Bible Word Study on Mobile App

daniel lukas
daniel lukas Member Posts: 12
edited November 21 in English Forum
  • Logos App Version 36.0.1 (1)
  • ipadOS 18.0.1

Generally: Is the Bible Word Study tool on mobile app limited as compared with the desktop app

Specifically:

I’m used to a work flow on the desktop app, where using the Bible Word Study tool, Greek words will show usage in my TOP BIBLE and then usually in the LXX as well. Which has me noticing the Bible Word Study  tool on my mobile app has less default detail than on my desktop app, and also seems to lack the ability for me to customize what is viewable. 

thanks,
daniel 

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Comments

  • Graham Criddle
    Graham Criddle MVP Posts: 32,628

    Generally: Is the Bible Word Study tool on mobile app limited as compared with the desktop app

    Yes - it is (and this is true of the other Guides and a range of functionality)

  • Tom Vidal
    Tom Vidal Member Posts: 270 ✭✭

    Is there some technical challenge to enabling complete results from the various guides to populate on the iPad Version? I can understand and appreciate the UI differences to presenting those results, but certainly the iPad can run all the category searches that Desktop Logos can run.

  • Alan Palmer (Logos)
    Alan Palmer (Logos) Member, Logos Employee Posts: 1,080

    Tom Vidal said:

    Is there some technical challenge to enabling complete results from the various guides to populate on the iPad Version? I can understand and appreciate the UI differences to presenting those results, but certainly the iPad can run all the category searches that Desktop Logos can run.

    Historically, there have been several challenges. Primary among them is that mobile uses web backends for most of this type of thing rather than local. It is really about catching up to the 30 years of desktop development. Over the last 5+ years, we have invested heavily in building out our web/mobile capabilities and bringing platform parity to as many features as possible.

    Currently our focus in the area of parity in Guides is to bring as much of that functionality as possible to Factbook. In fact, internally we often refer to this project cheekily as "Guidebook". Who knows, maybe that name will someday become a reality. [;)] So, if you start to notice yourself going to Factbook for things you used to go to Guides for, that's intentional. Plus, nearly all of that is available across all of our platforms!

    We are hoping the new Lens bar and Bible reference keys demonstrates some of that power and we are planning on bringing more and more of your favorite guide sections into Factbook. In addition to Bible references, we'd love to bring Bible words as a Factbook key which would allow us to bring much of the Bible Word Study Guide to Factbook.

  • Tom Vidal
    Tom Vidal Member Posts: 270 ✭✭

    Thank you. This was a really thoughtful response, which I appreciate.

    If I have not said it enough, I'll take this opportunity to repeat it year. I recognize how much progress has been made on Logos Mobile. It's a phenomenal tool, which I use a lot. I have dozens of custom layouts, I use multiple windows, on and on. I can't think of a feature that has been aded to Logos Mobile over the past few years that I don't use. So, I am deeply grateful for all that work.

    Regarding technical catch-up and web backends: now that iPads (in particular) are so much more powerful, can some of these things that were done as web backends now be done directly on-device?

    Some thoughts regarding the intersection of factbook and guides. I have historically been lukewarm about the Factbook; however, it has been getting much more useful. I have even started going to it to take a first stab at many research queries. I have been delighted in many cases to see that Factbook got me right to the answer that I was seeking. Candidly, I think my lukewarmth was because I favor the precision of search, not because there is anything particularly wrong with the factbook. Anyway, Factbook seems to have improved substantially over the years.

    I'd be thrilled if guides could be combined with the Factbook--as long as we didn't lose the things that makes guides great (customization, the word-by-word report, translation ring, etc.). I'm a heavy user of custom guides (thank you Morris Proctor). That is one of the things I always hoped would come available on mobile. But, if it could all be done through Factbook, that could end up being a much better solution.

    Here are my (unsolicited) wishes on what I'd like Guidebook to do. (i) I wish Factbook sourced articles from my own library, rather than articles chosen by Faithlife editors. (ii) I wish it treated my own content (notes, sermons, clippings docs, custom collections, etc.) as equal citizens with other material in my library. (iii) I wish we could tag notes and clippings with the same tags that Factbook uses so that Factbook would source contextual notes -- or that Factbook would just ingest our tags and let us easily mine our materials. (iv) same for custom tags of library books so that Factbook sections could be created (although, maybe that would be addressed with incorporating custom collections). Finally, (v) I'd want all the guide sections to be available and to be able to create custom Factbook guides combining the various sections that are available guides as they are currently constituted.

  • Alan Palmer (Logos)
    Alan Palmer (Logos) Member, Logos Employee Posts: 1,080

    Thank you for that wish list and feedback. We hear it and have been thinking similarly. Customization is a big hope of ours for Factbook. Like you said, it is one of the many key things we'll need to solve if we ever want to realize our dream of approaching the power of Guides.

    You should see more sections coming to Factbook throughout the next year. We're also hoping to bring more access to users' cloud books, print library books, and even popular books you don't own that may benefit your study (we've had great reception of similar efforts in search). Keep watching Factbook, I think it's an exciting time for that feature.

    Tom Vidal said:

    Regarding technical catch-up and web backends: now that iPads (in particular) are so much more powerful, can some of these things that were done as web backends now be done directly on-device?

    Of course from a technical perspective, yes. But, we have limited engineering capacity and we work really hard to be good stewards of that capacity. We try to allocate it in ways that serve our broad user base to the best of our ability. At this point in time, the investment doesn't rise to the level of everything else we want to accomplish.

  • NichtnurBibelleser
    NichtnurBibelleser Member Posts: 331 ✭✭✭

    Customization is a big hope of ours for Factbook.

    We're also hoping to bring more access to users' cloud books, print library books, and even popular books you don't own that may benefit your study (we've had great reception of similar efforts in search). Keep watching Factbook, I think it's an exciting time for that feature.

    That sounds very interesting. Is it under consideration to provide options of denominational theologoy lenses (e.g. "Catholic", "Anglican"... ) in Factbook?

  • Dawid
    Dawid Member Posts: 1

    In essence, it would be better to get a mobile device that runs Windows in order to have access to all of the Logos capabilities? (Specifically looking at a tablet solution for Logos)

  • MJ. Smith
    MJ. Smith MVP Posts: 53,397

    That sounds very interesting. Is it under consideration to provide options of denominational theologoy lenses (e.g. "Catholic", "Anglican"... ) in Factbook?

    I hope not as the denominational threads are too narrow for many of us.  Of course, if I could create four groups "probably right," "worth of respect," "interesting take," and "usually ignore" as my theological lens ...[:#]

    Orthodox Bishop Alfeyev: "To be a theologian means to have experience of a personal encounter with God through prayer and worship."; Orthodox proverb: "We know where the Church is, we do not know where it is not."