Recommendations for Getting and Managing Perseus?

Scott S
Scott S Member Posts: 423 ✭✭
edited November 2024 in English Forum

I am interested in at least some of the Perseus resources, but have not installed them yet.  What steps, if any, should be taken to avoid difficulties with such as large addition to my Logos library?

In my monitoring of the forums and in searches, I've seen only small number of posts reporting problems with Perseus resources interfering with their regular use of Logos. It is not clear whether these persons tried collections or tagging to segregate Perseus resources.

What is the general experience with the Perseus resources?  Are they a noticeable burden and should I be careful to only download items I'm sure I will use?

Thanks in advance . . . Scott

Comments

  • Mark Smith
    Mark Smith MVP Posts: 11,845

    Scott,

    They will add a burden to indexing and to searches if you don't exclude them by use of collections.

    I have not had any problem having them or using them when I want. If you have a less powerful computer indexing will take quite a bit longer (do it overnight). I'd use tags/series to create a collection that excludes all the Perseus resources for searching. There have been suggestions on how to form specific collections and how to exclude Perseus from searches so i won't repeat what I've done.

    Pastor, North Park Baptist Church

    Bridgeport, CT USA

  • Mark Barnes
    Mark Barnes Member Posts: 15,432 ✭✭✭

    Downloading and indexing take a while, but once that's done, you won't really notice any problems. It's worth creating a collection of 'Everything but Perseus' (just just -publisher:perseus as your collection string) to allow you to remove Perseus from Entire Library searches if you find results clogging up your search. But personally that's never been an issue for me.

    The only other thing to add is that it can be a pain hiding the Latin resources if they don't interest you. This post helps a bit: http://community.logos.com/forums/t/41127.aspx

     

    This is my personal Faithlife account. On 1 March 2022, I started working for Faithlife, and have a new 'official' user account. Posts on this account shouldn't be taken as official Faithlife views!

  • Scott S
    Scott S Member Posts: 423 ✭✭

    Mark & Mark:

    Thank you both for replying with notes of reassurance.

    it can be a pain hiding the Latin resources if they don't interest you.

    1. Why go through the pain . . . are there other benefits beyond freeing up a few 100 meg of disk space?

    2. What ability does Logos Customer Service offer in removing unneeded Perseus resources?  I assume they can remove (pull my license for) whole collections, e.g. Duke Databank of Documentary Papyri (256 vols.), but cannot pull just Latin resources. Do they have any other criteria on which to discriminate?

    3. And can you comment on the potential value of the Duke Databank of Documentary Papyri (256 vols.) to the non-scholar ( and I'm a beginner in orig. lang.).  Is there significant linkage to Logos resources?  Is there any value for apologetics, e.g. as "Show and Tell" resources?

    Thanks again . . . Scott

  • Mark Barnes
    Mark Barnes Member Posts: 15,432 ✭✭✭

    Scott S said:

    1. Why go through the pain . . . are there other benefits beyond freeing up a few 100 meg of disk space?

    It you don't mind clutter, it's fine. It doesn't really slow things down, but there's an awful lot of them that seem to begin with the letter 'A', and they tend to swamp your library!

    Scott S said:

    2. What ability does Logos Customer Service offer in removing unneeded Perseus resources?  I assume they can remove (pull my license for) whole collections, e.g. Duke Databank of Documentary Papyri (256 vols.), but cannot pull just Latin resources. Do they have any other criteria on which to discriminate?

    That's right. They can remove your licence for a whole collection, but not individual resources.

    Scott S said:

    3. And can you comment on the potential value of the Duke Databank of Documentary Papyri (256 vols.) to the non-scholar ( and I'm a beginner in orig. lang.).  Is there significant linkage to Logos resources?  Is there any value for apologetics, e.g. as "Show and Tell" resources?

    Note that the papyri are not available in translation, so if you have no Greek, you may get little use out of them. They are most useful to see how New Testament words are used in other contexts, particularly in every-day usage (which more closely resembles NT Greek than classical Greek does).. They are currently only linked from the LSJ lexicon (aka Liddell-Scott), though undoubtedly BDAG will be updated at some point to include the links. You can read about the links from LSJ here: http://blog.logos.com/2011/09/the-lsj-receives-a-massive-update-with-the-release-of-perseus/

    This post (written by an NT scholar with a particular interest in background) helps put Perseus and the Papyri into context, and gives really helpful examples of how it might be used: http://tyndaletech.blogspot.com/2011/11/perseus-greek-texts-free-on-logos.html

    This is my personal Faithlife account. On 1 March 2022, I started working for Faithlife, and have a new 'official' user account. Posts on this account shouldn't be taken as official Faithlife views!

  • Scott S
    Scott S Member Posts: 423 ✭✭

    Mark, thanks for the clarification.

    I want to keep track of which resources are in which collections, so I can determine whether to hide individual resources or remove the whole collection.  What do you think of the following approach?

    1. Download one Perseus collection at a time.
    2. Sort My Library by the "Last Updated" field to group all the resources in the collection together.
    3. Tag the resources with an abbreviated collection name.

    Thanks again,

    Scott

  • Mark Barnes
    Mark Barnes Member Posts: 15,432 ✭✭✭

    Scott S said:

    What do you think of the following approach?

    Looks a good plan to me!

    This is my personal Faithlife account. On 1 March 2022, I started working for Faithlife, and have a new 'official' user account. Posts on this account shouldn't be taken as official Faithlife views!

  • Mike Childs
    Mike Childs Member Posts: 3,135 ✭✭✭

    I love having Perseus.  Read it mostly for fun. 

    Collections are the key.  For example, I have really enjoyed my "War of Northern Agression" collection.  I have even been enjoying reading the memoirs of that Northern Agressor, U. S. Grant.  One of the best Presidential memoirs ever written. 

    I am buying a new laptop this month, so I will be downloading it all again soon.


    "In all cases, the Church is to be judged by the Scripture, not the Scripture by the Church," John Wesley

  • David Ames
    David Ames Member Posts: 2,971 ✭✭✭

    I have not been using RATING so I set RATING:  [only works if you are NOT using RATING for something like rating]
    rating:=0 -> New ‘stuff’
    rating:=1 -> Perseus   [1743]
    rating:=2 -> Vyrso    [12]
    rating:=3 -> Logos 4 (normal)  [lots and lots]
    rating:=4 -> PBB      [7] 
    rating:=5 -> not yet used

    And I have a collection [named: rating is count] with a rule of rating:=3 and if I want to know what is in which I just change the 3 to what is needed

  • I have not been using RATING so I set RATING:  [only works if you are NOT using RATING for something like rating]
    rating:=0 -> New ‘stuff’
    rating:=1 -> Perseus   [1743]
    rating:=2 -> Vyrso    [12]
    rating:=3 -> Logos 4 (normal)  [lots and lots]
    rating:=4 -> PBB      [7] 
    rating:=5 -> not yet used

    And I have a collection [named: rating is count] with a rule of rating:=3 and if I want to know what is in which I just change the 3 to what is needed

    Observation: several ratings have equivalent collection rules.  Also could tag resources since rating: and mytag: can be used by Logos 4 in many places (search, cited by, ...)

    rating:=2 -> edition:eBook

    rating:=3 -> edition:Logos

    rating:=4 -> edition:User

    Wiki has => Example Collections that includes many Perseus examples.

    Keep Smiling [:)]

  • David Ames
    David Ames Member Posts: 2,971 ✭✭✭

    " rel="nofollow">Keep Smiling 4 Jesus :) said:


    rating:=2 -> edition:eBook

    Yes, I just learned about 'edition:' about 10 minutes ago [may reset rating (someday)]

    [and what are we doing up so early? Happy New Year]