Why does Logos 4 have extreme computer requirements?

Maybe you could post your computer specs so someone can help?

HerbertJRader said:

I have a computer which I still use for video editing with Avid Liquid. Logos 4 will not work on this computer. How is it possible that the requirements for Logos 4 are greater than those of a professional video editing program? It seems like something is not being done right on the programming end to require such a recent computer to run this type of program.

Any thoughts?

Logos's philosophy has long been to build their product to expect and take advantage of a high-end computer so that they can push the envelope in terms of features and still be ahead of the curve with respect to their competitors years from now. I'm sure they could be more efficient with computing power even with all the great features and speed they've got. Sometimes expecting the highest end computer one possibly could just makes programmers lazy. On the other hand, it does take more time to develop faster software that will run well on less powerful machines, and I think Logos believes that their time and energy is better spent developing more features and bringing more resources out and getting them to us sooner rather than later.

RobertGMettler said:

At the danger of making the product elitist.

 

So? What's wrong with being elitist? You should read In Defense of Elitism by William A. Henry.[;)]

There are plenty of free Bible software products available for those who don't have a machine that can handle Logos. Someone in another thread was recently recommending http://www.theword.gr. There's also ebible.com, etc. Being able to study the Bible in the original languages and do all kinds of cool things like morphology analysis charts and the like isn't for the masses.

Rosie Perera said:

Logos's philosophy has long been to build their product to expect and take advantage of a high-end computer so that they can push the envelope in terms of features and still be ahead of the curve with respect to their competitors years from now. I'm sure they could be more efficient with computing power even with all the great features and speed they've got. Sometimes expecting the highest end computer one possibly could just makes programmers lazy. On the other hand, it does take more time to develop faster software that will run well on less powerful machines, and I think Logos believes that their time and energy is better spent developing more features and bringing more resources out and getting them to us sooner rather than later.

While I do agree with you Rosie, I see Herbert's side of this issue too.  To be honest, I still don't think that L4 is very efficient.  I've heard it blamed on Microsoft's WPF, but like Herbert with video editing, I have very advanced audio editing software in my recording software that uses WPF and it doesn't experience the lags that L4 does even while it does (at least what I think is) much more on the processing end.  I love the advanced features of L4 but I also think it should be smoother and more efficient.  Let's not forget that L3 had much of the same features of L4 and it ran much more efficiently (with the possible exception of searching).  Also, let's not forget that Logos toughts this program as being powerful yet easy.  That suggests they want it to be usable by everyone.  It's not just for original language study (although that is probably my favorite thing to do with it). 

This was in no way meant to be a flame to you.  You've been helpful to me and to others on this thread and I appreciate that.  I'm just suggesting that we try to look at the other point of view too.  If L4 is to keep growing in features, it is important to get a handle on efficiency with the features it runs now.  We all now how bad the notes function performs.  It would be nice if it were cutting edge in all respects.

Elitist?

I'm running L4 on a 7 year old machine with acceptable performance.

Rosie Perera said:

Being able to study the Bible in the original languages and do all kinds of cool things like morphology analysis charts and the like isn't for the masses.

Caution sister. Logos has been advertising that with their new interface, they hope to reach the average person. Those who don't know Greek and Hebrew. Even their new Video series (still in pre-pub) is advertised even for those who don't know original languages.

i am guessing this was just a slip of passion. Terry's reply about the Church not wanting the common people to be able to read the Bible was exactly what i was thinking about when i read your post. Many died to bring us translations we common people could read. Please don't take this as an attack on you. It just seemed so uncharacteristic of what i have read in your other posts here on the forum.

Peace in Christ sister

Terry and Douglas, I'm very sorry if I offended you. I did put a winky smiley in there, but I guess that didn't quite do the trick. Anyway, I sympathize with Herbert's complaints; was just trying to be light-hearted about it and forgot to include any corroboration of his general sense of frustration. Those of you who know my posts from other threads know that I share it. I'm sorry, Herbert, about being a bit flippant with someone I didn't know yet from other interactions on the Forum.

You are right, it is an awful lot of machine to expect for Bible study, even in-depth study that the "masses" might not be interested in. I wasn't meaning to defend their decision to target higher-end machines, I was just explaining that I know that's their philosophy from having heard it directly from Bob Pritchett.

And Terry, you've got to admit that morphology analysis charts are for total Bible geeks, not for Josephine average home Bible study leader. Even I haven't delved into them yet (they are new in 4.0a and I've been too busy answering questions on the Forum) and I've taken a year of Biblical Hebrew and am a total computer geek and have a pretty fast CPU. I'm not by any means suggesting that the Word of God and resources to aid in understanding it shouldn't be available to everyone. But some of the powerful stuff that Logos can do does require more computing power than every single faithful student of the Bible will necessarily have. Maybe they should sell it as a two-tiered product with a simplified version that isn't quite as power hungry for people who have the packages that are geared towards home study. But then there would need to be an upgrade path for that to the higher-powered version as well... Ah, so complicated.

Finally, to all, yes I think the Logos programmers could do better at making the product more efficient so it wouldn't require such mongo computing resources, but I have to be careful about slamming them here in this public forum because some of them are my friends... ;-)

Rosie Perera said:

Terry and Douglas, I'm very sorry if I offended you

You did not offend me, shock me a little, but definitely not offend.

Rosie Perera said:

And Terry, you've got to admit that morphology analysis charts are for total Bible geeks, not for Josephine average home Bible study le

Absolutely. But sometimes I think we expect too little from the masses. [:D] I am no longer a pastor, God in his infinite mercy has seen fit to allow me to not participate in church leadership at all right now. Yet, I hold myself to the same standards of Study that I did when I was behind the pulpit (and before), and frankly it drives me crazy when my denomination treats it's members like children giving them a watered down lessons on the Word because they can't handle anything else.

Terry Poperszky said:

Absolutely. But sometimes I think we expect too little from the masses. I am no longer a pastor, God in his infinite mercy has seen fit to allow me to not participate in church leadership at all right now. Yet, I hold myself to the same standards of Study that I did when I was behind the pulpit (and before), and frankly it drives me crazy

....

Damian McGrath said:

 

i'm not sure why people are reacting to this. Surely studying the Bible in Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek is not for the masses.

What's the problem....?

Damian, it is a visceral reaction on my part. I can imagine ti coming from the mouth of a Pharisee, but for the life of my me I can't imagine ti coming from the lips of the Lord. I do not believe that it accurately represents Rosie's heart or beliefs (Based on the reading of her posts). I personally believe that the masses have much more potential, then many give them credit for.

I think it's probably a case of you having a backstory about this particular issue, and my comments -- which were in no way intended to imply that laypeople can't be trusted with a high level of biblical learning -- pushed some button in you.

Maybe it would help you to know that:

(a) I consider myself a layperson; I have no MDiv and am not an ordained pastor and don't feel called to become one -- I preach once in a while at a lay-run congregation, but that's the only "pastoral" identity I have. Most of what I do in my life is not with a pastor's hat on at all.
(b) I wouldn't be where I am now if I hadn't been an extremely interested and curious member of the "masses" who had a pastor who taught us Greek and Hebrew words and did not feed us milk but solid meat, for which I am very grateful
(c) I strongly believe in the theological education of the whole people of God, that there should be no lay/clergy divide in learning or acts of service; I pursued theological education at Regent College for my own personal curiosity and spiritual growth, not to become a minister. Regent stands for that very principle perhaps above almost any other characteristic that sets its training apart from other seminaries (they used to call themselves the "un-seminary" in their marketing materials for that reason). At Regent there are lay people training alongside those who are planning to go into the ministry -- because Regent strongly believes that all work is approved by God and is "full-time Christian service." In fact it grants far more of the non-MDiv degrees and diplomas than it does MDivs. And a large perecentage of its graduates go back to their "secular" work for which they trained in undergrad, or into Christian environmental conservation or business or the arts or parenting or whatever. Not all become pastors or missionaries by a long shot.

So anyway, I was not saying anything that should have shocked you, because I totally agree with where you're coming from. I was being a bit of a smart-ass about the computing power requirements of Logos, that's all. And again I'm sorry if that was inappropriate or took you off guard or sounded like it was coming from a Pharisee. I was JOKING about the elitism comment. I did put a smiley.

Nevertheless, I do still think that there will be plenty of prospective users who look at Logos and say "yawn -- I don't want all that grammar/syntax/tense/voice/mood stuff; I don't know what it means." It doesn't mean they aren't capable of learning what it means. I'm sure if there's a desire, there is usually a capacity to learn -- for anybody. I would never be in favor of keeping information away from people who want to learn. (Drawing the parallel between what I had said and the laity being kept from reading the Word of God was unfair since I said nothing about keeping people away.) It is simply the case that a large percentage of people of faith don't care to learn all that Greek and Hebrew grammar stuff. They have other priorities. It does take time, and much of it is explained already by commentators who have already done the work of understanding the original languages, so most people won't want to learn how to do that themselves. It's an observation, not a value judgement against them. Just because I chose not to become a rocket scientist or a botanist doesn't mean I couldn't have if I'd wanted to. I just chose to leave that to other people who really were interested in those things. That doesn't mean that there isn't still TONS of good stuff in Logos that will be of value to people who don't have any interest in the original biblical languages. There's lots of meaty stuff there in English -- enough to fulfill the curiosity of the eagerest of souls. And you're right that Logos markets to average users and wants to encourage more of them to find out more about the Greek and Hebrew words underlying the text, which they definitely can without being Greek geeks. And I think that's totally cool!  But I will never accept the notion that everyone is equal when it comes to skills and talents and abilities and interests. The idea that people with a "big fat resume" or an "elite" education are to be scorned is something that has been popularized recently by certain politicians who shall remain nameless, but I think it's nonsense. Everyone should have equal access to that education, but not everyone will want to take advantage of it, and some who scorn it will be the lesser for doing so. Those who choose a different but equally noble path as laborers in the vineyard are not the lesser for not having the fancy education; the only losers are those who scorn such education because it is "elitist."

I'm sorry to hear your denomination treats its members like children. Maybe you should consider switching to mine.[;)]  -- Again, big fat smiley! OK? Are we still friends?

Peter McClellan said:

I would love to hear your guys' opinion on this issue of quality verses price among all of the serious Bible Programs.

Since this is the Logos Bible Software Forums, I don't think you're going to get an unbiased answer here, unfortunately. There are blogs that review and compare the various programs, and some of those blogs are even written by people who participate heavily here, but I doubt they are going to feel at liberty to speak openly about the pros and cons of Logos vs. its competitors here on the Logos forum. If I were you I'd do a Google search on Logos + the names of a couple of the other products you're wanting to compare it with and also throw in such search terms and "review" or "comparison" and see what you come up with. I'm afraid I can't be much help to you anyway since I haven't used any other Bible software besides Logos since I switched to it in 1992 from whatever DOS program was the going thing back then (I don't think it exists anymore, though it might have morphed into the current BibleWorks) and haven't looked back. The only other things I can compare it to are some websites (biblegateway.com, etc.) which I tried out for a while for quick lookup of a verse here or there when I felt it took too long to launch Logos just for that purpose. But now that I keep Logos running on my desktop all the time, and I do much more with it than just using it as a glorified concordance, that's a moot point.

I've been struggling with my computer's resources ever since I downloaded V4.  I have an adequate computer at work, but my computer at home is a six year old HP and it just didn't cut it. Also, I downloaded to a WD External hard drive and it seemed to work out pretty well.

Today, however, I finally broke down and bought a new Laptop.  I took the Logos spec sheet with me because I was determined to get a computer that would maximize the program.  I was quite happy to find an HP laptop on sale at Office Depot that met all Logos'  recommended specs.  I hadn't bought a computer in a long time and I was surprised how much the prices had fallen since my last purchase.

My download is almost complete and I'm very anxious to see how it works with the specs they recommend.

Jim

PS   I'll try to post back after I've had time to evaluate it.

Peter McClellan said:

I dont typically get on this forum and participate but I wanted to ask you guys a question?  I dont have any of Logos' Major Programs like Scholars, or Silver,or Gold.  I do have some commentaries though that work off of Logos' Interface.  I'm shopping for a comprehensive Bible Program that will be able to handle both Original Languages and regular commentary study.  I'm a Pastor and I believe that Study and Preparation are extremely important, however I've been very troubled with the options available.  If I may ask you guys a question, do you think that Logos' Software is worth the price in comparison to say BibleWorks?  I know that you don't get any commentaries with Bibleworks but its highly acclaimed and sooo much cheaper.  When I was examining the Scholars Edition I was amazed at the lack of good commentaries and yet the high price.  Also, the searching seemed fairly slow on my 1.3 gig Single Core CULV intel processor on my laptop.  I have also used BibleSoft Pro Edition and it gave you a lot more resources for the money, its just that the Original languages were not as solid as BibleWorks and Logos.  I've also heard really good things about Accordance which works off of Apple but can be used on a PC with an Emulator.  I would love to hear your guys' opinion on this issue of quality verses price among all of the serious Bible Programs.  Thanks for your time everybody.  

 

 

Hi Peter,

I use both Logos and BibleWorks.  You can too.

If you want commentaries to purchase and search, you'll need Logos.  I do not happen to use commentaries at all in preparing Bible studies, but Logos has works like Bullinger's Figures of Speech that I make use of regularly.  For my original language work BibleWorks has always trumped Logos, although Logos is now offering databases that you can syntax search.  I have more flexibility in BibleWorks for the morphological searches though.  BibleWorks also allows you to create and tag your own Bibles, if you are into that (I am) and also has the facilities to add on user created works, of which there is an extensive availability of free public domain works that you do not need a PBB utility to make or use.  BibleWorks is more "open".

If I were you, I'd use both.  You can link to Logos from within BibleWorks.  BibleWorks is programmed in such a way that is will be more responsive on your hardware - or any hardware for that matter.

If you already have Logos then get BibleWorks.  You can order it and I believe they give you a couple of months to test drive it and if you do not like it you can get all of your money refunded.  You can't lose by trying it out.  Having both of these packages at your disposal is great - between the two you can do pretty much anything.

I have not used Accordance, but if I bought a Mac, I'd buy it.  If I were using your laptop I'd forget about running emulation.  BibleWorks will run real nice on that hardware.

I hope that this helps you out.

Mike

MikeM said:

Mike Aubrey said:

RobertGMettler said:

And you might add more talent. So some of the criticism about Logos 4 is very well founded.

Cheap shot.

Do you program software Mike?  I do and have since the days of DOS.  In fact, before DOS.  It takes talent to make good software that utilizes the hardware.  Logos 4 should not require bleeding edge hardware to run.  I see that you have it running on a 7 year old piece of hardware, which means that you're likely running about a 1.8-2.0 Ghz P4 with a couple of gigs of ram with XP SP3, since a machine that old might run Vista, but it would do so rather slowly.

What Robert was correctly getting at is that it takes talent to tweak subroutines that the software often uses in assembly code so that the software not only runs faster, but is also less bloated.  The programming situation at Logos is one wherein they have chosen to go slow and bloated, using JIT compiled code that runs like Java code.  The code is compiled and run each time the application runs.  This slows down the entire process and makes for bloated code.  Logos is not programming for bleeding edge hardware because they want to target that - they code for bleeding edge hardware because the programming REQUIRES it.  If they went old school on the code and used C and assembler then it would be a lot smaller and absolutely scream.  But C and assembler take talent in C and assembler.  The new Microsoft .Net programming environment doesn't get you close to the hardware like real programming tools do.  And real programming tools require talented programmers to use them.

I'm sure that the coders at Logos have talent.  I'm also sure that they are not using real programming tools - I mean low level programming.  Lower level programming takes time and talent.

So your "cheap shot" comment may be your opinion, but it's not founded in reality.  If you could code then you'd have not said a word.  Robert is spot on in his take on this.

There, fixed that for you.

 

I have done a ton of programming in .NET and Java, managed code like what Logos4 uses.  Just in Time, or more properly called "managed code",  is not "slow and bloated", it is state of the art in current software engineering circles and has been for some time.  Yes it requires memory, but 8GB of memory, for example, is no more than a couple of hundred dollars, well less than what some people spend on one resource.  Logos4 does a lot more than Logos3, over 100 new features at last count on their web site.

Managed code is faster today because they can optimize for the computer they are running on, on the fly.  If you google and look around, there are quite a few benchmarks showing Java and .NET faster than C++ for example, with today's advanced systems (not true 5 years ago).  In many cases managed code is very close to, if not exceeding the performance of C++ or C.  In addition however, software engineering tools are better in managed code systems, reducing the time to develop code.  They also can take advantage of new capabilities like multi core processing.  Another thing, the multi-core utilization of .NET would be near impossible to scale using C++ or C. Also, you could never do an interface like Logos4 in C++ or C, no one has from an eye candy and user interface perspective (Windows Presentation Foundation, used by Logos for the UI, could not be written in C++ or C).

Another advantage, managed code has "garbage collection" - the managed code system collects, frees, and manages memory for you. Anyone who has written code knows that memory leaks, buffer overruns, and crashes from invalid memory pointers are prevalent. These largely go away in managed code because they can be detected at COMPILE TIME when the developer builds the module, not at run time when a user performs a particular action. C and C++ code suffers from type checking bugs, where for example a routine expects an integer and someone passes in a strong.  Managed code catches these problems at compile time.

Many other advantages in managed code - deployment tools, security features,  and the ability to easily move 32 bit code to 64 bit systems natively.  As a DOS programmer I am sure you know how difficult it was to move C applications from 8 bit to 16 bit. It took many years for the industry to do that.  Applications moved from 32 bit to 64 bit systems rather seamlessly (the big problems have been device drivers), because managed code handles it for you.

I know many people disagree with this, but in all due respect they are behind the times or just uninformed about the architecture of managed code systems.  If you don't think so, go to ACM.org, the prominent software engineering research organization in the world, and try to find one article saying C++ or C or any statically-compiled system is state of the art or the foundation to base your software product on moving forward - you won't find a single one.  Software engineering is based on managed code with many advantages that are easy to find in an hour of research on google, if you look around. Also, not one major software vendor - IBM, Microsoft, Oracle, or Sun, supports unmanaged code over managed code.  There are just too many disadvantages in today's world with unmanaged code. It only exists at all today to support legacy applications that have not been rewritten.

If you still don't believe, just google "advantages of managed code over unmanaged".  You will find a ton.  You won't find much on unmanaged code over managed." [;)]

But don't listen to me - Association for Computing Machinery - ACM.org. find anything supporting unmanaged code. It doesn't exist.  Bob said they wanted to develop a next generation platform, and they did exactly that. And every major software vendor agrees with his choice.

Ward Walker said:

Bill Stonebraker said:

...L4 will use all the power you give it... and they've had a great time spec'ing out wonderful components for a dream system.

 

I am thrilled that Logos4 runs well on a 64-bit OS, and even more thrilled that it is highly multi-threaded...I run it on an i7 processor with many windows/tabs open on two monitors (soon to increase to four)--shortly after invoking a passage guide, I normally see all 8 cores throttle up to 75% or better for a few seconds.  I've never seen anything else use the computing power this well before...I can burn a DVD Movie, a BlueRay Data Disk, and render video all at the same time and still not tap the i7 processors as fully (see in-line screenshot).  I'm also surprised it doesn't eat much RAM in the process (about 362K). 

That said, if I was running this on a dual-core machine (or older), I'd just compensate by not linking all my windows/tabs and I'd probably not have all those open at the same time...that would dramatically reduce the CPU load.  Logos, thank you for taking the risk to leap beyond the coding constraints of V3!

I doubt that Logos wants to be known as the Bible software that requires a “dream system” to run to the fullness of its potential. I built a core i7 860 overclocked @ 3.4 GHZ with 4 GB of ram @ 1600 mhz and fast caviar black 640 GB hard drives. I did not put the system together for the upgrade to version 4 and I would have not done it just to run Logos.  I am glad that Logos 4 was not able to bring it to its knees (just ask my core 2 duo laptop or my poor netbook) but I am not happy about the way it taxes the resources.

Bible software is not supposed to tap the full power of a powerful processor like the core i7 series. Customers should not have to upgrade (or to think about upgrading) their machines just to meet the hardware requirements of the new version. It did not work well for Vista, it will not work with Logos 4.

 Logos would gain nothing by adding entry barriers (hardware upgrade) to the adoption of its new version and I am sure they are well aware of that fact.

As others have pointed, it is not by design that Logos 4 requires powerful hardware to run smoothly (indexing my 11.3 GB of resources took me a little more than a hour on my core i7 system versus a day on my laptop and much more on my notebook). The high hardware requirements betray at the very least a lack of optimization of the code (as in “the product was released too soon” probably for short term business reasons (i.e. the deadlines of ETS and SBL) that might end up hurting the long term if the situation is not kept under control).

Do not get me wrong, I like the concept behind version 4, I am just underwhelmed by some aspects of its execution. Ironically, the fact that I am using Bibleworks to search the biblical text lessens my frustration since I do not have to rely of Logos 4 to perform the same operations. I think that I will keep using both pieces of software for the foreseeable future  

I remain hopeful that the Logos 4 will be optimized and show itself to be scalable so as to run smoothly on moderate specs and seamlessly harness the resources of more powerful systems for the extras (multitasking, myriad of windows opened, and so on).

I also hope that Logos will introduce various levels of customization (in an intuitive way). It is fine to have fewer options for novices that might be intimidated by complex choices, but power users should also be able to customize the program to suit their needs.

Despite what I consider to be a few  “faux pas”, I still believe that Logos is the best solution overall for someone like me who is abandoning print resources for a searchable and customizable digital library (things like prepub, the academic program, a great customer service, the greatest number of resources available, and so on). I have not lost faith in the ability of the company to listen to the customers, correct what is wrong and improve the product.

Alain

ThinkPad Z60m-1.7GHZ-2GB-XP Pro SP3

L4 startup is incredibly slow.  Opening up tabs is also slow, but tolerable.  Scrolling through books gives some lag.  The debate about managed vs. unmanaged code is interesting, but the question remains - where exactly is the bottleneck?  Performance tests will need to be run on a variety of platforms using an analysis tool in order to identify the issues.

My guess is the slow startup is due to the .NET Framework initialization.  As for general slowness, there's no way they would invest the hours to redesign a faster GUI app in C++, but perhaps a few of the calls could be optimized by shifting to unmanaged dlls.  At this point, all I can do is speculate about what the problem is.  I'm trusting Logos to perform benchmark and performance tests, and identifying and fixing any code issues. 

I admit my hardware is a bit dated, but I am not planning on playing the latest video games.  I am not even using the advanced search features in L4.  All I want to do is open L4 and read a book or 2 while scrolling without experiencing lag.  L3 worked wonderfully.  At this point, I don't think the extra features in L4 are worth the performance hit.  (I also tried the performance setting suggestions given in another thread).

Rosie Perera said:

Dominick Sela said:

Windows Presentation Foundation...could not be written in C++ or C.

Begging your pardon, sir, but I do beg to differ. Anything could be written in C++ or C, or Assembler for that matter, given enough code-monkeys and enough time. Programmers used to know how to clean up memory usage after themselves, and do white-box texting to prevent buffer over-runs and invalid pointer references, and use a profiler to find performance snags in their algorithms. They don't know how anymore because they write on top of huge systems that do all that stuff for them. But that doesn't mean that something equivalent to WPF couldn't be written in a lower-level language by a team of people who knew what they were doing. As Bill Gates used to apocryphally threaten us when we were taking too long with some application written in C that was getting all bloated, "Hey, what's the matter? I could write that in wrote a Basic interpreter in 4K in a weekend!" (He didn't actually say that to us, but we used to quote that to each other. The reference was to MITS Altair 4K BASIC, which Gates wrote in a hotel room one sleepless weekend, in Intel 8080 Assembly language -- the Altair wasn't completed yet, so he wrote it on legal pads. That story was deeply embedded in Microsoft programmer lore and made us all shiver our timbers.) So there.

Why make a meal from scratch at home anymore when you can buy delicious one at a restaurant and not have to worry about all that messy cleaning up after yourself, or get one even more quickly from a package that you stick in the microwave? Because there is something beautiful and enjoyable about the craft of cooking well from basic ingredients. It's healthier and better for the environment, and it's purely delightful to participate in doing it well, and to taste the fruits of another's labors. The same is true with the craft of programming. It's sad that it is virtually a dead art now. Anyone born after about 1975 is probably thinking I'm some old granny that should just sit in my rocker and stop complaining about what this world is coming to. I don't program much anymore but when I do, it's in a real programming language.

I programmed in Assembler in college and hated it.  But you're right that you don't get any more efficient than that when its done well.  And it's possible to do anything given the time and skill.  The move toward managed code happened for scalability and portability reasons.  In addition it brings down costs for development.  I have to agree though with it being a lost craft.  In fact it is no longer a craft, but an assembly line of each dev making his contribution (at least for enterprise apps).  That's why I left development and stayed an SA.  The apps I write may not be as scalable, but it's amazing what you can do in a day with PERL :-)

Rosie Perera said:

I think it's probably a case of you having a backstory about this particular issue, and my comments -- which were in no way intended to imply that laypeople can't be trusted with a high level of biblical learning -- pushed some button in you.

Maybe it would help you to know that:

(a) I consider myself a layperson; I have no MDiv and am not an ordained pastor and don't feel called to become one -- I preach once in a while at a lay-run congregation, but that's the only "pastoral" identity I have. Most of what I do in my life is not with a pastor's hat on at all.

Rosie, this conversation has gotten way too serious, but thank you for your explanation. The button that was probably pushed for me revolves around the whole concept of laity/clergy which is a concept that I believe is contrary to the teachings of the New Testament and has caused great harm to the Body of Christ. When I saw the phrase "Not for the masses," it brought to mind the common modifier that is used with it "unwashed"

unwashed masses (plural only)

1. (idiomatic) The collective group ("mass")
   of people who are considered by someone to be somehow uneducated,
   uninformed, godless, or in some other way unqualified for inclusion in
   the speaker's elite circles.

Unfortunately I have been acquainted with clergy who viewed the laity in this manner. At no time, did I believe this is what you meant, but as I said earlier, it evoked a visceral response in me.

But please, let's leave this subject behind, since it wasn't what you meant, and I have had a chance to throw in my two cents.

As for moving to your denomination? I am afraid that the my God given assignment of keeping the the So. B. (Southern Baptist) humble hasn't been accomplished yet. [:O]

Rosie Perera said:

Begging your pardon, sir, but I do beg to differ. Anything could be written in C++ or C, or Assembler for that matter, given enough code-monkeys and enough time. Programmers used to know how to clean up memory usage after themselves, and do white-box texting to prevent buffer over-runs and invalid pointer references, and use a profiler to find performance snags in their algorithms. They don't know how anymore because they write on top of huge systems that do all that stuff for them. But that doesn't mean that something equivalent to WPF couldn't be written in a lower-level language by a team of people who knew what they were doing. As Bill Gates used to apocryphally threaten us when we were taking too long with some application written in C that was getting all bloated, "Hey, what's the matter? I could write that in wrote a Basic interpreter in 4K in a weekend!" (He didn't actually say that to us, but we used to quote that to each other. The reference was to MITS Altair 4K BASIC, which Gates wrote in a hotel room one sleepless weekend, in Intel 8080 Assembly language -- the Altair wasn't completed yet, so he wrote it on legal pads. That story was deeply embedded in Microsoft programmer lore and made us all shiver our timbers.) So there.

Wow!  I'm impressed.  Actually, this thread has a lot of impressive conversation and it seems that several of you know quite a bit about programming.  That's good.  BTW, Rosie, I'm not offended in the slightest.  As I said in my earlier post, you have been most helpful to me and to others using this forum and I am very appreciative of those like you who take the time to be helpful.  I want to do the same. 

This thread has convinced me to spring for an extra 4 gigs of RAM of the system I am building this week.  Let's see now.  That's an i7 with 8 gigs on an Intel P55WB motherboard with nvidia's 9800 series graphics card with 1 gig of ddr3.  860 gigs of Sata drives, 2 sata optical drives.  Does this sound sufficient to anyone?

DouglasEStephens said:

 

Wow!  I'm impressed.  Actually, this thread has a lot of impressive conversation and it seems that several of you know quite a bit about programming.  That's good.  BTW, Rosie, I'm not offended in the slightest.  As I said in my earlier post, you have been most helpful to me and to others using this forum and I am very appreciative of those like you who take the time to be helpful.  I want to do the same. 

This thread has convinced me to spring for an extra 4 gigs of RAM of the system I am building this week.  Let's see now.  That's an i7 with 8 gigs on an Intel P55WB motherboard with nvidia's 9800 series graphics card with 1 gig of ddr3.  860 gigs of Sata drives, 2 sata optical drives.  Does this sound sufficient to anyone?

Buy these hard drives: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136322

You'll be REAL glad you did.

Dominick Sela said:

For the comments posted questioning my background,  actually I programmed assembler, wrote compilers and assemblers, and programmed in C since the early 70s.

And to other comments, yes you CANNOT program WPF in C or assembler, because NOBODY has.  It is entirely too inefficient to do so. However many lines of code it is in managed code to do so, multiply it by about 20 or 30 to get the lines of code to support it. People think because you could write a user interface layer in C that it's better than WPF, but things like managing memory and security were done very poorly by most C programmers, if at all.  Also, a hobbyist who writes C or assembler in Windows because they can is a far cry from a professional software architecture that does what WPF does.

You can reply back with the disparaging remarks about mine or anyone else's experiences, attack Microsoft, claim that good programmers could do better, whatever - the fact remains no one has, academics and major software companies disagree with you.  Unmanaged code can't write the systems we enjoy today, it's that simple, and it's not opinion.  If you feel strongly quit the unfounded opinions and give us some proof from a reputable industry institution or corporation that agrees with you, otherwise it's just an uninformed opinion.

Hey Old timer,

I am also an old timer.  Just because I code NOW as a hobby in assembler doesn't mean I have always done programming as a hobby.  I've been in this computer game for about 30 years and you've just been drinking the wrong Kool-Aid and fell for the hype.  For someone to claim that they programmed in assembler and then laud managed code doesn't ring true.  ANY assembler jockey would know that managed code is bloatware.  And you WROTE compilers and assemblers too?  Which ones?  I have pretty much seen them all, so which ones were yours? I know - you probably wrote them for the proprietary chips that you invented in the lab in your basement and never released the compiler or assembler.

Blah-blah-blah-blah-blah.

VladimirLukyanov said:

Ladies and gentlemen,

since there is obviously a TON of talent among Logos users, let's put the following question to rest: which computer subsystem is the bottleneck for Logos4 in an older machine (mine is a 3.5 year old Dell laptop, Intel T5500 1.66GHz 2GB RAM 200GB 7200RPM HD integrated videocard)

• is it the processor(number of cores/ on-chip memory)
• is it the RAM (which in turn may require OS upgrade 32/64 bit)
• is it the video subsystem (speed/memory; integrated/dedicated)
• or is it the hard drive (quite possibly spending $300 on a great SSD drive might make all the other slowness pale in comparison)

I would wonder if the hard drive is and IDE or a SATA drive.  If it's an IDE, it'll slow you down some.  But I'd say the real problem is the integrated graphics card.  BTW, which OS are you using?  Win XP should function pretty fair on that system.  Vista will struggle a little more.  Win 7 would do okay. 

This is the rating for my laptop.  As you can see, even with 384 MB of dedicated graphics memory, this is the weakest link.  This makes the whole system suffer because no matter how I speed other subsystems, the graphics card is still going to bottleneck the performance of the machine.