Weather with Doppler, in words

Field Notes

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Questions you can ask

Tap the microphone button in Ask Doppler, wait for the “Listening” message, and ask out loud — or type your question instead. Doppler answers in words and reads the answer out loud. You can ask things like:

• The weather somewhere else: “What's the weather in Chicago?” or “Will it rain in Tokyo tomorrow?” Name any city, state, or country in the world. Doppler looks that place up live, answers about that place, and says its name first. For a state or country, he reports from a well-known city there and tells you which one. Answers use that place's own units and its own local time — Celsius and kilometres per hour in most of the world, Fahrenheit and miles per hour in the United States — and “today” and “tomorrow” always mean that place's days, not yours. Speak naturally, with or without commas, and close spellings are fine.
• What to wear: “What should I wear today?” or “What should I wear in Chicago tomorrow?”
• What to do: “What should I do in Biloxi today?” or “Is it a good beach day in Biloxi?” Doppler reasons over that place's real forecast and answers with a verdict, the best hours to be out, the hours to avoid, and what to wear or carry. You can also ask for advice, like “What should I do if it snows?” — he first checks whether that weather is actually in the forecast for your place, then gives practical guidance — or a plain question like “What's the difference between a watch and a warning?”
• A specific place in a city: “What's the weather outside the news station in Savannah, Georgia?”, “What's the weather outside of the E 93 radio station?”, or “What's the weather outside the grocery store in Savannah, Georgia?” Doppler looks the place up live at question time — radio and TV stations, grocery stores, pharmacies, hospitals, schools, airports, and more — names the exact spot he picked out loud, and leads with what it's like right outside it right now. If two spots fit equally well, he asks you one short question naming both. If he can't pin the exact address, he says so plainly and gives you the weather for that part of town instead — never a made-up spot.
• Follow-up questions: Doppler keeps track of the last place you asked about, so follow-ups like “Will it rain there tomorrow?” or “And this weekend?” keep talking about that same place.
• Your name: tell Doppler “My name is…” and he'll remember it on this device. The “Forget me” button in Ask Doppler clears your name and your saved place from this device.

Voice activation and the chime

Tap “Turn on voice activation” in Ask Doppler, then just say “Doppler” or “Ask Doppler” and then your question — no tap needed. When Doppler starts listening, you'll hear a short two-tone chime — that sound means he's listening.

Voice activation works only while this page is open; it can't listen when the page is closed. On iPhone the browser may stop the listening after a while — if that happens, the status line in Ask Doppler will say so, and one tap on the button turns it back on.

Doppler speaks in his own built-in voice — your screen reader stays yours. Answers are written on the page for you to read on demand; they are never pushed to your screen reader as announcements.

Your privacy

While Doppler waits for the wake word, nothing is recorded or sent anywhere. Only a question you actually speak is handled, exactly like the microphone button.

Where the weather comes from

Forecast data comes from Open-Meteo, a free weather service. Warnings come from official sources: every answer checks the official alert source for that place's region first — the National Weather Service in the United States, Meteoalarm in Europe, Environment and Climate Change Canada in Canada, and the Bureau of Meteorology in Australia — and any active warning is read first. For a country whose official warnings are not connected yet, Doppler says so plainly and names that country's national weather authority to check. If a check cannot be completed, Doppler says so instead of guessing — he never claims an all-clear he didn't actually check. If anything here ever disagrees with an official warning, trust the official warning.

About

First, so all of this makes sense: I'm visually impaired. I live with optic nerve atrophy — the optic nerve is the cable that carries what the eye sees to the brain, and mine is damaged and worn thin, so the picture my eyes send never fully arrives. That's why radar screens and weather graphics don't work for me. I can't follow colors sweeping across a map. I take the sky in the way I've always taken it: by ear.

Weather got to me before music did.

I'm Javon — in music, most people know me as Kashey, a producer and artist. But long before I made a beat, I was a kid glued to the weather. Growing up in Georgia, I was raised on FOX 5 Atlanta and Good Day Atlanta, watching the meteorologists work a storm like it was a story being told just for me.

Then life brought me to North Carolina, and my stations changed with me — WRAL, and a little bit of WECT. Different state, same habit: when the sky had something to say, I was listening.

TV weather is told in pictures — and I still love it. I just always needed somebody to say out loud what the screen was showing. So eventually, I built the somebody. This station tells the weather in words: forecasts and warnings spoken plain, for anyone who can't see the map — or just can't look at one right now.

And the dream is bigger than a website. I want this to grow into something that shows up in person — traveling to the places storms hit, feeding people, and helping them get back on their feet. Weather has told me where the trouble is my whole life. One day, I want to be standing there for it.

If the station ever helps you through a storm, that's the whole point.

— Javon

Contact

Questions, ideas, a storm story of your own, or business inquiries — they all reach me directly.

Email: loops4kashey@gmail.com