Logos 4 Original Languages vs BibleWorks 9

1. One of my concerns is that the very cluttered 'look' of BibleWorks. Is there a full screen toggle where the menu bars can be eliminated from the screen? Does one always need to have three windows (search, browse, analysis) open all the time? Is the size of each of three these windows adjustable?

No, there are some adjustments you can make resizing, duplicating, and closing windows. I'm unaware of a full-screen toggle.

2. Does anyone have a list of things that one can do on BibleWorks that cannot be done on Logos? 

I find some things much easier to do on BW, so much so that I've never learned (after trying it once) to do them on Logos. I do all my original language work in BW, and treat Logos as my research library, and I find they complement each other that way. I don't own a Logos package, just individual books and collections. 

3. I am already aware of the larger assortment of books that can be added to Logos, but I'm not interested in the many older commentaries or confessional or apologetic, even devotional or self-help types of works. I am interested in the more modern academic stuff, eg, the 3-volume Davies & Allison commentary on Matthew, especialy if they can be linked to the textual analysis part of Logos.

You can make links into Logos, but the BW forum is the place to ask about this.

4. One of the biggest advantages of BibleWorks for me is the parallel Hebrew-LXX module. It seems like that is not available on Logos. Correct?

It is available, but it's not integrated the same way. 

http://www.logos.com/product/2209/the-parallel-aligned-hebrew-aramaic-and-greek-texts-of-jewish-scripture 

5. Another substantial advantage of BibleWorks are the morphologically analyzed complete works of Josephus, Philo, and the apostolic fathers. It seems like that is not available on Logos. Correct?

I believe they are, but as separate purchases or packages. Here's Philo, for example.
http://www.logos.com/product/7865/the-works-of-philo-greek-text-with-morphology 

6. How good are the Logos iPhone/Andoid apps? Those would be very nice to have depending upon level of functionality.

I use the Ipad app, and am quite happy with it. I know others who aren't, but we have different usage models. I'm essentially using it as a portable reader/markup, not trying to run complex searches on it. 

7. I've read that searches on BibleWorks are much faster. Any other things that I should be thinking about?

BW has amazing bang-for-the-buck, and is tightly integrated, and seems much more responsive. Logos has greatly increased in that department, once your books are indexed. Adding new books (and sometimes program updates) can require a re-index, the speed of which depends on the size of your library and how powerful your hardware is. Some people talk of it taking several hours; when I add a book, my powerful Mac does it in a few minutes, but I have less than 1000 resources. 

The Logos engine and some books are available for free download, and Bibleworks offers a 30-day no-questions asked refund (minus shipping.) I recommend you try both. You should know, they both have training and intro videos, as learning how to take complete advantage and become a power user has quite a learning curve.

Hope this is helpful. 

Edit: I should point out, I haven't yet upgraded to BW 9 for financial reasons, but I've been with it since version 3. 

How is Bibleworks in regards to syntax searches?  D you think it is easier in logos or the other way around?  I am trying to find a software where syntaz is user friendly.

Robert Gilbert said:

Hi, all.

I'm contemplating buying BibleWorks 9 or Logos 4 Original Language package. I would very much appreciate any helpful advice people have, especially those who use or have used both programs recently.

1. One of my concerns is that the very cluttered 'look' of BibleWorks. Is there a full screen toggle where the menu bars can be eliminated from the screen? Does one always need to have three windows (search, browse, analysis) open all the time? Is the size of each of three these windows adjustable?

2. Does anyone have a list of things that one can do on BibleWorks that cannot be done on Logos? Or vice-versa? On of the things that I read in a comparison of older versions of both programs was that purely syntactical searches were able to be done on Logos but not on BibleWorks. I've heard that this is no longer be the case, but I am very interested in this aspect so if anyone has some specific information along this lines, please share.

3. I am already aware of the larger assortment of books that can be added to Logos, but I'm not interested in the many older commentaries or confessional or apologetic, even devotional or self-help types of works. I am interested in the more modern academic stuff, eg, the 3-volume Davies & Allison commentary on Matthew, especialy if they can be linked to the textual analysis part of Logos.

4. One of the biggest advantages of BibleWorks for me is the parallel Hebrew-LXX module. It seems like that is not available on Logos. Correct?

5. Another substantial advantage of BibleWorks are the morphologically analyzed complete works of Josephus, Philo, and the apostolic fathers. It seems like that is not available on Logos. Correct?

6. How good are the Logos iPhone/Andoid apps? Those would be very nice to have depending upon level of functionality.

7. I've read that searches on BibleWorks are much faster. Any other things that I should be thinking about?

Sorry for so many questions, but I hope some of this information would be very helpful to others also looking into this software. Many years ago, when I was doing my doctoral studies I used L-Base by Silver Mountain Software as well as GRAMCORD (free version for some work I did on the Greek analysis), but I have not used anything comparable in a Windows environment.

Thanks for your time!

I have both programs because they do different things.  When it comes to the original languages, BibleWorks (BW) beats Logos (L4) hands down IMHO.  When it comes to speed, BW runs like 2011 Ferrari Enzo and L4 runs like 1972 Ford Pinto.

If you are doing any other type of biblical studying, L4 is the way to go.

Why? BW was designed for people to study the original languages, and L4 was designed to be an electronic library.

Ah, but it's not. That doesn't bring up the abridged bdb. It's just a search on "free" sorted by cost.

Robert ... I took some screen shots just to give you a flavor. Logos' wiki is down today; else there's a section in there that provides more detail than Logos.com on some of the resources you asked about.

1. Summary Analysis of Hebrew to LXX Translation Patterns
 The screenshot below is from a section of Logos' Bible Word Study. I'm reading a 1995 discussion on why Cain was not viewed favorably by YHWH. It concentrates on the word for 'soil' but also looks at the verb 'look at' or 'turn to'. Below is an analysis of how the LXX handled the hebrew. The underlying is a pie chart of the hebrew verb, while the overlying pie chart is a break 'backwards' from a specific greek choice back into hebrew. In the upper right is the bar chart on its  usages across the OT books. Click on any slice brings up the actual verses, etc. It uses the Logos MT/LXX conversion database which makes for very interesting analyses without having to do much search slices on Tov.

 .

 2. Example Books I Use in My OT Study
This is just a screen shot of my OT layout ... you'll notice the hebrew interlinear in the upper-right, the MT/LXX conversion below that. On the left top are various english translations, below that the DSS, Targums and Peshitta (morph-tagged). And below these various apparati. You probably can't see the tabs but one nice feature I like is Logos doing the lookup on the massorah automatically which allows quickly comparing across the verse usage.

 .

 3. Example Interlinears: Josephus, Philo, Apostolic Fathers and some canaanite interlinears (you can zoom in to see what's available).

Yep ... we have a gentleman by the name of 'George' that is absolutely death on interlinears. And for the reason you mention. But one can choose which lines to display; typically there's 6 or 7. I'm a 'glancer'. I want to study and quickly glance over to a follower resource for anything unusual. I see no reason to 'mouse-around' zooming through the various sources as quick as possible (research).

Thank you for the screenshot. It's interesting the various approaches to display/use. Good luck on your choices! You're best to take your time; once you commit, it's hard to 'go back'.

Oh, by the way, I don't know how Bibleworks promotes their packages. Logos has their 'standard price' and then periodically discounts in various ways. So in my case I bought the Original Languages package and then added. Overall I found on my library I average out about 30% below the Logos.com price (due to the sales). They can have some hefty sales which are hard to resist.

DMB said:

I don't know how Bibleworks promotes their packages.

Robert Gilbert said:

Thanks, Mitchell.

You've been very helpful!  I was very happy to learn about the ability to download the free Logos search engine and supplement whatever may be lacking in BibleWorks without the need to buy a Logos base package. That substantially reduces some of the duplicate costs in using both programs, which I think is inevitable for me.

Can you point me toward a better understanding of the nifty things that can be done with the Logos syntax searches especially, but also the pssageguide and BibleWord Study, that cannot be done on BibleWorks?

Good morning, Robert.

You may want to look at the comparison table because some features and databases only work with certain packages (syntax search only works in the original language package and up)

Robert Gilbert said:

Is there a way for me to edit my original post. That would be helpful to others with some of the same questions and may keep some people from answering questions that have already been addressing.

Unless you made an error, don't edit your posts, that is more likely to cause confusion than help.

As an exercise of power, I suggest you look at this blog post on the Granville-Sharp Rule.  This was published in the Logos 3 days, I replicated it in Logos 4.  You get a good appreciation for the power of the Logos Suntax engine by going through this exercise/working through the PDF document linked to in this blog, and I presume you could attempt this with other products as well. It's a very interesting exercise to work through!

robrecht said:

Thanks, Lynden.

There were two videos on the Anderson-Forbes syntax tools that were very helpful. 

Someone sent me a screenshot of a NT syntactical analysis tool in BibleWorks but I'm not yet sure how functional it is in terms of how well it is integrated into their search system.

  I am still very interested in anyone's specific practical experience in differentiating Logos' syntactical tools from what can be done in BibleWorks.

FYI in case anyone doesn't recognize it, this is a Sentence Diagram in Logos 4, very easy to construct and build yourself. Plus, if you look in the wiki, users have posted their own sentence diagrams of Bible books which you can then modify to your own liking...