
- Image via Wikipedia
“The principle definition of “partly cloudy” is opaque cloud covering 3-5 eighths (or oktas) of the sky as seen from a specific location. This can fall into either of your latter two definitions, as a snapshot in which one looks up and sees the sky 35-60 percent covered with opaque clouds at a given moment (like your number 3) or, if one totals up the amount of cloudiness over the course of a day and on average the amount of cloud cover is 3-5 oktas (like your number 2).” (from http://www.wral.com/weather/blogpost/3089051/)
… so my question is… how do I measure ‘oktas’ ? how do I take the 360 degrees of the sky and divide it geometrically to eights the easiest?
possible answer: http://www.weborix.com/8.htm
question remains, why use eights in the first place?