What Scholars Need
Logos has asked for feedback on the Android App, so I thought it might be helpful to start a thread where scholars (mainly college teachers and writers) could communicate what they are looking for. So here's my opinion, but I realize I may not be speaking for the vast majority of Logos customers.
I have been very happy with my Logos 3 for several years. I am a new droid user, and recently upgraded to Logos 4 (for a day) for primarily one reason: because I wanted to have access to some of the basic primary resources, primarily the Bible in original languages on my android. For the few hours that I could actually use Logos 4 on the Droid (before the 2.3 upgrade crash), I found the program very uneven since it is lacking in some fundamental features (original languages), while including some advanced features (word studies, links to dictionary articles, etc).
Here's a summary if you don't want to read further: Many of us are just looking for a way to access basic biblical resources so that we don't have to carry our Hebrew Bible, Septuagint, and Greek New Testament (and perhaps lexicons and reference grammars) with us in a wheelbarrow.
First, I am looking for the basics: Properly displayed biblical text in the original languages. It seems to me that this should be a high priority, and that by Beta 8 it should be attained. The Hebrew and Aramaic still read the wrong way, and the Greek accents appear as boxes, breaking up words.
Second, once the biblical texts are readable, the critical apparati are essential.
Third in importance are the lexical and grammatical cross references.(Everything else is icing on the cake).
Fourth, the other features are nice, and would be used occasionally on the phone, but for serious research most of us prefer a big screen (or multiple screens) where we can see other resources (like the dead sea scrolls), Theological dictionaries, word studies, etc. Even if we have it available on the phone, the computer will still be the medium of choice for serious work.
The bottom line for me is that I will only get one major biblical program for my droid (I can't afford two). I would prefer Logos 4 since I already own most of the Logos resources that I need. Since the basic resources don't work, however, I returned Logos 4 after only one day. My guess is that the top priority is get the App working again on 2.3, and that the issues mentioned above are back burner. So right now Olivetree is very tempting since it meets the basic criteria outlined above.
My two cents.
Laurie
(Mr. Laurie J. Braaten)
Comments
-
Welcome to the forums and thank you for your feedback. Keep your eyes on the Logos 4 product - after all it is still a test product not a finished product.
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."
0 -
Laurie,
The step from B7 to B8 was huge, and as you say there is a way to go, but so far so good for me...
What resouces specifically are you having difficulties with?
I am using the Lexham Greek resources and the Greek seems rendered excellent to me (no blocks)
I dont know hebrew/aramaic so cant test that for you
Never Deprive Anyone of Hope.. It Might Be ALL They Have
0 -
Hi, first, my thanks to Logos for quickly addressing the Android OS 2.3 (gingerbread) non compatibility issue, and for fixing a few bugs. Also, it was a pleasant surprise to find that Logos for Android works with Logos 3.
Second, sorry for the delayed response, but apparently one can't respond on an android in the android forum, or at least I couldn't figure out how. ;^).
Accents now appear properly in the Greek texts, instead of rectangles, etc. between letters. The SBL Greek NT now works, as well as it's critical apparatus.
Hebrew still doesn't display properly in the BHS, Hebrew Grammars, Lexicons, etc. The only place I saw properly displayed Hebrew was in the NET Bible notes - I assume it is embeded differently. I probably use the Hebrew Bible materials more than anything else in Logos, so I eagerly await a fix for this.
I also played a little with some other materials and found that in the middle of the S entries (I think after "Samaritan") in the Tyndale Bible dictionary that several pages suddenly turned into a narrow column of text.
anyway, I'll keep watching and waiting.
Laurie
0 -
Hi, first, my thanks to Logos for quickly addressing the Android OS 2.3 (gingerbread) non compatibility issue, and for fixing a few bugs. Also, it was a pleasant surprise to find that Logos for Android works with Logos 3.
I also played a little with some other materials and found that in the middle of the S entries (I think after "Samaritan") in the Tyndale Bible dictionary that several pages suddenly turned into a narrow column of text.
anyway, I'll keep watching and waiting.
Laurie
I was able to reproduce that error in the Tyndale Bible Dictionary. We will work on a fix for that and will push it out in a future release.
We are working on improving support for Right-To-Left read languages in the app and will be releasing those improvements as soon as we can.
Thanks,
0 -
Laurie, I totally agree, especially with the readability and availability of good original language texts available on your mobile device. I know that Logos is aware of this need, but kind and well-written posts like this can only help encourage prioritizing these needs over some others...
Jacob Hantla
Pastor/Elder, Grace Bible Church
gbcaz.org0 -
I heartily concur with Laurie's post and I'm thrilled to see it stated so succinctly. As an OT Ph.D. student my priorities are basically the same as those stated above: Texts and apparatuses, lexica and grammars, search functions (to replace a concordance), followed at a short distance by the eReader access to books in my Logos library (mainly commentaries and texts in translation). I bought Logos 4 last year primarily as an excuse to start building an eLibrary which I could access on a tablet device. I haven't purchased a tablet yet, but it would be nice to see the Android app be equally functional to the iPad (then I suppose I can make my final choice based on non-Logos criteria).
-John
0 -
Another option might be the ability to open an html tab. Laparola.net provides a free apparatus for the NT in html. I have suggested this as an option in Logos4.
0 -
Once original texts, grammars and lexicons are working, another desirable feature would be a split screen (window) like Olivetree. This could display various original texts (e.g., BHS and LXX), texts and modern translations (e.g., BHS and NRSV), or Texts and Lexicon (e.g., BHS and BDB).
Laurie
0 -
Hi, another hearty thanks to Logos for improving the Android Beta. The consonants on the right to left languages now appear in the correct order. Based on limited testing of this version I have the following list of bugs, some have been briefly mentioned before:
1. All pointing, including vowels are offset. to the left. This includes dots in and over letters (meaning the letter Shin appears to be the letter Sin).
2. Morphology activation is also offset. I found it necessary to press one word to the left of the one I am trying to retrieve info for. In other words, pressing a word retrieves information for the word to its right.
3. Display in morphology and word study sections is inconsistent, sometimes the Greek, Hebrew and transliterations are 100%, at other times they are not.
4. Missing resources: this has been mentioned before. On my short list of essential resources: HALOT (New KB Hebrew-Aramaic Lexicon), Dead Sea Scrolls Biblical Data Base, Jouon - Muroaka, Hebrew Grammar. Holladay's Lexicon is also AWOL. (Most of these I purchased as add ons directly from Logos, HALOT I purchased directly from Brill, but Logos has the license info.)
5. And of course, the textual critical apparati are still missing for the appropriate versions of BHS and Nestles (which I also note is hard to bring up in a search).
6. Morph lookup and word study don't work on downloaded books when there is no internet connection. Not sure if this by design, or if it something to be fixed later (how does it work on the iPhone?)
7. Question: when I download books onto the Droid, will these have to be deleted and downloaded again with the next Beta, or are corrections made with the update?
Thanks again Logos, this is a hugh step forward, I am looking forward to further improvements.
0 -
2. Morphology activation is also offset. I found it necessary to press one word to the left of the one I am trying to retrieve info for. In other words, pressing a word retrieves information for the word to its right.
I also find it is offset one word - 1 word to the left in LGNTI!
Dave
===Windows 11 & Android 13
0 -
I also find it is offset one word - 1 word to the left in LGNTI!
Dave, I get mixed results on this issue. Selecting words in the Hebrew text always appears to be offset. Sometimes in various Greek texts the selection is spot on, at other times I have to select the word to the left.
Laurie
0 -
6. Morph lookup and word study don't work on downloaded books when there is no internet connection. Not sure if this by design, or if it something to be fixed later (how does it work on the iPhone?):
I recall one of the Logos gurus saying that these features require indexing, which would require more extensive resources than the phones or tabs have available.
Do you get Nestles? I can only get the free SBL Gk text. Word lookups on it are quite irregular. Sometimes it shows the previous word, sometimes it calls up the SBL apparatus and sometimes in is out in the ozone somewhere.
0 -
Do you get Nestles?
Hi Jim, I get Nestles by searching NA27, usually pops up by the time I get to the 2. I purchased the version with the apparatus, although that is not working yet.
0 -
No go for NA27 or Nestles, but thanks for checking. I am suspecting that it might be related to SESB, not sure. I purchased the "limited" languages option when I bought Logos4. Fortunatly for me, The SBL "free" edition of the text is the same text as UBS4 and NA27. As a bonus, it does have a simplified apparatus that actually works! Since it is the same text, and Nestles and UBS4 do not link to a apparatus, I'll be happy with SBL until then.
0 -
I recall one of the Logos gurus saying that these features require indexing, which would require more extensive resources than the phones or tabs have available.
A look up requires an index, especially for words. A Morph lookup is much simpler & could be done offline if it was programmed that way.
Dave
===Windows 11 & Android 13
0 -
Jim, I bought the SESB version, so you are probably right about the NA27 being connected with that.
Regarding the most recent beta, I don't notice much different on the Hebrew / Greek functions. Initially I thought the word lookup had been fixed since usually the selected word (mostly with Hebrew texts) shows up at the top of the header at the bottom of the screen. But a closer look reveals that the information given below the word is for a different word, still offset by one word. I can see this has been widely reported.
0 -
Just checked the latest Logos Android Beta, which downloaded a couple of hours ago. Hebrew pointing is still misaligned, and the word lookup doesn't work properly in the BHS or LXX. I get mixed results with the NA 27 (Greek NT), most of the time the word lookup has the same problems as before, occasionally it works properly. There are still many important missing resources.
Laurie
0 -
nothing new on the Android app front for a long time, we are still using the same incomplete and sometimes buggy beta. Since Android usage worldwide has surpassed iphone, I am a bit surprised by this lag. But maybe I expect too much and have unrealistic expectations. Does anyone have or know of someone running logos original language resources on an i Phone? If so, how does it compare to the Android?
0 -
nothing new on the Android app front for a long time, we are still using the same incomplete and sometimes buggy beta
Newer Android Beta available => Logos for Android 0.9.2 Beta 1 (announcement posted 4 Nov) that includes integration with Proclaim presentations.
Logos developers are also working on cross platform sync v2 framework so highlighting and notes can replicate in any direction between mobile apps (Android and iOS) along with Logos 4 on Mac and PC. Anticipating mobile app updates with sync v2 once Logos 4.5 ready for stable release.
Keep Smiling [:)]
0 -
Hi Keep Smiling - just checked the Android market and this update is not there yet.
0 -
Hi Keep Smiling - just checked the Android market and this update is not there yet.
Noticed Logos for Android 0.9.2 Beta 1 includes:
We've released Beta 1 of 0.9.2 today. This will be a non-market release.
If you wish to participate in the beta, visit this link from your phone to download it: http://downloads.logos.com/Android/Logos/beta/Logos-22.apk.
Keep Smiling [:)]
0 -
Our application architecture depends on the underlying OS to render text. Android sometimes does a poor job of this. We're doing what we can to make text display as best we can with the platform limitations. Hebrew will not display great on Android until Android fixes how they handle Hebrew text or until we re-architect our application to not depend on the OS for text rendering. The latter is something we are investigating, though it is a huge undertaking.
Resource availability is up to the publisher. If a resource is not available on the mobile platforms, it is because the publisher has not granted Logos the rights to make it available.
0 -
Hi Dunkin. I saw this same response on another thread that brought up the topic of misaligned Hebrew [and I would also add Aramaic] vowel points. I will give a response similar to someone else's on that thread: I have Olivetree software on my Android and the vowel points in the Hebrew line up perfectly. If it were the fault of Android to properly handle the Hebrew text, then we could expect Olivetree to have the same display problems as Logos. Perhaps the problem is in the Logos application architecture not being fully compatible with the Android OS. Unless, of course, your last sentence is meant to suggest that Android has granted some resource rights to Olivetree which it has denied to Logos.
0 -
I suspect Olive Tree does not use Android's built in text rendering.
0 -
[Y]I suspect Olive Tree does not use Android's built in text rendering.
...there ya' go, I thought there was a solution to the problem! ;^)
0
