Aloha is a viewer for the notes you already have. It opens your Obsidian vault or your Notion pages and shows them as a small town you can walk through: folders as lands, notes as houses, links as roads. There is nothing to install and no account to make; it runs in your browser at app.aloha.place.
The first minute
The first time you open Aloha, a short film of about 25 seconds shows how a world grows: a folder opens into a land, a note becomes a house, writing grows its garden, a link lays a road. Tap to jump to the next shot, or press Skip.
Then you choose where your notes come from:
- Obsidian: open your vault folder. Folders become lands and notes become houses. See Aloha for Obsidian.
- Notion: sign in with Notion and choose the pages Aloha may see. See Aloha for Notion.
- An example: walk round a small sample town first. You can also write notes in Aloha itself.
Take a walk
The ink drop in the middle of the screen is you.
- On a computer: walk with W A S D or the arrow keys, hold Shift to run, or click where you want to go.
- On a phone: tap the ground to walk there, or slide a finger to steer.
A short tour walks you through the first steps: a few paces, a visit to a house, and building your own.
Read a note
Walk up to a house and its name appears above the door. Press Space, E or Enter on a computer, or tap Read on a phone. The note opens full-screen. The arrow keys, or a swipe on a phone, turn to the next note in the same place. More in Walking and reading.
Write your first thought
Press N on a computer, or tap the round + button on a phone and choose Build → Thought. Write; the first line becomes the title, and Enter saves it (Shift + Enter starts a new line).
A building site appears right beside you, and a moment later the house goes up. That’s your note. Link it to another note and a road runs between their doors — see Writing and linking.
Where your world is kept
A world you start in Aloha is kept in this browser, on this device. Aloha has no copy of it. If you clear the site’s data, the world goes too — so if you want your notes as files you can back up, open an Obsidian vault instead, or carry notes off the map as Markdown. The details are in Privacy and your data.
Put it on your home screen
Aloha is a web app you can install. On a phone, use your browser’s Add to Home Screen; on a computer, the install button in the address bar. Once installed, it opens like an app and works offline.