Using the Church Fathers Schaff Protestant Edition in Series

Hi Steven

When I open vol 1, is there any way to access from within vol 1 window the other volumes (other than going to the library and opening the volume I need)?

I'm afraid that, as far as I know, there is no way of doing what you want.

For this to be possible, the individual volumes would need to be indexed by volume as well as by page and they are not.

When I open vol 2 in a tab and check the parallel drop down it says there are no resources available.

The parallel resources feature finds other resources that point to the same content, so not designed to move between resources in a series.

What am I doing wrong here? or is this not an option?

I don't think you are doing anything wrong, I just don't think it is an option

If anyone has any better ideas I'm sure they will contribute

Graham 

I'm afraid that, as far as I know, there is no way of doing what you want. For this to be possible, the individual volumes would need to be indexed by volume as well as by page and they are not.The parallel resources feature finds other resources that point to the same content, so not designed to move between resources in a series.I don't think you are doing anything wrong, I just don't think it is an option

Hey Graham.

Thanks for always getting back to me so quickly. You must live on your computer, too! 

Maybe you know the answer to this, then. Why is it that the Church Fathers (and my Pulpit Commentary) are divided up into so many modules? That is certainly one thing I miss about TW5. A single module for each, even for multi-volume series. 

I was surprised that a Collection would not work. I was able to get different types of resources into a single collection for my "commentaries." There are commentaries in there and also cross-reference modules, study notes, and even two apparatus. It works very well. 

I'll keep playing around with it and see if I can't make it work.

I might consider making a personal book with hyperlinks to each volume of the Church Fathers, so I can launch them quickly when I need them. Basically an external version of the master TOC. It won't be pinpoint by chapter, but at least it will be quicker than what I have now. I suppose I could also make a shortcuts folder and put them all in there, but I've pretty much run out of room up there (small screen not much real estate).

Thanks again for all the help!

Maybe you know the answer to this, then. Why is it that the Church Fathers (and my Pulpit Commentary) are divided up into so many modules? That is certainly one thing I miss about TW5. A single module for each, even for multi-volume series. 

I don't know the complete answer to this.

It may be to do with licensing arrangements.

But it is probably also to do with pricing. With each volume as a separate resource it is possible for us to buy the specific volume(s) we are interested in as opposed to paying for the entire set.

I was surprised that a Collection would not work. I was able to get different types of resources into a single collection for my "commentaries." There are commentaries in there and also cross-reference modules, study notes, and even two apparatus. It works very well. 

Yes - Collections are a good way of combining resources, and useful in searches and guides etc. But they don't address the navigation issue of moving from one volume to another.

I might consider making a personal book with hyperlinks to each volume of the Church Fathers, so I can launch them quickly when I need them

You might find the discussion at https://community.logos.com/forums/t/38538.aspx?PageIndex=1 interesting. Work was done on creating a personal book with an index (see second page of the thread for the latest version). I haven't checked it so don't know if it will do what you are looking for.

Why is it that the Church Fathers (and my Pulpit Commentary) are divided up into so many modules? That is certainly one thing I miss about TW5. A single module for each, even for multi-volume series. 

The Early Church Fathers is a very old resource - both in paper and in Logos. It is produced as it was in print. And at the time it was produced, the resource size if it were a single module would have been a bit of a pain. It is an anthology of unrelated resources that gains nothing from sequential accessing. What Logos does provide is quick access to other editions we may own of the same work.

I was surprised that a Collection would not work

Collections are intended primarily for resources that one accesses in the same way. As you describe, you can mix a variety of resources that are accessed by a scripture reference ... but that is no a standard way to reference the Church Fathers; there are some Church Father resources that have a secondary reference by scripture references - mainly commentaries or sermon sequences.

I might consider making a personal book with hyperlinks to each volume of the Church Fathers, so I can launch them quickly when I need them.

What are you actually trying to achieve? In general, if you have a reference to the Church Fathers there is already a link available.  I suspect you are reinventing the wheel in the sense that Logos has an alternative way of doing what you are trying to do.

What are you actually trying to achieve? In general, if you have a reference to the Church Fathers there is already a link available.  I suspect you are reinventing the wheel in the sense that Logos has an alternative way of doing what you are trying to do.

In this particular instance I was looking to see if a particular author was included in the 37 volume series. In TW5 I would simply open up the resource and look at the TOC that had all 37 volumes in a collapsable tree that made it easy to see what was in the set. Plus it also had a TOC page in the front of the module so I could scroll through the main entries from Vol 1 to 37. This is, surprisingly, not available on the LOGOS version.

I see from the link someone included in the thread to personal book project completed that hyperlinks all the Church Fathers together by author. It's not quite what I'm looking for, so I think I will spend a little time putting one together that has only the links I have resources for. It's repetitive, I know. But I simply need a TOC that's easy and quick that will allow me to open each volume on the fly. Doesn't solve the single TOC problem, but then that can be solved by grabbing one off the internet and including it in the personal book, too.

The collection idea is a weird one, though. The one I created, it does appears when I have Vol 1 open (and click parallel resources), and it presents vol 1 and vol 7 in the list, but none of the other ones. I'm not certain why those two work but none of the others. I might look into this a little more. There might be a work around.

I see from the link someone included in the thread to personal book project completed that hyperlinks all the Church Fathers together by author.

There's actually 2 PBs ... one strictly for Schaff, and the other more encompassing (Logos resources and web sources). The former also combines indices from each Schaff volume.

To improve matters, I also retitled each of the 37 volumes, so they sort correctly, and then the primary authors included, so I can quickly find.

When I open vol 1, is there any way to access from within vol 1 window the other volumes (other than going to the library and opening the volume I need)?

There used to be, but I guess gone now. In Libronix you can use the ECF index to quickly hop around (eg ECF 2.3).

There's actually 2 PBs ... one strictly for Schaff, and the other more encompassing (Logos resources and web sources). The former also combines indices from each Schaff volume.

I looked at both but decided to do my own anyway. I ended up adding some personal books to the page covering the Desert Fathers and adding the Apostolic Fathers Greek and English versions as well. I didn't want or need such a detailed breakdown as the other PBs provided. I'm looking for something that I can launch and without a whole lot (or preferably any) scrolling I can click and launch any volume I choose. Below that I have a detailed outline (no hyperlinks) of the entire series so when I need to look again and find out if a document or author has been included I can do so without the need of the internet (I'm typically away from internet access for days at a time, so I need to be as self-contained as possible).

I guess I understand why Logos hasn't fixed the issue, though there is something in CF vol 1 & 7 that allow for their inclusion into a collection. They are tagged by type differently, but that doesn't seem to make a difference. I imagine whatever they did, especially to 7 (probably inadvertently) would allow us to make a collection of the entire series so all volumes would be accessible from the parallel resource dropdown. But this issue is really just for the CF and I image most people use them in search queries only and don't spend a lot of time jumping from volume to volume. Commentaries that have individual volumes avoid the issue since each volume is triggered by the reference.  

The PB TOC will do the trick going forward. But thanks for all the input.

It is obvious that different people have vastly different understandings of the Church Fathers. I for one don't want this collection to be that much more self-contained and self-referential. I instead want to see the connections between these authors and other authors across the church. The different resource type tagging I view as an advantage in that it allows the Bible Commentaries to be Bible Commentaries, and some of the great works of Systematic Theology to be viewed as Systematic Theology, so their discussions on various topics can be easily seen with those Christians who today work on the same things, and not as any kind of drawback to create a collection.

I will admit that it is not always the easiest task to find an English translation of any particular work. But this problem applies to other Patristic collections as well. Between Library view and searches, it is probably just about as good as scholars have ever had it though.

Hey Ken,

I can certainly see your point, though my initial inquiry was entirely access based and not a theological one. We do all have very different opinions of what the Church Fathers are. I guess it's presumptuous of me to use such a loose term in referencing them. But, the Schaff series is, after all, a collection printed as a series. I just find it to be inconvenient that a easy means of connecting these disparate volumes was not included when designing the modules themselves, especially when other programs seem to have little to no problem doing so. 

But, that being said, it is a small inconvenience. Most of my use of the series in question is from the Ancient Literature lookup in the guide, which serves as a great commentary for mining the 37 volumes as a single resource. But, occasionally, I do have need to work conventionally through the series or jump from one book to the other, or need to view the entire 37 volumes altogether (outline TOC) to better understand what is actually in the collection itself. The current navigation system in Logos does not really allow an easy way to do this. A little work on the TOC solves this problem.

Plus, I would not recommend forcing any kind of series "collection" overall, such as a static binding. I'm suggesting the option be available for those who do want it (i.e. making the 37 volumes as a single file as an alternate download, or fixing the issue with collections so it can function in the way I described - that would give everyone full control of how they approach and use the series).

In this particular instance I was looking to see if a particular author was included in the 37 volume series. In TW5 I would simply open up the resource and look at the TOC that had all 37 volumes in a collapsable tree that made it easy to see what was in the set.

What I would do is type the author's name into a Library pane, perhaps with the special author syntax, e.g., author:"Ambrose of Milan", which also pulls up the volumes I have (if any) by that author that are in other series or no series at all. In the example case, I have half a dozen volumes by the author that are outside the 37 volume Schaff collection, and it is handy to be able to see them all.

What I would do is type the author's name into a Library pane, perhaps with the special author syntax, e.g., author:"Ambrose of Milan", which also pulls up the volumes I have (if any) by that author that are in other series or no series at all. In the example case, I have half a dozen volumes by the author that are outside the 37 volume Schaff collection, and it is handy to be able to see them all.

I ended up creating a simple Personal Book that includes hotlinks to each volume of the Church Fathers at the top, with additional links to external books (Desert Fathers volumes and Philokalia) below that, then a full table of contents (not hyperlinked) of the 37 vol Church Fathers below that (so I can see at a glance who is included in the series). The Desert Father volumes are all individual so they have their own TOCs within and the TOCs from the Philokalia can be added in the future if needed. This Personal Book is placed in the shortcut bar so whenever I need it I can just click and click on the vol I need. This accomplishes both goals: 1. having quick access to each volume as needed and 2. finding out what is included in each vol without having to go to each volume to find out.

I would recommend to use the Favorites function in Logos and to reference the Schaff Church Fathers Collection there.

In this way you have an overview of every volume with the title an can access by one click the specific volume you want to access:

I would recommend to use the Favorites function in Logos and to reference the Schaff Church Fathers Collection there.

In this way you have an overview of every volume with the title an can access by one click the specific volume you want to access: