Welcome to the Curious Souls Café! This live web app is your companion for exploring fascinating ideas and fostering meaningful connections with others. Through thought-provoking questions, it offers conversation starters for friends, prompts for personal journaling, or fresh ideas to ponder.
Originally created to facilitate meaningful discussions during Curious Souls Café meetup events, this app is now available to everyone, bringing the spirit of curiosity and connection to your fingertips. (Please note: the app is actively evolving, so features may be added, updated, or refined as we continue to enhance the experience.)
Step into meaningful conversations with ease! Here's how you can join the fun:
Launch the Live Web App
Open the Curious Souls Café web app in your browser by clicking this link: Curious Souls Café Web App.
Invite Others
On the main page, you'll find a QR code. Share it with friends or participants—anyone can scan it to instantly join the conversation.
Pick a Topic
Gather your group, choose a topic (or question deck) that resonates with everyone, and let the exploration of ideas begin!
Start the Conversation
Unsure where to start? Try Style One – Open Discussion: With the three questions presented (by default), each person chooses their favorite one, and then rolls a colorful dice to determine whose question goes first (e.g., the person whose virtual question card matches the dice color). After the first person has finished sharing, they pick a direction (clockwise or counterclockwise) for the discussion to proceed.
Pro Tip: For a deeper understanding of how our events are structured, including different conversation styles, check out our Event Structure Guide.
Our in-person Curious Souls Café meetup is your space for meaningful conversations and deep self-reflection. Like a cozy neighborhood café, it’s a place to share ideas, explore life’s big questions, and connect with others in an open and welcoming way. At the heart of the Curious Souls Café experience are questions, thoughtfully designed by our facilitators or third parties to guide you through soul-searching discussions. Whether you're reflecting on your personal journey, navigating life changes, or building deeper connections, these decks spark introspection and encourage engaging dialogue.
Explore diverse themes like self-discovery, happiness, love, and authenticity, or revisit thought-provoking prompts inspired by our global community. These questions help uncover insights about who you are, where you've been, and where you’re headed:
💖 We express our heartfelt gratitude to the Singaporean facilitator(s) for the question sets for the topics Love Relationships, Happiness, and The Mind Speaks, as well as to all curious souls (participants) who contributed past questions from our global events.
Let these decks inspire your journey of exploration, connection, and growth!
Pick a Topic: On the main page, you'll see general questions like Icebreaker and different topics like Transitions or Love Relationships. Just click (or tap) on a topic button to dive in!
Get Random Questions: Once you're on a topic page, tell the web app how many questions you'd like, and it will instantly give you new ones to ponder.
Find Specific Questions: Looking for something particular? Use the search bar to find questions that match your keywords.
Save Questions: See a question you like? Simply click or tap on it, and it will be added to your "Saved Questions" list at the bottom of the page. You can clear them anytime.
Optimized for On-the-Go: The web app is designed to work seamlessly on smartphones and tablets, making it the ideal companion for dynamic, on-the-go interactions.
Join a Live Discussion: During special events, a prominent "Live Discussion" button will appear on the main page, giving you access to real-time questions curated for that event.
Did you know there's a little Easter egg in the Curious Souls Café web app? The colors of the virtual question cards (when you highlight a question or a saved one by a click/tap) aren't just random! They're designed to subtly match the fun dice colors used by our event facilitators to make those in-person discussions even more engaging. It's a small nod to bring a bit of that real-world fun into your digital experience!
Here are some helpful tips to enhance your Curious Souls Café experience:
Highlight Chosen Questions: Always highlight the question that is chosen by tapping or clicking it. This makes it easier for other participants to focus on the active question, preventing confusion when multiple questions are displayed on the app at the same time.
Return to Main Page: Clicking the round Curious Souls Café icon at the top of any topic page will take you back to the main topic selection page. This has the same effect as clicking the "Leave Page" button at the bottom.
Quick Scroll to Top: The sticky "Top" button located at the bottom-right corner of any topic page can be used to quickly scroll back to the top of the screen. This is especially useful if you've scrolled far down and need to quickly access controls or re-read the topic title.
Direct Topic Page Links: Each topic page has its own unique URL. You can directly link participants to a specific topic page by appending the appropriate HTML file name to the base URL. For example, to direct users to the "Icebreaker" topic, you would use: <URL>/pages/icebreaker.html like this.
Single Random Question for Punishments: For participants who land on a punishment (e.g., via specific dice colors used by our facilitators) which requires them to randomly choose a question and answer it:
Set the "No. of questions to pick" field to 1 (instead of the default value, e.g., 3).
Then, have the participant tap "Generate Questions!" so that only one random question is displayed.
Roll the Dice: On the main page, you'll find a "Roll the Dice" button. This will take you to a special page where you can roll a virtual dice to get a random color outcome. Each color corresponds to a different category or action in our in-person discussions, adding an element of chance and fun! It supports customization of colors and the number of sides, so that it can be used to break a tie too!
Advanced Search & Clear:
Searching with nothing inputted in the search field will display all questions in the current deck. Be mindful that this could quickly fill up the screen.
For more advanced searching, you can combine the above with your web browser's built-in "Find" functionality.
In case the screen becomes too crowded after a search, simply tap the sticky "Top" button and then click the "Search" button again (or "Clear Search") to clear the search results and tidy up the display.
The Curious Souls Café web app keeps its files organized in a clear and maintainable way:
The main page (index.html) is located in the root folder.
All individual topic pages (like icebreaker.html, love-relationships.html, etc.) are located in the pages/ folder.
All the questions for each topic are stored in simple text files (.txt) inside the questions/ folder. For example, all "Icebreaker" questions are in questions/icebreaker.txt.
Other data files, such as quotes.txt, are located in the data/ folder.
Image files, including qr-code.png and csc_logo.jpg, are stored in the images/ folder.
If you're an event facilitator looking to add new question sets to the main page, here's a straightforward process:
Add a new questions.txt file: Create a new text file inside the questions/ folder. Name it clearly, reflecting your new topic (e.g., questions/MyNewTopic.txt). Populate this file with your questions, one per line.
Duplicate an existing HTML subpage: Choose an existing topic's HTML file (e.g., icebreaker.html) and duplicate it. Rename the duplicated file to match your new topic (e.g., mynewtopic.html).
Open the file in a text editor and modify the page title, questions.txt link, displayed topic name, and main page link to reflect the new topic. (Tip: If icebreaker.html was copied, search for "Icebreaker" and replace each word accordingly.) You will also need to update index.html similarly.
Add to index.html Configuration:
Edit index.html file (located in the root of the project).
Find the TOPIC_CONFIGS array in the <script> section.
Add a new entry for your topic, ensuring the name, htmlFileName (pointing to your new file in pages/), and txtUrl (pointing to your .txt file in questions/) are correct. You can also set cache: true for faster loading after the first visit.
By following the these steps, you can seamlessly integrate new question sets into the Curious Souls Café web app for your events!
The "Live Discussion" feature or button is designed for dynamic, event-specific use. Its visibility is controlled directly by the presence of a specific file in the repository, eliminating the need for code changes in index.html.
This allows event facilitators to quickly activate and deactivate the live discussion feature as needed for their events.
To enable and disable the "Live Discussion" button for an event:
To Enable the "Live Discussion" Button:
Place the live-discussion.txt file (containing the specific event's questions) inside the questions folder in the GitHub repository.
Uncomment or unhide elements related to "Live Discussion" in index.html.
Commit and push these changes to the GitHub repository. (The changes should then be automatically deployed to GitHub Pages within a minute.)
The "Live Discussion" button will now be visible on the main page for participants. (Note: For those who already have the page loaded, they may need to refresh their mobile browser.)
To Disable the "Live Discussion" Button (after the event):
Remove the live-discussion.txt file from the questions folder in the GitHub repository.
Re-comment or hide elements related to "Live Discussion" in index.html.
Commit and push these changes to the GitHub repository.
Thank you for visiting the Curious Souls Café! We hope it sparks many interesting conversations.
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