SunnyTracker Widgets

Description

Show your visitors when the sun rises and sets – on a campsite, hotel, wedding venue, sailing club, fishing or photography blog. Everything updates itself every day.

Two blocks for the block editor

  • SunnyTracker widget – a small card: sunrise & sunset with day length, moon phase with moonrise and moonset, golden hour for photographers, or a countdown to the next solar or lunar eclipse. Light, dark or following the visitor’s mode, three sizes, ten languages, your accent colour. Try them all on sunnytracker.com/widgets.
  • Sun & moon times – the day’s times as plain text in your theme’s fonts and colours: sunrise, sunset, solar noon, sun height at noon, civil, nautical and astronomical twilight, blue and golden hour, day length, moonrise, moonset and moon phase. Pick the fields, list or table, today or tomorrow. Search engines read it like the rest of your page.

Both blocks have a city search built in. For a place outside town – a campsite, a beach, a venue – use coordinates instead.

Shortcodes for the classic editor, page builders and text widgets, including a single time inside a sentence: “Sunset tonight: [sunnytracker_time city="hamburg" field="sunset"]”.

Sidebar widget for classic themes under Appearance Widgets.

Settings SunnyTracker sets the default city, language and colours for the whole site.

Times are calculated by SunnyTracker with the NOAA solar algorithm (refraction included) and Meeus lunar theory. Polar night and midnight sun are handled. No account and no API key needed.

Shortcodes

Card:

[sunnytracker city="berlin" type="golden-hour" theme="dark" size="large" lang="de" accent="3b82f6"]
  • city – the city’s slug as in its SunnyTracker address (sunnytracker.com/new-york new-york)
  • type – sunrise (default), moon, golden-hour, solar-eclipse, lunar-eclipse
  • theme – light, dark, auto
  • size – compact, default, large
  • lang – en, de, fr, es, it, pl, nl, pt, ja, zh
  • accent – colour as hex without #

Times as text:

[sunnytracker_times city="berlin" show="sunrise,sunset,day_length,moon_phase" layout="table" date="tomorrow"]

[sunnytracker_times lat="54.18" lon="7.89" tz="Europe/Berlin" name="Heligoland harbour"]
  • show – any of astronomical_dawn, nautical_dawn, civil_dawn, blue_hour_morning, golden_hour_morning, sunrise, solar_noon, noon_altitude, sunset, golden_hour_evening, blue_hour_evening, civil_dusk, nautical_dusk, astronomical_dusk, day_length, moonrise, moonset, moon_phase
  • layout – list (default) or table
  • date – today (default), tomorrow or YYYY-MM-DD
  • title – yes (default) or no for the heading with place and date
  • lat, lon, tz – coordinates and time zone instead of a city; name – the place name for the heading

A single value:

[sunnytracker_time city="berlin" field="sunset" date="tomorrow"]

All shortcodes and blocks take credit="yes" or credit="no" for the source link; without it the site-wide setting applies.

External services

This plugin relies on SunnyTracker (www.sunnytracker.com), which computes the sun and moon times. Without it the plugin shows nothing.

  • Cards (block “SunnyTracker widget”, shortcode [sunnytracker], sidebar card): the visitor’s browser loads the card as an iframe from www.sunnytracker.com each time a page with it is viewed. Like any web request this sends the visitor’s IP address, browser user agent and the address of the page it is embedded in, plus the chosen city and display options. SunnyTracker counts these views anonymously; it sets no cookies and stores nothing on the visitor’s device.
  • Text times (block “Sun & moon times”, shortcodes [sunnytracker_times] and [sunnytracker_time]): your web server requests https://www.sunnytracker.com/api/v2/sun with the chosen city or coordinates, time zone and date, at most once per place and day (answers are cached). Nothing about your visitors is sent. The request carries your site’s address in the user agent.
  • City search in the block editor: your web server sends the typed search text to https://www.sunnytracker.com/api/v2/cities. Only logged-in editors can use it.

SunnyTracker: privacy policy – legal notice – API documentation

Screenshots

Blocks

This plugin provides 2 blocks.

  • Sun & moon times Today's sunrise, sunset, twilight, golden hour, moonrise and moon phase for a city or coordinates – as text in your theme's style.
  • SunnyTracker widget Sunrise & sunset, moon phase, golden hour or an eclipse countdown for a city – as a small card.

Installation

  1. Install the plugin under Plugins Add New and activate it.
  2. Optional: set your city and language under Settings SunnyTracker.
  3. Add the block “SunnyTracker widget” or “Sun & moon times” to a post or page – or use a shortcode.

FAQ

How do I find the slug of my city?

The blocks have a city search. For shortcodes, search for your city on sunnytracker.com and take the last part of the address, e.g. new-york from sunnytracker.com/new-york.

Does the plugin add a link to my site?

Only if you want it: a small “SunnyTracker” source link can be switched on under Settings SunnyTracker or per block and shortcode. It is off by default.

Does it set cookies or slow down my pages?

No cookies. The text times are fetched on your server once per place and day and then cached, so your pages do not wait for SunnyTracker. The cards load lazily as iframes. Details under “External services”.

The card is cut off in a narrow column

The cards have a fixed width: 280 px (compact), 320 px (default) or 380 px (large). In a narrow column or sidebar choose “Compact”, or use the “Sun & moon times” block, which fits any width.

What if SunnyTracker cannot be reached?

Visitors see nothing where the times would be; logged-in editors see a short note. The plugin tries again after ten minutes.

Reviews

There are no reviews for this plugin.

Contributors & Developers

“SunnyTracker Widgets” is open source software. The following people have contributed to this plugin.

Contributors

Translate “SunnyTracker Widgets” into your language.

Interested in development?

Browse the code, check out the SVN repository, or subscribe to the development log by RSS.

Changelog

1.1.0

  • New block “Sun & moon times” and shortcodes [sunnytracker_times] / [sunnytracker_time]: the day’s times as text – sunrise, sunset, twilight, golden and blue hour, day length, moonrise, moonset, moon phase – for a city or coordinates.
  • New block “SunnyTracker widget” with city search and live preview.
  • New sidebar widget for classic themes.
  • New settings page for site-wide defaults; the language follows the site language.
  • The source link is now opt-in, site-wide or per widget.

1.0.0

  • First release.