40.0 (40.0.351) is now available
Comments
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Re: Accessibility
Early in the V39 cycle (I think) the release notes indicated a 'Windows only' improvement in screen reader tagging When I inquired about similar macOS improvments, I was told that they are lagging behind. I did notice sometime after that, that some of the major toolbar icons have had 'VoiceOver' / 'Speak item under pointer' functionality.
In the V40 release notes a sweeping statement is made regarding screen reader functionality. Since I have no audible clues on my Mac that the sweeping statements are true for me, I'll assume it's still 'Windows only'.
Please consider being pedantically precise in the release notes, lest some are provided with false hope.
macOS (Logos Pro - Beta) | Android 13 (Logos Stable)
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thanks this seems to have fixed it
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This is not an improvement. This is just going to result in people accidentally buying books they didn't intend to, and then CS having to fix it.
Please change this back to allow us to view the resource on Logos.com. I already fell for this this weekend, and had to e-mail CS to get the book refunded.
I think the majority of users DO NOT want the ability to instantly purchase a book with a single click within the program. At least have it open up to a browser for us to confirm the purchase.
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I found that clicking on the title takes you to the product page. But I can see how, if you're used to the previous setup and not paying attention, you can easily end up buying a book without planning to, though it's beyond me why the link goes to immediate purchase instead of taking you to the cart - this part is really not appropriate (and comes across as grasping).
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I agree. If "Buy now" is designed to allow people to make purchases without leaving the app, then I think it should lead to a confirmation page within the book before processing the order. One more click would not be much of an inconvenience to those wanting to purchase the book, and it would prevent many accidental orders.
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Since the update I notice the import song lyrics option has been removed from the media drop down menu, has this been removed completely or is it now in a different location.
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Am I correct in assuming that this comment relates to Proclaim? If so, please ask this question (and future Proclaim-related questions) in the Proclaim forum, rather than the Logos and Verbum forum.
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I think that in-app purchasing (including rapid, no-confirmation "buy now") existed in many prior versions - the change seems to be the look of the "you don't have a license"-tab which I don't like when there's content in it:
to the right is the old version (from Verbum 36.1): a clear bolded statement, what is happening, what am I seeing. The resource ID. The link to the shop ckearly recognizable as such. And then a look-into which really helps - I pointed to the slider in the scrollbar to reflect that. To the left is the new thing: cover picture (who wants to see that), blurb, the title is a link.
What bugs me even more is when the thing has no current product page in the store:
This thing is completely empty - no piece of info whatsoever. Inacceptable.
EDIT: @Matt Mattox (Faithlife) do you need a separate bug-post about this anywhere? /EDIT
Have joy in the Lord!
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We have a long way to go on accessibility/screen reader support on both Windows and macOS. However, there should be some improvements that spanned v39 and v40. Specifically, the dynamic resource toolbar should fully support VoiceOver on macOS. If you find deficiencies in screen reader support on the dynamic resource toolbar, we would really love to get feedback. We treated it a little bit as a trial to set some foundation and understand the work required to slowly increase our accessibility footprint.
You may find improvements in certain other panels that came as a side effect of the foundational work that we did on the resource toolbar, but we didn't want to make any promises because it will be inconsistent at best.
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Previously, we had both a "Buy Now" button and a "More Info" button. The former isn't changed, but to save space, we removed the latter.
If you accidentally click "Buy Now", you should see a "Cancel" button that allows you to cancel the transaction BEFORE it completes.
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The "Buy Now" button may not be new, but regardless I don't believe this is best practice. Forcing a user into panic mode to stop an accidently initiated process is a far worse solution than the standard, common-sense approach of offering the user an opportunity to confirm the purchase.
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It's intended to be similar to the "Quick Buy" button at logos.com. We labeled it "Buy Now", partly because that's the wording that Amazon and many other online retailers use for buttons with a similar purpose. We hoped customers would be familiar with that wording.
Can you (or others) think of what is different about this button compared to those many other experiences?
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Quick Buy has a last chance.
Maybe look at courtesy to Faithlife customers, instead of competitor behaviors.
unSubscribe is getting better, almost daily.
"If myth is ideology in narrative form, then scholarship is myth with footnotes." B. Lincolm 1999.
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I appreciate your engagement. But I must say that your comparisons are off here. The "Quick Buy" button on Logos.com offers the user a chance to confirm the purchase. The "Buy Now" button on Amazon.com likewise offers customers a chance to confirm the purchase. The difference between this button and the examples you listed is obvious: the other buttons offer the user a chance to confirm the purchase while this one does not.
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The cancel part shows up for about 1 second, and Logos freezes up when you try to press it. At least mine did. I'm obviously not going to try it again to see if it was just an odd fluke.
The Quick Buy button on Logos, if I remember, (I'm too scared to test it out), doesn't immediately buy it. It adds it to your cart and takes you to the last screen, so that all you have to do is click Place Order. It also doesn't immediately place the order.
Amazon's Buy Now doesn't actually buy it immediately. It too will have a pop up screen confirming it, and giving you a chance to both confirm the price is what you thought and to make any last minute changes.
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Should I admit that I use the Buy Now feature and appreciate not having to the extra step - I like it on Amazon and eBay as well. I also liked the more info button and am not keen on its disappearance.
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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Sure 😊. I'm not familiar with eBay's Buy now process. Is it two clicks like Amazon and Logos.com or just one? I have seen a purchase method on Amazon that explicitly states "1-Click" purchase, or something along those lines. I believe that purchase method can be disabled if one so chooses. I would be ok with the Logos app explicitly stating "1-Click" purchase next to another option to see more info or something. To me that would be clear and convenient. The way the current button functions, however, in my view is neither clear nor consistent.
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Amazon's Buy Now button isn't consistent. Perhaps it wasn't a good example for me to pick. But at Amazon, for digital goods (which is the closest parallel), Buy Now (always? usually?) means exactly that.
For physical goods, you often get a confirmation screen. This is more likely to happen if you're a Prime member, where they give you the option to choose an "Amazon Delivery Day" instead. If you're a cynic, you'll likely conclude that the "Amazon Delivery Day" is mainly there because Amazon wants your Prime subscription dollars, but they'd prefer not to pay the additional cost of 1- or 2-day shipping. The incentive to reduce their Prime delivery costs outweighs the benefits of helping customers check out as quickly as possible.
For digital goods at Amazon, that math doesn't apply, so Buy Now really does mean Buy Now, and you can check out more speedily.
That's the decision we took here. We've been trying to reduce the number of clicks required throughout the app, and although we haven't made recent changes to this button, it's perhaps a good example of us trying to optimize for the "minimum number of clicks to get the job done while still being easy to use."
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Mark Barnes says, "We've been trying to reduce the number of clicks required throughout the app..."
And here's me thinking I've read dozens upon dozens of posts on the increased number of clicks in Logos, especially with interlinears, lol. I think there's a rapidly disappearing veil on the old emperor's body in the Private Equity Era.
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I just confirmed at Amazon, and the one-click purchase method for digital goods explicitly states "1-Click". It does not only state "Buy now". Therefore, Amazon correctly differentiates between the 1-click and 2-click purchase methods, while Logos does not. Quick buy on logos.com is 2 clicks and Buy now in the app is 1 click.
If there is no willingness to consider changing this process, please do your customers the favor of being clear about the order process. Follow in the footsteps of Amazon and make clear that it is a "1-click" purchase. I can't imagine this would be a difficult change.
I'm going to limit my comments on your reference to trying to reduce the number of clicks throughout the app to simply saying that I find it distasteful.
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I always like to make any purchase on Logos.com because there's been several occasions where I wanted to purchase a book, and upon looking at it on Logos.com I saw that it's included in a package and for a couple bucks more I can get not only that book but maybe a dozen or two others.
Sometimes it has even been cheaper to buy the package than to buy the individual book.
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@Mark Barnes (Logos) I'm sorry, but things are getting worse. I just purchased a book by accident. I went into the Bookstore search and found to my surprise that the button in the bookstore was called "Quick Buy" while the button in the preview was called "Buy now". I wondered if this "Quick Buy" button worked the same as the website "Quick Buy" button. So, fingers ready to click "Cancel", I clicked on "Quick Buy". Except "Cancel" never came. There was no way to stop the order. So, not only does a button with an identical name perform a surprisingly different function in the app vs at logos.com, there's also no way to cancel it when a mistake has been made. This whole thing is surprisingly confusing.
- Please change the Bookstore instant purchase button to match the book preview instant purchase button, as these buttons perform an identical function.
- Please change the name of these buttons to "Buy now with one click" or something similar. This would add much clarity. To keep the button shorter, you could have a taller button with two rows, "Buy now" on the top and "One click" on the bottom.
- Add the "Cancel" option on the bookstore page, as it is on the book preview page.
- I would like to see the "Learn more" button in the book preview page, but I understand if the intention is that the hyperlinked book cover and title is thought to sufficiently provide access to that information.
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It's true that we've increased the clicks required in the dynamic toolbar. We didn't like doing that, but we felt it was the only realistic option given how little usage and understanding many of the tools had.
But for things like "opening your top commentary in a linkset", or "finding all the people mentioned in a passage", the number of clicks has reduced significantly.
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things are getting worse. I just purchased a book by accident.
… fingers ready to click "Cancel", I clicked on "Quick Buy". Except "Cancel" never came.Aaron, I'm sorry about the accidental order! I agree that's bad. But that product section in Bookstore search has not changed, so it's not "getting worse." In version 40, the only changes we've made are to the book preview panel.
I'd just like to clarify, there's not much that's really new here.
In the old way (still used in Bookstore Search and Guides):
- If you have a credit card on file, the button text is Quick Buy.
- Clicking this button places the order immediately.
- There's brief cancellation period (about 5 seconds), but it places the order after one click if you don't cancel. (The fact that the Cancel button is missing in Bookstore search is a problem, but not a new regression.)
- If you don't have a credit card on file, the button text is Add to Cart.
- Clicking this button takes you directly to the cart on logos.com to checkout with the item.
- If for some reason the product isn't configured to be sold in the app, you would also see Add to Cart.
- In either case, clicking the book title or Learn More brings you to the product page on the website.
The new way (in the unlicensed book panel) is virtually identical, except the button always says Buy now.
- If you have a credit card on file, Buy now places the order immediately, with 5-second cancelation period.
- If you don't have a credit card on file, Buy now adds the item to your cart on logos.com.
- In either case, clicking the book title brings you to the product page on the website.
Also new:
- We now list the collections that contain this book. You can "Buy now" the top collection in app, or click any of the collection titles to open its logos.com product page.
(Known issue: Collections are sorted by lowest price first, but they aren't correctly sorted on dynamic price, if you are already own part of the collection. It correctly displays your dynamic price, but it's still sorted on the regular price.) - The new layout re-flows much better in narrow panels, and offers a better experience when scrolling the book content preview.
We've been using the new UI on the web app for over a year. This update brings consistency to the desktop app. It's small, but I hope you'll agree that it's an improvement.
0 - If you have a credit card on file, the button text is Quick Buy.
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@Adam Borries (Logos) Thank you for the detailed reply.
it's not "getting worse."
I understand. Apologies for being vague. I meant my experience was getting worse.
I'd just like to clarify, there's not much that's really new here.
I understand, but it doesn't affect my suggestions. I was hoping that since things are being redesigned, perhaps they could be redesigned better (I understand that "better" is subjective).
If you have a credit card on file, the button text is
Quick Buy.Clicking this button places the order immediately.
I stand by my earlier suggestions. I think it is unintuitive and inconsistent (also not standard with industry norms) to have Quick Buy and Buy now be 1-click purchases. In my experience, if a button works as a 1-click purchase, it is usually clearly identified as such.
It is inconsistent that Quick Buy takes me to a checkout screen at logos.com but immediately places the order in the app. I'm not sure how someone could argue against this plain fact.
We now list the collections that contain this book. You can "Buy now" the top collection in app, or click any of the collection titles to open its logos.com product page.
This sounds cool, but I don't understand. For the books I have searched for that I know are part of a collection, I only see the option to buy the book in the app, not the collection. I'm not seeing any collections on the book preview page.
This update brings consistency to the desktop app. It's small, but I hope you'll agree that it's an improvement.
In some ways I can see it as an improvement. In other ways I feel like the concerns of users are not being heard.
These are just my thoughts. I understand that they might not make a difference in app development choices, and I don't intend to fixate on an area of the app in which I obviously spend very little time. However, I would say that my experience thus far with the new changes has not increased my motivation to spend more time here in the future.
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Thanks, for clarifying, Aaron. Now is the right time to give that feedback.
For the books I have searched for that I know are part of a collection, I only see the option to buy the book in the app, not the collection. I'm not seeing any collections on the book preview page.
Hm… It should be something like below. What book(s) are you checking?
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You've inspired me to create a 2nd account, which I've been wanting to do anyway to offer guidance on the free version of Logos. Whatever is supposed to be happening isn't. Sorry.
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Well, that certainly doesn't look right. Let me start a new thread to follow up.Oh, wait… silly me. I forgot that the containing collections didn't make the cutoff for version 40; it will be in version 41. In the meantime, you can also test it at app.logos.com. Sorry about that!
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While I like having the "This book is included in this collection…" info, I don't think the one click purchase is a good idea. One stray click and you've made a $24,000 purchase. I just don't understand why having a small popup that says "Place order for "Book Title" for $xx.xx to card ending in 1234" Confirm Yes or No? would be so unwanted. Or better yet, just have it open to the website.
Why can't we just stick to having the software be for Bible study and the website for purchasing?
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