Guides

Updated in Logos 8, Guides now allow you to launch individual sections of a given Guide, like the Journals or Ancient Literature sections. You can tailor any premade guide to your needs or use the Guide Editor to create custom guides.

We've prepared a variety of articles and videos on using Guides here:

Feel free to use this forum thread to post feedback and questions.

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Comments

PetahChristian

In Logos 7, I had a number of specific passage and bible word study guides that I had saved. They would show up under the Guides window, and I could pull up my previous study of a passage or word.

In Logos 8, I can't find those saved guides. Now when I do a word study for a word I had previously saved, it runs a new guide for that word, instead of bringing up my previous results.

I would star commentaries that had valuable insight about a passage, and feel like I've lost all that work.

Are we no longer meant to save guides, or access guides we've saved?

Dennis Phelps

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1004525#Comment_1004525

This is a good question and important issue.

Adam Borries (Logos)

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1004525#Comment_1004525

Petah, thanks for your question. In short, this is correct: saved guides are not a feature of Logos 8. But don't worry, we still have the data from your starred commentaries and guides notes, and we plan to bring them back to guides in a more integrated way.

What is a saved guide? (Let me just recap here, because a lot of people might not know.) In Logos 4-7, after you open a Passage Guide (or Bible Word Study, etc.), if you make any changes to the guide, Logos would save it for reference later. Examples of such changes:

Add, delete, or rearrange guide sections
Take a note on a guide section
Star or remove a commentary to mark it as helpful/unhelpful for the passage

You could find these saved guides in the Guides menu, and if you happen to open Passage Guide (etc) later that matched or intersected the same passage range as a saved guide, Logos would show you changes you made in the earlier session. The idea behind saved guides was "save my research on this passage/word/topic, so I can find it when I come back to study it again later."

In practice, though, very few people used this functionality. In fact, many users didn't even understand what those saved guides in the right-hand side were for, or how they were different from opening a new guide instance on the (much smaller, but much more used) left side of the menu. Some users even actively deleted their saved guides, just to "clear the clutter." Finally (and this is where you can help me), I'd say that even for the few users who intentionally use saved guides, they are a bit clunky because they are so isolated. Which passages do I have notes on? I don't know, because the only way to find those guide notes is to open my saved guides and see if they have notes. Which commentaries do I star most often as helpful? Same problem.

What are we going to do instead of saved guides? We think we can better serve these needs with other mechanisms.

Guide notes will get imported to the new Notes tool. They will be browsable in the tool, anchored to both the guide section and the passage, and searchable, making them much more discoverable.
Commentary stars will likely be migrated to Favorites, so you can see them all in one place.

And already, add/remove/reorder guide sections modifies the guide itself in Logos 8 -- a capability that has been around since Logos 4 with the Guide Template Editor, but the new functionality is much more intuitive.

I'm very interested to hear your feedback on this proposal. And again, I want to reiterate that your data is safe, even if it isn't visible right now. If you need access to the information in your saved guides immediately, before we can develop these new features, please reach out to me directly.

PetahChristian

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1004684#Comment_1004684

Thank you, Adam, for sharing this insight about the direction that Logos is taking.

I can recognize how transitioning from saved guides would the user experience less confusing and/or cluttered. For example, it wasn't obvious that saved guides needed to be refreshed to take advantage of new resources. That's one extra burden that FL can eliminate.

And already, add/remove/reorder guide sections modifies the guide itself in Logos 8 -- a capability that has been around since Logos 4 with the Guide Template Editor, but the new functionality is much more intuitive.

Yes, I agree that it's more intuitive, and I do appreciate not having to maintain/edit a separate copy of a customized guide.

I'm very interested to hear your feedback on this proposal.

I'm definitely open to the changes that FL is planning to make, as you've all put a lot more thought into this.

For what it's worth, I mostly used saved guides as a historical "reminder" that I happened to previously study this or that passage/word for a specific Mobile Ed course. Stars indicated to me that a commentary contained interesting highlighted information about a passage.

In that sense, I think of stars as more related to specific insight, rather than a particular commentary being a favorite. I haven't used Favorites myself, and simply happen to prioritize more useful commentaries, to appear first.

I definitely like the direction that L8 has already taken in many areas (e.g., canvas, workflows, search templates, new notes) which make the user experience more intuitive and natural, and bible study more educational.

I'm grateful that FL does listen, and accommodate some of our requests, as plans and improvements are made for 8.x. Thanks again!

Gary Jarvis

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1004684#Comment_1004684

Hello Adam,

It was quite disappointing to me to open up Logos 8 for the first time to see all of my saved guides and the notes attached to them gone. I was using those features every week for my sermon prep. So I would be opening up that same saved guide all week as I worked on my sermon, going back and forth between my study of that passage in the guide to the Sermon Editor. Then the saved guides were great to keep the history of all my study work, because it told me a number of things. 1. What passages I preached on and when. 2. I could easily find those saved guides as they were listed in Canonical order in case I was preaching on another occasion or at a different time with that text. I could pull up the saved guide and see all of my previous study work and refresh my memory as I prepared for the new sermon in that context. 3. If I was preaching in a series, I could pull up previously saved Guides to remind myself of a few things that tie in across the series. As you can see, These features I used every week.

My question is when I will get my notes back? I was in the middle of one Sermon prep this week, and those notes are gone.

Thank you,

Gary Jarvis

Adam Borries (Logos)

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1004999#Comment_1004999

Gary, I'm sorry about this. It will be a while before we add notes back to guides (as new Notes tool notes, see above), but I'll follow up with you privately to see how we can help your immediate situation.

Dennis Phelps

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1004999#Comment_1004999

Gary, thank you for posting this. I had several saved guides that I had customized for various exegetical and sermon prep needs, also. Regrettably, I guess they are now gone. It is also regrettable that Logos did not warn or prepare for such basic and significant changes if we chose to "update" to L8. Although several of the new tools are nice, I am not yet sure of the value of the improvements for those of us who worked so hard with L7 and developed customized templates, guides, etc. I have been using Logos since before it was Libronix. I have taught many Logos classes at the seminaries where I have served. I have strongly encouraged and even required many students to purchase the program. I am trying to keep an open mind at this point.

Stephen Terlizzi

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1005059#Comment_1005059

I think it would have been good for Faithlife to have a list of deprecated or removed features in the release available before people upgraded. IMHO.

God bless!

Steve

Dennis Phelps

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1005086#Comment_1005086

Stephen, I agree. It would enable the consumer and previous user to have appropriate expectations before the purchase rather than buyer's remorse in reaction to discovering so many changes and discontinued features.

Phil Gons (Logos)

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1005086#Comment_1005086

It is also regrettable that Logos did not warn or prepare for such basic and significant changes if we chose to "update" to L8.

I think it would have been good for Faithlife to have a list of deprecated or removed features in the release available before people upgraded. IMHO.

It would enable the consumer and previous user to have appropriate expectations before the purchase rather than buyer's remorse in reaction to discovering so many changes and discontinued features.

Thanks, Dennis and Stephen. That's a good suggestion.

We did that for Notes in this Notes FAQ article (scroll to the bottom). I tried to point people there in this announcement post, but I understand that many could have missed it.

But we didn't do that for the Homepage and probably should have. I'm sorry about that.

Graham Owen

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1005428#Comment_1005428

It is also regrettable that Logos did not warn or prepare for such basic and significant changes if we chose to "update" to L8.

I think it would have been good for Faithlife to have a list of deprecated or removed features in the release available before people upgraded. IMHO.

It would enable the consumer and previous user to have appropriate expectations before the purchase rather than buyer's remorse in reaction to discovering so many changes and discontinued features.

Thanks, Dennis and Stephen. That's a good suggestion.

We did that for Notes in this Notes FAQ article (scroll to the bottom). I tried to point people there in this announcement post, but I understand that many could have missed it.

But we didn't do that for the Homepage and probably should have. I'm sorry about that.

From a user perspective Guides are a separate feature from Notes Phil

I can understand how they are interrelated and how a working Notes feature is a prereq for the Guides. Seems like the new Notes has broken a lot more than many of us were expecting.

Graham Owen

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1005428#Comment_1005428

But we didn't do that for the Homepage and probably should have. I'm sorry about that.

Hi Phil

As a minimum I suggest that the lead post in this thread should contain a warning.

This is probably also true for the equivalent Home Page and other threads.

The current content now reads like pure marketing spin and that really is not fair to existing users considering an upgrade.

RyanB

Hey All,

I don't yet have L8 (still flipping couch cushions looking for extra money) so please forgive this basic question, but I just wanted to verify that when I ultimately do upgrade to L8, that I will NOT lose what L7 called "My Passage Guide." Specifically, that (heavily) edited guide template that I created with sections that I found valuable and useful. I understand that any passage guides saved to a particular scripture are gone, but I wanted to make sure that I still had access to my edited guide template.

If someone could just confirm this for me I'd be grateful.

Richard Wardman

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1005528#Comment_1005528

Hey All,

I don't yet have L8 (still flipping couch cushions looking for extra money) so please forgive this basic question, but I just wanted to verify that when I ultimately do upgrade to L8, that I will NOT lose what L7 called "My Passage Guide." Specifically, that (heavily) edited guide template that I created with sections that I found valuable and useful. I understand that any passage guides saved to a particular scripture are gone, but I wanted to make sure that I still had access to my edited guide template.

If someone could just confirm this for me I'd be grateful.

Hi Ryan. It's still there! What used to be called "My Passage Guide" is now called "Passage Guide." It's your guide template as before, and is still fully editable.

RyanB

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1005530#Comment_1005530

Hi Ryan. It's still there! What used to be called "My Passage Guide" is now called "Passage Guide." It's your guide template as before, and is still fully editable.

Great news. Thank you Richard. I appreciate it. I'm trusting that all of your template edits from L7 also transferred over to the L8 Passage Guide?

Andrew Batishko

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1005531#Comment_1005531

Great news. Thank you Richard. I appreciate it. I'm trusting that all of your template edits from L7 also transferred over to the L8 Passage Guide?

All of your custom templates from L7 are available in L8 exactly as they were in L7. The only change with templates is that "My Passage Guide" is not listed separately, but is instead automatically used and edited in place of the default Passage Guide template.

RyanB

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1005654#Comment_1005654

Perfect. [Y] Thank's Andrew.

john camping

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1004684#Comment_1004684

Adam Borries thanks! One of your customer service team members guided me here to this thread. I was lil distraught when the my content feature went away. But after reading this I see how you have integrated other functional tools to do the same thing. It is actually much easier to see now and all I have to do is click on the post-it note that is next to the chapter and verse. It's so much better in my opinion as well and more options to write and edit and like you said search. Thanks.

I'm new to this all, so from a newbie standpoint using the Notes Tab you made and anchoring the text is by far easier for me. Looking to see more features great job everyone there at Faithlife.

Phil Gons (Logos)

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1005521#Comment_1005521

As a minimum I suggest that the lead post in this thread should contain a warning.

We're working on an article that outlines all the things that are missing or different between Logos 7 and Logos 8 and hope to get that out by Friday. I'm sorry we didn't have that available on Monday.

David Thomas

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1004684#Comment_1004684

Star or remove a commentary to mark it as helpful/unhelpful for the passage

Could "mark as helpful" (or something similar) be included in the exegetical sermon WORKFLOW? I'm thinking whenever I study a particular passage there are certain commentaries that I consult for every sermon and there would be certain commentaries that I consult for a particular passage.

Perhaps the "consult commentaries" section of the workflow could be divided into my collections with 2 checkboxes next to each resource - I checkbox could be "read/unread" and the other could be "helpful/unhelpful". [personally I would use CLIPPINGS to collect the portions that I find helpful, but other users may not use/be familiar with clippings.]

This way, whenever I resume my workflow I could easily identify the commentaries that I've already consulted for this message.

Gary Jarvis

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1005019#Comment_1005019

I want to thank Adam Borries and the team of Developers who were able to create a workaround for the notes in my logos 7 guides that disappeared in the upgrade. All of the notes are there now and in a way, I can navigate them and find them. It is not ideal ongoing, but it will do fine in the short-term. I do look forward to when the Guides and notes are integrated again in a few months. That will be awesome. In the meantime, this issue forced me to learn about the new Workflows, and I think that feature is fantastic and I really like how easy it is to set up my own workflows for the way I study and prepare for sermons. I think in the end the changes will be much better than what was in Logos 7, it just might take a little bit more time to get there.

Nathan Rice

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1004684#Comment_1004684

Adam, thanks for the update. I appreciate your willingness to openly discuss

I am a pastor and as part of my sermon prep, I try to study at least 20-30 commentaries from my library.

I loved the "Mark as Helpful" feature from Logos 7, because that was a way I could keep track of which commentaries I had already read. I would star these commentaries in the Sermon Starter guide as I moved through my studies. I Now that this feature is gone, I feel a bit lost in Logos.

Could you either bring the feature back or tell me another way to keep track of what I've studied- other than pen and paper? I'll check out tutorials on the new notes features. It will be very hard to replace the simplicity and accessibility of the saved guides.

Perhaps very few users used the saved guides, but those that did found them to be immensely helpful? Please keep us in mind as you consider our sermon prep times!

Torrey Porter

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1007519#Comment_1007519

I am a pastor and as part of my sermon prep, I try to study at least 20-30 commentaries from my library.

I loved the "Mark as Helpful" feature from Logos 7, because that was a way I could keep track of which commentaries I had already read. I would star these commentaries in the Sermon Starter guide as I moved through my studies. I Now that this feature is gone, I feel a bit lost in Logos.

Adam this is exactly how several Pastors at our church kept track as well

I would star them in the Passage Guide.....

Please advise a work around or the new solution.....

Torrey Porter

Larry Craig

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1004684#Comment_1004684

I never used saved guides, and from what you just described, it seems to be a timewaster. Maybe I just don't know enough about it.

I did star commentaries that were helpful, and the stars showed up if I did a new guide search, and I was happy for that.

I was so disappointed that they weren't a part of Logos 8, I asked customer service if I could run Logos 7 as a separate program. The answer was no.

He walked me though the favorites thing, and I didn't see the value of that. That could fill up very quickly with hundreds of resources. Would there be some way to sort them by passage or search criteria. Just a lot of extra work, where you could just stat a commentary and be done with it.

The feature needs to be expanded so that whenever you do a search, you can somehow mark a resource as either being read, useful, not useful,etc. If you are doing research or a sermon, you will be repeating searches or guides, and you will end up looking at books you already went through before. A softwareprogram is supposed to save your time and not waste it.

I worked through my monographs so I will be using them a lot more in my passage guide. Here it would be really helpful to be able to mark them in some way after I look at one. This would save a lot of time.

Thank you

Larry