Enough with the WordSearch brouhaha...I want what I paid for.
I really must insist that FL honor its marketing spiel and create the requisite hyperlinks for the products in its current stable...and do it in a first come, first served manner. In other words, FL needs to PARK all of its WS hoopla and attend to matters that have been festering FOR DECADES. Specifically, I just opened up a JETS journal and encountered a footnote that cites the H. D. Betz Hermeneia Commentary on Galatians, a commentary I happen to own, and yet that citation is infuriatingly NOT HYPERLINKED. This is unacceptable, period. UNACCEPTABLE!!! I frankly don't care what series of events transpired to result in this condition, because this issue has been festering unabated for over a decade during which I (and others) have asked, cajoled, pleaded, and begged FL to attend to its remedy...all to no avail. This is not a matter of no consequence, not the least of which is the fact that FL MARKETS LOGOS SOFTWARE AS VALUABLE PRECISELY BECAUSE THE LOGOS RESOURCES ARE (supposedly) LINKED TOGETHER FOR MAXIMUM RESEARCH AND STUDY BENEFIT. And yet, all too often, that just isn't the case. This is no small matter since, for me as for others, the primary reason I own a Logos library of the size that I do (nearly 14,000 volumes), is BECAUSE MY LIBRARY IS SUPPOSED TO BE LINKED. There is no way I could read that many books even if I lived three lives. I didn't purchase these books to be read individually. I purchased them because they (according to FL marketing) provide instantaneous links that allow me to follow the citation and research threads of a given subject.
My Logos library is supposed to make study easier by automating much of the process. Right now, not only is that frequently not happening, but my Logos library at times is essentially lying to me. I have hundreds of books, maybe thousands, that I don't even know I own. For me that is by design, for the reasons already stated. I'm not intending to read all of them cover to cover; I'm rather expecting my library to alert me when a particular book I own is pertinent to the study I am presently engaged in. In the case of the Hermeneia Galatians volume, I happened to be aware that I owned that book and, if inclined, I can take the time to go to my library, type in the necessary info to call up the volume, open it and then navigate to the appropriate location as indicated by the citation...but that ordeal, which takes 30-100x as much time as a simple click of a hypertext link, can only happen IF I KNOW FOR CERTAIN THAT I DO IN FACT OWN THE BOOK MY LIBRARY IS DECEIVING ME INTO THINKING I DO NOT OWN. This is an absurd state of affairs!
And just to be clear, I PAID TO HAVE THE THING I AM DOING WITHOUT. I paid for hyperlinked resources...to the tune of TEN$ OF THOU$AND$ OF DOLLAR$. I (and everyone else who is a Logos customer) AM OWED WHAT I PAID FOR. I AM TIRED OF BEGGING FOR IT. I am at the point where I am considering a class action lawsuit to find a remedy that should have been forthcoming many years ago. Maybe FL needs to be forced to do an audit that requires them to identify any non-linked resources and provide refunds for them to their customer base. Or, FL can just do the right thing AND DEAL WITH THIS LONG ENDURED, ONGOING, FESTERING PROBLEM THAT MAKES THEIR MARKETING APPROACH OF OFFERING THAT WHICH THEY DO NOT PROVIDE ESSENTIALLY A SCAM.
It's time for this lingering issue to be resolved now.
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"The Unbelievable Work...believe it or not." Little children...Biblical prophecy is not Christianity's friend.
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David, I know that you know Faithlife is continuing to update older resources to newer tagging standard as an ongoing process. We should be thankful that they do not charge us for the tagging that is beyond the resource as we purchased it. If you have resources just released by Faithlife that are lacking tagging, they are usually very prompt in correcting the issue. Yes, it is frustrating when an older resource lacks the tagging needed for one's immediate project ... but we know we live in an imperfect world bound by time. Much though Faithlife might want to have instant tag updating, they, too, find that tagging takes time and other resources. If their error rate in tagging becomes too high, it is worth a rant ... they have more control over that.
And yes, David, my response is partially to your inflammatory language, use of capitals etc. - it's your style and certainly is appropriate. However, it is so far from the style in my region of the country that it evokes a response other than what you intend when thrown into the milieu of Scandinavian reticence.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."
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Just...fix...the...problem.
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"The Unbelievable Work...believe it or not." Little children...Biblical prophecy is not Christianity's friend.
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David Paul said:
Just...fix...the...problem.
Well. It seems to me, the new WS resources aren't heavy-duty cross-referencing. So, in theory, FL is getting an expanded customer base, with limited cross-referencing pressure ... supports your goal concerning improving the current spotty referencing. If FL went that direction.
But not likely.
"If myth is ideology in narrative form, then scholarship is myth with footnotes." B. Lincolm 1999.
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Some things never change.
I feel like FL is doing a decent job. Rants like this are better sent as emails to customer service.L2 lvl4 (...) WORDsearch, all the way through L10,
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I've occasionally noticed things that could have been links but weren't for whatever reason, or were tied to a specific version of the resources. I assume the sheer size of the resources (I personally have close to 8500) they have to keep rechecking as new works are added has got to be pretty difficult.
So, yes, I would love for this to be resolved. But I have no idea how much work it will realistically take. I've occasionally pointed out problems and sometimes they've confirmed and corrected them. Maybe that's part of it?
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I have no idea how automated or not the link creation process is--it probably varies depending on whatzits. But seeing as there is an obligation to paying customers to resolve and complete this process, putting a few warm bodies on the project shouldn't break the bank. I would think that even interns could get the job done. Also, I don't for a second accept that the argument of "it's always been that way" is acceptable, the notion being, as MJ intimated, that "we supposedly purchased those resources in that less than desirable condition". Let me be clear: I NEVER perceived that I was buying Logos resources that were not linked, and I've been a customer since the mid-90s. Plain and simple, this problem still persists because IT IS NOT PERCEIVED TO BE A PRESSING NOR URGENT ISSUE within the decision-making apparatus at FL. As a paying customer, I find that offensive...and potentially actionable. And I'm not just any customer, but one who has certainly spent enough to put me into the top quartile if not top tenth of customers. In years past, I had a CS rep who told me he would put any other customer on hold to take my call even though I told him it wasn't necessary. The point is, though, that what I'm objecting to doesn't only affect me; it affects ALL CUSTOMERS, even the brand new ones who are just now getting swept up into the FL sphere of influence. If you are reading this thread, this issue affects you.
At this point, since I think we are approaching the point where patience is not only exhausted but obscene, I think it is probably a good idea that FL creates a listing of all resources known to lack adequate hyperlinking and thereafter create a once or twice monthly update of which resources have been removed from the list as completed. This list could then be audited by the community for both inclusiveness (in case needful resources are not included) and thoroughness (checking to make sure that removed resources are satisfactorily completed). This problem has dragged on for at least 20 years and so it needs to be explicitly and expeditiously attended to ASAP.
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"The Unbelievable Work...believe it or not." Little children...Biblical prophecy is not Christianity's friend.
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abondservant said:
Some things never change.
Correct you are...like missing hyperlinks that have never been activated for over 20 years.
abondservant said:I feel like FL is doing a decent job. Rants like this are better sent as emails to customer service.
If I was speaking about an issue that only affects me, then an email or phone call would suffice. This issue affects ALL Logos users.
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"The Unbelievable Work...believe it or not." Little children...Biblical prophecy is not Christianity's friend.
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David Wanat said:
I've occasionally noticed things that could have been links but weren't for whatever reason, or were tied to a specific version of the resources. I assume the sheer size of the resources (I personally have close to 8500) they have to keep rechecking as new works are added has got to be pretty difficult.
So, yes, I would love for this to be resolved. But I have no idea how much work it will realistically take. I've occasionally pointed out problems and sometimes they've confirmed and corrected them. Maybe that's part of it?
I think fixing typos is a different process than adding links. Regardless, I made a suggestion about a decade ago regarding link creation that I think makes a lot of sense, but I have no idea if they implemented it. Back then (and still now?) when a new resource got added to Logos that had citations from resources that were already in Logos, those citation links had to be created and added to all of the older Logos resources. In other words, when book B got added to Logos, any citations of B that existed in book A were dead because they hadn't been created since book B wasn't in Logos when book A was processed and the links added. My recommendation was that Logos should create every possible link in every newly added resource, even if some of those links were for books that were not in Logos at that time. Then, if that book gets added to Logos at a later date, the "receiving" link would get created and all of the previously created "sending" links could automatically match up and talk to each other. It's a simple matter of matching addresses. Creating viable links for future resources shouldn't be a big deal, but doing it up front saves all of the hassle of having to backtrack and create those links later (which, let's be honest, is not ever going to be a top priority precisely because it's considered "back"-tracking, and going backward isn't naturally associated with making progress--it's just a psychological glitch that humans have).
Like I said, I have no idea how FL handles making new links in new resources, and I don't really care as long as everything it gets done. But the one thing I absolutely do care about is that the "old", "tired", "tedious", "annoying", "back-tracking" links also GET DONE...and, psychological glitch or not, they need to get done NOW.
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"The Unbelievable Work...believe it or not." Little children...Biblical prophecy is not Christianity's friend.
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Well one could go down the rabbit hole of problems with Logos...which seem numerous in program implementation. Yet I would ask the questions about user concerns in a different way. When the core product is constantly supplemated, in pursuit of profit, with multiple other lines of products (i.e. dating services, secular products, TV channels, purchasing marketing share, endless marketing) how can the core product be maximized for usability? Perhaps business is truly what leaders says its about....making money.
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Sum for the number of resources missing links l(ink type X number of links) X (human time required per link + electronic resources time required per link) = total amount of time required which then must be limited by the maximum available human time and the maximum available electronic resource time with overhead accounted for. The only variables that Faithlife controls is the available time - human and electronic which is limited primarily by financial constraints. As my Dad used to say "I'm from Missouri 'Show me'" ... show me a viable business plan that meets your demands.
Personally I am more concerned with Logos providing incorrect information than I am about the extra effort required by missing coding. I suspect I am in the minority on that and that you are in the majority.
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."
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MJ. Smith said:
Personally I am more concerned with Logos providing incorrect information than I am about the extra effort required by missing coding. I suspect I am in the minority on that and that you are in the majority.
I would say incorrect information is perhaps not so much a concern for people because it is hard to know if information is accurate or not. We just expect it to be accurate. I agree with you that incorrect information is a major concern. But we are paying for coding as well. When a business gets successful, often (not always) quality starts to diminish. Hopefully Faithlife will keep quality as a priority.
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I don't think that is going to happen or get better, they are still converting my Wordsearch books, and already errors and issues are popping up. Pretty much the saem one when I used earlier iterations of Logos. But I feel your pain, too many will chime in here because they don't experience the problems, to praise the software... but the day will come for them when they have problems as well.
I'll just stick with WSB until it dies or find another bible software company or just start buying Kindle books and go back to to the figurative ebooks spread on out on the desk as I work.
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This inadequate response to Mr. Paul's concerns can only be fixed if the biz owners want to do so. And they do not. Or they already would be in process. Sad, isn't it??
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David is there anything else we can be praying for you?
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That's a gracious Colossians 4 way of putting it MJ. Thank you for expressing this in a way I could not.MJ. Smith said:
And yes, David, my response is partially to your inflammatory language, use of capitals etc. - it's your style and certainly is appropriate. However, it is so far from the style in my region of the country that it evokes a response other than what you intend
It evokes something bordering hostility in me.
The way I look at the tagging situation is this: When I bought my first 3.5" floppy with Logos, they were only tagging a few things. By logos 4 they were tagging a lot more things. By logos 8 they are tagging scores of things.
By logos 12 it will be scores upon scores of things. Like an encyclopedia, there are always new things being discovered, and so by the time its published its out of date in some ways. Its one of those jobs when done right that is never really complete.
I'm just grateful that its always improving.
Downloaded a book today that has had some new tagging added, I was grateful L2 lvl4 (...) WORDsearch, all the way through L10,
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Perhaps the question then is Logos, in whatever form, done right when a person spends thousands of dollars on a product and significant parts don't work. After all the Pinto was done right in many ways...it just had an itty bitty problem. Personally I have about $1500 wrapped up in this beast over 25 years but I still would use any possible alternative (which I have tried many that died) that actually functioned in the way I wanted it to...Satan shoveling ice from his driveway time perhaps.
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I am unaware of any resources in my library that should have hyperlinks to other resources but don't. It is my expectation that resources produced prior to whatever I buy will be linked to, and that all else in terms of hyperlinks is icing on the cake.
“The trouble is that everyone talks about reforming others and no one thinks about reforming himself.” St. Peter of Alcántara
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SineNomine said:
I am unaware of any resources in my library that should have hyperlinks to other resources but don't. It is my expectation that resources produced prior to whatever I buy will be linked to, and that all else in terms of hyperlinks is icing on the cake.
I think the Catechism of the Catholic Church has several references to other resources that Logos has, but are not linked.
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David Wanat said:SineNomine said:
I am unaware of any resources in my library that should have hyperlinks to other resources but don't. It is my expectation that resources produced prior to whatever I buy will be linked to, and that all else in terms of hyperlinks is icing on the cake.
I think the Catechism of the Catholic Church has several references to other resources that Logos has, but are not linked.
That would not surprise me. But were they in the system when the CCC was produced? If not... to me, they're icing. Mind you, I do like icing.
“The trouble is that everyone talks about reforming others and no one thinks about reforming himself.” St. Peter of Alcántara
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SineNomine said:David Wanat said:SineNomine said:
I am unaware of any resources in my library that should have hyperlinks to other resources but don't. It is my expectation that resources produced prior to whatever I buy will be linked to, and that all else in terms of hyperlinks is icing on the cake.
I think the Catechism of the Catholic Church has several references to other resources that Logos has, but are not linked.
That would not surprise me. But were they in the system when the CCC was produced? If not... to me, they're icing. Mind you, I do like icing.
Me too. I guess what I hope for (perhaps unrealistically, as I have no idea how much work is involved) is that they would add links as their library expands.
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Near as I can tell that particular title is 8 years old. Tagging has gotten a lot more extensive since then. 2 year cycles, that would have been at least logos 4 right? maybe older... some titles go years without comments.David Wanat said:SineNomine said:I am unaware of any resources in my library that should have hyperlinks to other resources but don't. It is my expectation that resources produced prior to whatever I buy will be linked to, and that all else in terms of hyperlinks is icing on the cake.
I think the Catechism of the Catholic Church has several references to other resources that Logos has, but are not linked.
L2 lvl4 (...) WORDsearch, all the way through L10,
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David Wanat said:SineNomine said:David Wanat said:SineNomine said:
I am unaware of any resources in my library that should have hyperlinks to other resources but don't. It is my expectation that resources produced prior to whatever I buy will be linked to, and that all else in terms of hyperlinks is icing on the cake.
I think the Catechism of the Catholic Church has several references to other resources that Logos has, but are not linked.
That would not surprise me. But were they in the system when the CCC was produced? If not... to me, they're icing. Mind you, I do like icing.
Me too. I guess what I hope for (perhaps unrealistically, as I have no idea how much work is involved) is that they would add links as their library expands.
They do
.
But its a never ending task for Faithlife. Logos gets more tagging types with each new version.
Something like 40,000 titles in logos catalog.
What is being asked for would require 1. no new development for the software and 2. no new titles. Thats the ONLY way I can think of that ALL of the books would be able to be brought up to current. Anything less and you are trying to hit a moving target from a moving platform. at best you can achieve this on occassion, but then a new book, or feature for the software starts you back at zero.L2 lvl4 (...) WORDsearch, all the way through L10,
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Hi David
I am sorry for your frustrations. We are always in the processing old resources to support additional linking to resources that weren't possible to make at the time or supporting new features such as sermon or prayer labels.
If we got something wrong during the initial production we try to fix it as soon as we're made aware of it.
In your additional post you referenced an issue with JETS. I believe you were using this as an illustration for a larger point that I don't want to distract from too much. However, I looked into it a bit further and I think you were referring to issues that are part of the Galaxie Theological Journal bundle. On the product page we explicitly state on that certain tagging isn't supported. I wish this wasn't so but it's was a unique and purposeful decision to produce them in that matter.
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Unless I'm remembering wrong, Galaxie is the only remaining third party that makes/produces logos resources. That is they are responsible at galaxie for the finished product, and logos makes it live when the files are recieved.Kyle G. Anderson said:Hi David
I am sorry for your frustrations. We are always in the processing old resources to support additional linking to resources that weren't possible to make at the time or supporting new features such as sermon or prayer labels.
If we got something wrong during the initial production we try to fix it as soon as we're made aware of it.
In your additional post you referenced an issue with JETS. I believe you were using this as an illustration for a larger point that I don't want to distract from too much. However, I looked into it a bit further and I think you were referring to issues that are part of the Galaxie Theological Journal bundle. On the product page we explicitly state on that certain tagging isn't supported. I wish this wasn't so but it's was a unique and purposeful decision to produce them in that matter.
There was some discussion about this a few years back when Logos was going to bring all the journals in house. Which has expanded their journal offerings in a wonderful way; but wasn't fully successfull regarding the galaxie journals IIRC.
Correct me if I"m wrong.L2 lvl4 (...) WORDsearch, all the way through L10,
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Thomas Myers said:
David is there anything else we can be praying for you?
That's pretty much sums up what I was thinking!
I am astounded pretty much every day that we have greater than the Library of Alexandria at our fingertips. Never has Bible Study been so thorough and so quick and easy. I try to keep in perspective that yes we have a few glitches and frustrations with Logos... but I also have frustrations with Microsoft, Google, Apple and a host of smaller software operations - which certainly is the class that Faithlife-Logos fits into. I am happy that Logos has absorbed WordSearch... talk about frustrations... you should have tried using their latest Mac version!
When our personal software gets upgraded to the glorified version, "then we shall know even as we are known". But until then, if today the marshmallows are missing from our Lucky Charms... tomorrow will bring another bowl!
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abondservant said:
But its a never ending task for Faithlife. Logos gets more tagging types with each new version.
And they're processing credit card charges in return for marketing claims, year after year.
But I agree, it's not possible. It's like a pyramid scheme (the equation itself, not the trickery).
Folks have recommended crowd-updating. Personally (as a customer), I'd be happy with selected-volunteers-only, and color code the reference links (where not yet checked, etc).
"If myth is ideology in narrative form, then scholarship is myth with footnotes." B. Lincolm 1999.
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While I hope I wouldn't communicate with the vitriol that David is communicating, I agree with him 100% that FL doesn't deliver what it advertises. And a link data model which automatically accounted for new arrivals would have taken care of this years ago.
An interesting exercise would be determining what percent of references in Logos books to other books within the Logos universe are actually links. I suspect it's pretty low.
-Donnie
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I'm really sorry it's taken so long to solve this problem. We've been actively working for the last two years to fully implement our bibliographic work tagging across the library. We have a database of almost 3 million works (available online at https://biblioindex.com/) that provides the plumbing for making connections between various works and resources.
We kicked this effort off many years ago in place of making direct links from one resource to another, but there were some breakdowns in various systems and processes that led to a lot of duplicate biblio records, resulting in many links not making it to their correct destination.
I asked the team to make getting this cleaned up a top priority over the last couple of years, and we've made really good progress on it. The end result will be a much better interlinking system (e.g., by allowing us to link to works before we even have them in the system, meaning that once we add them we won't need to recycle existing works to add links to the new resource).
It could also open up all sorts of opportunities for some pretty cool applications down the road:
- Building a master citation graph that maps the relationships between resources, works, their authors, etc.
- Building a system for browsing, searching, and managing works (e.g., an essay in a festschrift) as distinct from resources (i.e., the resource that contains it).
- Improving the ranking of resources and works by leveraging citation strength (among other factors) throughout the application (e.g., improved default resource priorities, improved search result ranking, improved ranking in various guide sections).
- Showing a list of the top incoming and outgoing linked resources and works both in Logos and on Logos.com.
- Providing us with another really important data point for prioritizing which works we need to acquire, add additional tagging and functionality to, etc.
It's been a huge undertaking, and it's long overdue. I'm really sorry it's taken so long to solve some of these systemic issues keeping many hyperlinks from properly resolving. But we're making really good progress and are committed to getting to the finish line on this. And I'm hopeful we'll be able to build some really cool functionality on top of this data once we're finished with the merging work and have the remaining systems and processes issues resolved.
If there are particular resources that need attention, please report them. I'll make sure the team prioritizes getting them fully functional as soon as possible. I'm sorry this has taken so much longer than we had hoped. But I'm optimistic that we're on the right path and the future is even brighter than we original anticipated (especially when you couple this with our dramatically expanded author database of over 100,000 authors and our plans for expanded metadata there). We'll keep pressing forward to make sure we get there as quickly as possible.
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Phil Gons (Faithlife) said:
I'm really sorry it's taken so long to solve this problem. We've been actively working for the last two years to fully implement our bibliographic work tagging across the library.
Thanks you Phil for acknowledging the issue and explaining what you are doing to address it!
Making Disciples! Logos Ecosystem = LogosMax on Microsoft Surface Pro 7 (Win11), Android app on tablet, FSB on iPhone & iPad mini, Proclaim (Proclaim Remote on Fire Tablet).
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