to a tenth of a degree, your accent colour, and two dates it uses to ask for a rating at most once a month. See the privacy policy.