Kyoto Story Guide — User Manual

An offline-capable app (PWA) for exploring Kyoto's 243 places through 267 events, 6 acts, 10 stories, and a page on art and craft history.

The app opens on the Places index (A–Z). From the footer navigation you can reach the events by year, the acts and stories, the art/craft page, and this manual at any time.

1. The screen at a glance

┌─────────────────────────────┐
│ THE GUIDE                   │ ← Title (3 lines)
│ Kyoto Strata                │
│ The Capital's Invisible…    │
│ Map                  MEMO   │ ← Header (top row)
│ ★ Search box            ℹ  │ ← Header (search row)
│ [Near me][A][B][C]…         │ ← Filter chips
│                             │
│  A list of cards (main)     │
│                             │
├─────────────────────────────┤
│ Places Events Story Art     │ ← Footer nav (5 entries)
│ A–Z   By year Acts Crafts   │
└─────────────────────────────┘

2. Using the header (top of the screen)

2-1. Top-row buttons

2-2. Title (centre)

2-3. Search-row buttons

3. Footer navigation (5 entries)

The footer switches between five entry points. From any screen you can jump straight to any of them.

The selected entry is shown in gold (with a top rule and bold text).

4. The Places (index) page

4-1. Reading the list

• Alphabetical headings (A, B, C …) divide the list. Tap one to jump to that letter
• Typing in the search box removes the headings and shows only matching cards, flat
• The chips along the top (A, B, C …) filter the list to a single letter. Letters with no places are not shown

4-2. Reading a place card

┌──────────────────────────────┐
│ To-ji Temple              ★  │ ← Google Maps name, bookmark ★
│ 東寺（教王護国寺） (Tō-ji…)   │ ← Japanese name + romanisation
│ 9th-10th Century · 796 …  WH NT │ ← Era, year, designation badges
│ Capital's guardian temple; … │ ← Cultural property designation
│                        Map ↗ │ ← Opens Google Maps
└──────────────────────────────┘
[Act 1 · Boundaries]              ← Act label

Marks on the card:

• Memo … this place has a memo
• ★ (gold) … bookmarked
• Distance (e.g. 560m / 1.2km) … shown only when "Near me" is on
• WH / NT / CP … World Heritage / National Treasure / Important Cultural Asset

4-3. The ★ (bookmark)

• Tap to turn it gold and save; tap again to remove it
• Tapping the card body opens the detail page (tapping ★ does not)
• Saved items appear in the list behind the ★ in the header

4-4. The "Near me" button

• Tap "Near me" at the left of the chip row, allow location access, and the 243 places are sorted nearest first
• Each card then shows its distance (e.g. 560m, 1.2km)
• Tap again to return to alphabetical order
• If location is unavailable, you will see "Location could not be obtained (please allow it in your device settings)"

5. The place detail page

Tap a card to open it. From the top:

1. Title and ★ — the star beside the name lets you bookmark or unbookmark
2. Japanese name — with the romanised form in parentheses
3. Era and year
4. Why this place matters — a short summary
5. Description — the consolidated, fact-checked commentary
6. Mind of Kyoto — how to approach the place, in the spirit of a local
7. World History Parallel — the contemporary overseas parallel
8. Contemporary World History — events happening elsewhere at the same time
9. Act label, then Location — a small map of its own. "Open in map" takes you to the map page
10. Related web pages — Official Site (EN) / Wikipedia / Search (EN) / Map (EN) / Official Site (JP)
11. Memo — a free-text field plus a date picker (see section 12)
12. Events in chronological order — the events linked to this place (tap to open an event)
13. Nearby places — places within 3 km, nearest first, with an m / mi switch. "See this area as a list" opens a distance-sorted list centred on this place

5-1. Reading a place aloud

• Tap the 🔊 button beside the place name to start reading the page aloud
• The app reads, in order: the place name, the short summary, Description, Mind of Kyoto, World History Parallel, and Contemporary World History, with a short pause between sections
• The Japanese name and the era/year are not read
• Tap 🔊 again to stop. Leaving the page also stops the reading
• Reading uses your device's built-in speech engine, so it works offline. Availability depends on your device and browser

5-2. Audio narration on the Story Acts and Art Crafts pages

The Story Acts and Art Crafts pages also have 🔊 buttons, but the narration there is different in nature from the Places pages.

• On the Places pages, the narration reads the on-screen text exactly as written — it is a word-for-word reading of the displayed content
• On the Story Acts and Art Crafts pages, the narration is an edited script, written separately from the on-screen text so that you can grasp the whole story by listening alone

Because these scripts are written to be heard from beginning to end, we recommend that the first time you use them you set aside about 10 minutes and listen to the whole narration — the Prologue through all six acts (or all six materials) — before dipping into individual sections.

How to listen

• Tap the 🔊 button beside the page title to hear the whole narration (Prologue → all acts / all materials → Closing)
• Tap the 🔊 button at the top right of an act or material heading to hear only that section
• Long-press (about 0.6 s) any 🔊 button to open the Reading Voice picker. Your choice is saved and shared across all pages

6. The Events (by year) page

• Events are listed chronologically. The buttons along the top filter by act (All, Act 1–6)
• Each event card shows the year, the title, the outline, the category, and the most relevant place
• The ★ at the top right of a card bookmarks it
• Events marked "Tradition" contain material based on tradition
• Tap a card to open the event detail page

The event detail page

1. Overview — the main commentary
2. Category commentary — City & Society / Religion & Thought / Politics, Power & Warfare / Arts & Customs / Founding & Legacy (only the sections that apply are shown)
3. Related places — links to the places linked to this event
4. Related web pages — Wikipedia / Cultural Heritage DB / Heritage Online / Maps

7. The Acts & Stories page

• The front page lists the six acts as vertical colour bands with a card for each
• Tap a card to expand it:

- Theme and Context — the body text

- Epoch Events of this Act — chips that open the corresponding event

- Read Stories (Our Perspective) — the stories of this act, each with its own Historical Traces chips

- Related places — the places belonging to this act

• The footer entry "Story / Acts" opens the same list from inside the app

8. The Art / Craft History page

Open it from the footer entry "Art / Crafts".

• The City of Seeds and Blooms — Kyoto's art and craft read through six materials (wood, paper, thread, gold, tea, earth), framed as "seeds" brought from outside and "blooms" nurtured in Kyoto
• Catalogue of materials: tap a material to expand its text (opening one closes the others)
• Selecting text in the body brings up a "Lookup: 'word'" button, which opens a set of links (Google / Wikipedia / CiNii / Cultural Heritage DB / Maps) — the same operation as on other pages
• Visitable Sites in Kyoto: places in the 243-place dataset link straight to the matching card in the app; facilities outside the dataset link to their official websites

9. The Map page

• Open it by tapping MAP at the top left of the header
• The map fills the screen. Only the Act 1–6 colour chips are shown at the top; the header and footer are hidden
• All 243 places are shown as pins coloured by act
• Map tiles come from GSI Japan. The tile images require a connection

9-1. Working with pins

9-2. Moving between the map and the cards

• Long-pressing a pin opens the place card (description, world parallels, location map, and so on)
• "Open in map" inside the card returns to the map with that pin centred
• On the map screen, "Index ▲" at the bottom returns to the places index

9-3. Showing your current location

• Tap MAP at the top left of the header. The app asks for location permission and, once granted, shows your position on the map
• Your position appears as a blue person icon with a pulsing ring, and a 50 m circle around it
• The map centres on your location at that moment
• Location is used only on your device; it is never sent anywhere
• If location is unavailable, you will see "Location could not be obtained (please allow it in your device settings)"

10. Bookmarks

Saving

• The ★ on a place card in the index
• The ★ on an event card in the by-year list
• The ★ beside the title on any detail page

Tap to turn the star gold and save; tap again to remove it. Bookmarks are stored on your device (localStorage), so they survive offline.

Viewing

• Tap the ★ at the left of the header search box to open the Bookmarks screen
• Places and events are listed separately
• Tap a card to open its detail page
• The header star turns gold when you have saved something
• Using the nav, search, or "Near me" returns you to the previous screen

11. Finding places near you

• Tap "Near me" at the left of the chip row on the Places page → allow location → the list is sorted nearest first
• Each card shows its distance
• In a place's detail page, "See this area as a list" under "Nearby places" opens a distance-sorted list centred on that place — useful for checking what is around your accommodation before a trip
• Use the m / mi switch beside "Nearby places" to change the distance units. The switch updates the distances in place without moving the page
• GPS works on the device, so distance calculations work offline (map tiles still need a connection)

12. Memos

Writing a memo

1. Open a place's detail page
2. Type freely in the Memo field (research, web links, impressions from your visit, photo links)
3. Every keystroke is saved automatically — there is no save button

Adding a date

• The date picker beside the Memo heading (default: today) adds a date to the top of the memo when you choose one
• If the visit date and the memo date differ, change it to the visit date first
• The date line is replaced automatically if you change the date later

Checking your memos

• Place cards show a Memo mark
• Bookmarked places with memos show the mark too

Exporting your memos

• Tap MEMO at the top right of the header to gather all memos into the format ## S001 To-ji Temple\n【date】\ntext
• Share them (mail, notes app) or copy them to the clipboard

13. Common operations

Glossary highlights

• Underlined terms in the commentary (dotted underline) can be tapped to open a "Lookup" panel with the Wikipedia summary

Looking up selected text

• Select text in a detail page and a "Lookup: 'word'" button appears
• Tap it to open a set of external links (Google / CiNii / Maps, and so on). Select between 2 and 30 characters

Index button

• On detail pages and the map, "Index ▲" at the bottom returns you to the places index

Snack bar

• On launch, a note appears for three seconds: "This app distinguishes documented fact from tradition" (tap to dismiss)

14. Documented fact and tradition

This app distinguishes two kinds of source.

1. Documented fact (documents and official records) — events recognised as fact. These are stated with confidence
2. Tradition (the anecdotes that colour history) — stories passed down without firm evidence. Events carry a "Tradition" mark, and the text uses expressions such as "is said to have"

15. Using the app offline

• On first visit, the app shell and data are saved to your device
• From the second visit onward you can browse offline
• Data is served "from the local copy first, refreshed in the background"
• When the app updates, the new version is installed at next launch

Adding to your home screen

• iOS (Safari): Share button → "Add to Home Screen"
• Android (Chrome): Menu → "Add to Home screen" or "Install app"

16. Troubleshooting