How to order notes by reference?

I recently upgraded from Logos 7 to Logos 8 and am struggling a bit with the new notes format. I have a notes file for each Bible book which I like to sort according to reference. However, my note file of Matthew for example, is not ordered strictly according to reference. It seems recent highlighting in Matthew in a specific translation and underlining in a commentary on Zechariah has been assigned to my Matthew note file. In the past these highlights/underlines were always coded to Emphasis Markup rather than my personal note files. Anyone know what's gone wrong or what I can do about it?

Thanks for the help!

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Comments

Reuben Helmuth

If you are in a Notebook, you can reorder manually by dragging and dropping. If you wish to simply display by reference, first select "Reference:Bible" from the facets sidebar. This will enable the sort by reference option.

Paul Chatfield

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1051824#Comment_1051824

Thank you Reuben for your swift reply. Well, that does kind of work, though it is quite longwinded.

In Logos 7, I click on my note and the Matthew notes file appears, sorted in reference order.

In Logos 8, I click on my note, go to the side toolbar filters:reference-Bible which then orders my Bible notes correctly however starts at Mt 1:1 rather than the notes around the one I'm looking at (Mt 18:15 in this case). So to see the notes around them, I try scrolling down through my hundreds of notes to the bottom of the page (where it reloads), scroll to the bottom again (where it reloads), then eventually I can scroll to the right place to find the other notes around it.

This is cumbersome. Can highlights not be stored elsewhere like in Emphasis Markup as before? Is there another way round this?

Kevin A

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1051827#Comment_1051827

You can set your highlighting palette to a specific notebook, which you could use for just highlights. See the 'Notebook' selection from the palette triangle dropdown. It can be either the current 'Active notebook' or one of your choosing.

Reuben Helmuth

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1051827#Comment_1051827

Can highlights not be stored elsewhere like in Emphasis Markup as before? Is there another way round this?

Absolutely. Use the Type facet at the top of the list to filter to only Highlights, then select all the notes (highlights) in the list (Cmd/Ctrl+A works as of 8.5; otherwise use shift+click). When you select more than one note, the right-hand pane becomes the bulk actions pane. Choose a different notebook (or "no Notebook) and select "apply changes". All the highlights from your current notebook have just been evacuated!

Once you "get the hang" of the new Notes system, I think you'll like it. IMO it's a HUGE improvement over what we had.

Paul Chatfield

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1051837#Comment_1051837

Guys - thank you so much for those suggestions. They are both really really helpful!!!

Logos is just taking hours in moving my highlights now but it's getting there I believe!

Paul Chatfield

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1051906#Comment_1051906

Anyhow, those suggestions have both been very helpful. Logos 7 notes were much better in that they were default ordered by reference whereas these - even after removing my highlights, require re-ordering and then scrolling down to the right place in the notebook to see the adjacent notes. Does anyone know if others have expressed concern about improving this part of Logos 8 notes - as it seems strange to me they've not made it possible to sort by default by reference?

Reuben Helmuth

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1052135#Comment_1052135

Paul, are you aware that if you simply select a resource from the Resource facet, the default sort order will be "by Resource"? So if you've selected a Bible, then you're good since "by Resource" and "by Reference" would be identical. If you've simply filtered to a Notebook, on the other hand, it's possible that you have unanchored notes and some that are anchored to other datatypes. In this situation "by reference" doesn't make sense unless you first select the reference/datatype: Bible. I do think there's room for improvement, such as automatically enabling "by Reference" if all the notes in the list are compatible (without needing to apply a filter to manually ensure this).

Reuben Helmuth

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1052192#Comment_1052192

Also, if there's a certain setup that you want to use frequently, I would suggest saving a shortcut. Get the Notes Tool exactly as you want it (filters, find, sidebar open/close, sort order, etc), then simply grab the panel tab and drag it to the shortcuts bar.

Paul Chatfield

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1052192#Comment_1052192

Thanks Reuben - the idea of saving the format is good, but I often switch between books between preparing a sermon, quiet time or other things and each time I add a note it opens a new notes file that I have to reorder etc rather than using the existing notes file that I have ordered by reference for example. This is not ideal.

However your other observation about select a Bible book which is default ordered by Reference is a good one and helpful in getting used to this new format - thank you! As I had a notes file for each Bible book I would open one of those but these would then need ordered. If I just click on the Bible book it is automatically ordered in sequence.

It would still be nice if, for example, when clicking on a note on Gen 18:5, the surrounding notes appeared in the preview pane like in Logos 7 but let's hope Logos are still working on it for Logos 9! Thanks for the helpful comments and patient explanation!

Reuben Helmuth

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1052198#Comment_1052198

It would still be nice if, for example, when clicking on a note on Gen 18:5, the surrounding notes appeared in the preview pane like in Logos 7

Does the "Full Preview" mode (a new "view" that was added recently) do what you're asking for? I realize there's no editing...

I had a notes file for each Bible book I would open one of those but these would then need ordered.

With the metadata that's now captured, and actionable, having "Resource Specific" or Bible book specific Notebooks is largely redundant. There still are cases where it makes sense and I can elaborate if you wish... tomorrow (10:50pm here and I should be in bed :-)).

Paul Chatfield

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1052202#Comment_1052202

Thank you Reuben for your help. Yes, the full preview mode does come pretty close. I hadn't spotted that, so thank you again!

As for the comments on the notes files, yes I realise they're less needed. I could export them into one large file but don't know if that's best practice or not. I've separated the highlighting out as that affected ordering by reference so I might leave sleeping dogs lie on that one for a while.

Anyhow, your comments have been very helpful in helping me get to grips with Logos 8 so thank you!

Reuben Helmuth

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1052207#Comment_1052207

I could export them into one large file but don't know if that's best practice or not.

It really makes very little difference, performance-wise... A notebook assignment is really not much more than a tag on a note. FWIW, I would avoid the term "file". Notes are now all individual records in a database. Using the term "file" lends to confusion between the two systems.

I might leave sleeping dogs lie on that one for a while.

Fair enough, just make sure to wake them before they get too old to learn new tricks. 😉