Logos Staff: A Story to Give you something to think about

Cynthia in Florida said:

Dave and Petah:  ...  I mean, in reality, you two are clearly power users,

I think you've gotten the wrong impression about what I know! I'm a search newbie who has been intimidated by search, but is slowly starting to make a little progress, thanks to people like Graham, who helped get me started asking questions about search.

Thanks for giving all of us something to think about! [:)]

Dave Hooton said:

Both use the AND operator. Not quite the same as INTERSECTS (which is safer than WITHIN most times).

Thanks for the info.

I'll need to read up on the differences, since I don't know why INTERSECTS would be safer, most times.

Dave Hooton said:

Mark said:

I just dont understand why I cannot find a go to page that explains in simple terms how to conduct searches

This wiki article might be your answer.

Mark said:

I also do not understand why the complex search rules cannot be automated with simple commands or a drop down menu so I do not have to type in all the complex rules to do a search.

You might have missed the significance of the Context menu in generating the Search query. Just right click on a word and let the context menu do the work for you. But then you have to modify the query e.g. to get the questions of Jesus. This is where the wiki can give you the {Speaker } term and some examples under https://wiki.logos.com/Search_HELP#Proximity.

Dave

I always appreciate your comments.  But first of all, I know about the wiki article.  It is long and takes long to digest.  And your second comment about the context menu...I just spent a few minutes trying to understand what you wrote...and I have given up.

Hello Cynthia 

After reading your post my opinion about your two IT guys is first just because someone is an IT guy it doesn't mean that all software can be understood at the same level. 

I studied computer systems as my major back in 94, I know I'm dating myself some but I also ran my own computer company I did networking and built hardware systems. And later worked as a networking operator in a big company overseeing four different networks every day. But I didn't understand all the software installed on every system. 

Back to the two IT guys they have a connection with sound boards and music systems so that could be a reason that they think Logos is way harder, for me I would say ProPresenter would be way harder. 

I have been using from Logos 4 about 10 years now, I don't think of myself as a power user, I use Logos to help me with my studies in Theology and my work in the mission field.

Because of the forums and the many videos, like DAL I have learned enough to carry me through my needs and studies.

In the end I think that any software system is only as good as the programers making it, but also it is the duty of the user to study the program they want to use.

Today I still don't use all that the program can offer me even though i use Logos everyday but I get around pretty good.

I just opened this thread and am amazed by the discussion generated.

I've been happy with Android Logos: it starts up quick enough, allows me to download just the resources I want, even to report typos. It's become the main way I use Logos.

Windows desktop Logos, however, is different: it takes long to start up, wants to download like 500MB (or more) all the time, even if I just need to read up something briefly. I avoid using it...

Looking for new resources on Logos, however, is best done via the website, on desktop. You win some...

(With this mixed usability, I'm not convinced I should pay a premium to have whatever extra indexing functionality Logos editions are supposed to have, over other platforms or ebooks.)

Jonathan Ray said:

1) LOGOS is slow. The indexing process makes my laptop's fans spin so hard I almost worry the machine might short circuit. It's borderline unusable for a slower machine....

Cynthia in Florida said:

 However, (and this comes back to my original post), Logos’ motto is “Bible study has never been easier.”  REALLY?

Well, if you put your Logos computer in your lap, then put your Bible on top, it's great in class. Just open your Bible! It's so easy. Not being sarcastic, but one big reason I still use Laridian with a $30k Logos, is it's quick, and no muss, no fuss.

But I do now use Libby (of course), Logos, Bibleworks, Accordance, Laridian, Olivetree, and my own Bible software. My observation is each seems to assume a different customer. OT and Laridian (PC version) are militantly easy to use. I really can't imagine why 95% of Christians wouldn't select one of these two or even Gateway. These days, they have pretty broad libraries.

After that, the going gets rough. There's a time investment, whichever. My impression, 'time' is the main issue.

But why Logos doesn't GUI it's search, provide a free manual (to encourage), and 'com-mun-i-cate' is beyond me. They're smart, so I assume they want a specific customer ... like the comedy where the western town put a tollgate in the desert charging 10 cents. Worked!

Cynthia in Florida said:

Never ever have I  once ever thought about this...that they want a specific customer.  In my mind, I was assuming (maybe that was my naïveté) that FL wanted to reach everyone with their software.  Perhaps that’s not the case.  Hmmmm....

Bob has indeed noted most customers are a drag on costs ... they buy limited, and run up support demands. Ergo, the forum. And the corporate strategy is a limiting one ... pricey books, Cadallac of software, and its customers happily stating ... "want cheap, go somewhere else".  JoshRI didn't get far.

The dissonance is in the marketing. As you noted, "easy to use!". Oh, sure. Even the new mobile was carefully geek-crafted! 

But, I should be so hypocritical. 3,100 carefully selected books, the cost of a new Honda car, and no regrets. Thankful to Bob.

Learning Logos is hard. Learning to study the Bible is harder.

What is the goal for the proverbial  "person in the pew"? Learn a software program or learn how to study the Bible.

In my opinion, Logos doesn't teach you how to study the Bible. Yes it quickly provides a lot of facts and interpretations. Often contradictory. How do you sort that out?. The software won't help. Many posts in this thread have dealt with "how to search". To me the bigger question is what and why  perform a specific search. What questions lead you to do a search. 

To be fair. FL has produced LT271 Study the Bible with Logos: Jonah 1 and a few other "How to" resources in the Fundamentals package. It includes tips on using the software and approaches to Bible study. Doing all of the suggested activities will lead to a greater appreciation on Bible study, but I don't think it goes far enough. Personally I prefer books over videos for this because they can go deeper and easier to reference. There are many  available resources on "How to Study the Bible".

By example. I'd like to see an  "XXX Study Guide using Logos". I will use Howard Hendricks "Living by the Book" as an example. Primarily because 1) It is in Logos, 2) it is aimed at the "person in the pew" and 3) It was profitable to me many years ago. 

The book includes activities at the end of each chapter. So a "Living By the Book Study Guide using Logos" would provide Logos solutions to each chapters activities. Substitute your favorite "How to" resource.

Gerald

Accordance makes videos on how to study with their software.  Learn Logos has videos that show you how to study topics or prepare sermons with Logos.  

At one point, the webinars Logos streamed were helpful, but for some reason they stopped doing those.  Maybe going back to doing those and archive them and have a section on the webpage for those would help.

DAL

Michael S. said:

Dave Hooton said:

{Label Question WHERE Rhetorical ~ false AND Type ~ "Wh-"} 

{Section <PropositionalOutline = Question>}

{Section <SpeechAct = Info: Quest>}

{Section <SpeechAct = Oblig:Direct>}

{Section <Sentence = Interrogative>}

I felt my eyes begin to glaze over when I started reading these strings...  Because I am not a programmer.

Same. And I am a software developer. I'm even willing to put in effort to learn these capabilities. But from my POV, there are no "hooks" in how it works for my brain to hang onto. For anyone who's done Perl programming or complex regular expressions, it's like that. You have to re-learn at the point in time when you need to use the capability. It should not be that way.

-Donnie

Thank you, Bruce. I usually see this message at the top, and if I don't need to deal with it, I just ignore it. But even without any updates, Logos desktop startup is still slow.

Bruce Dunning said:

Darrell, did you know that under "settings" you can control when you would like this to be done so that you can update when it is convenient for you?

Dave Hooton said:

Mark said:

And your second comment about the context menu...I just spent a few minutes trying to understand what you wrote...and I have given up.

Let me try again

Start with a Reverse Interlinear bible and right click a word. The right side of the Context menu will show the data you can search for, and the left side will allow you to Search by opening the Search tool with a properly formatted query e.g. {Section <Sentence = Interrogative>}. If you want to search for questions of Jesus, you have to modify that query so that it looks like {Section <Sentence = Interrogative>}. INTERSECTS  {Speaker <Person Jesus>}. You can see similar examples under https://wiki.logos.com/Search_HELP#Proximity.

Thank you Dave for trying again.  I really appreciate it.  But it still seems complicated to me.

One question for me, would be what a Section search extension refers to. The term {Section ...} isn't understandable like {Highlight ...} or {Speaker ...} or {Label ...}, especially when you consider that a {Section ...} could refer to a Preaching Theme, Cultural Concept, Speech Act, Sentence Type, Grammatical Construction, or Literary Typing.

It's like "Section" is some type of overloaded placeholder or "meta-extension," which handles those "sub-extensions." (I'm guessing, and probably using the wrong "terminology.")

Words such as "textual phenomena," also leaves a lot to guess about. I didn't go to bible college, and I'm not familiar with the term.

The documentation isn't written at a novice level, and it presumes a certain level of familiarity (or expertise). I'm still not sure what a "Section" is. (Is it short for "Section of text?") All I know is that it's part of the syntax you have to specify for 6 or 7 specific types of extended searches.

Andrew:

Shut your eyes and pretend that you don't live and breathe searching and such: then open them and read out loud the sentence you just wrote:  It's not a milestone, because it's not necessarily aligned with the verses in the Bible. It's just an arbitrary block of text that has an associated tag.

It simply does not communicate to somebody who does not have your world view.  

Probably, to get the most out of Logos,I will need to get your world view.... it sure seems that making this simple is next to impossible, particularly since there is a huge amount of theological vocabulary built into the search process.  

My last sentence might not make sense either!

So, it is tough to get it right and perfected.  Oh well, I am still shocked at what I can do with limited knowledge.

I will just say I agree with all that has been said regarding the difficult searches. I have had Logos for many years and I have never grasped it.  Would love to see some significant changes toward being more user friendly.

I think some button driven, virtual assistant platform may be helpful.  Let me see if I can put into words, what visual my mind has...

I open my Logos program.  If I have set it up to show my homepage, it does.  If so- buttons are on the side or top.  These buttons are kinda general "What do I want to do" types- like the Guides.  If I have not chosen to show my homescreen on launch, all I see is the big buttons (maybe with some sort of representative graphic on them~ and colorful of course).  If I wait a few seconds without selecting a button (like Read, or Study, or Research, Prepare a Sermon for example), an assistant comes up asking WHAT WOULD YOU LIKE TO DO?  And with a chat-type box, I can type what I am wanting to do in as few of words as possible (or if advanced enough capable, I can speak into the mic and voice recognition kicks in).  It filters what I type or say to apply to Logos function, and then asks for confirmation before opening one of the buttons for me.  Once that level of entry into the Logos machine has happened, there are another set of buttons that further breaks down the general function offered by the first set of buttons.  Functioning like a flow chart would.. IF-THEN scenarios that lead me where I want to go.  But of course all the complicated programming strings, etc. are going on behind the scenes.  And there is an easy back button that takes me back ONE step each time I use it.  That way, if I go down the wrong rabbit hole, I can get back to my last fork in the road.  These buttons open panes, like now, so that way I can do more than just one of these button driven functions.  So if I am in Sermon Prep, and need to launch Research... the buttons are there and it opens a new panel just for that line of functioning.  Buttons at the tops of panels like Search, Compare, Copy, Highlight, Back, etc. are on every panel that opens, and only applies to data in that panel.  When I click one of those buttons, if deeper options are available, either a row of more buttons populate, or a drop down menu.  So for the Search button on a panel, the drop down will provide options that will help me the user get to what I am wanting- whether simple, or complex (FL would have to figure out how that would be done)... but the point is menus are what is driving the machine... not my directing it by knowing code.  Also, if I choose wrongly, I can easily right where the screen is - back up.  And the Assistant is always there to help if I get stuck (which if the menus are designed well enough, that should not happen).  

Does this make sense?  It is hard to write what my mind sees... but the key is the program is walking one step at a time based on the direction I am choosing at each juncture that I make a choice.  Depending on the complexity will determine how many of these choices I have to make, but it does as MP always says, "the heavy lifting".

Cynthia in Florida said:

Beloved:  While this doesn't solve the search problem, it does help me a bit.  Thanks!

Cynthia,

That you have derived use from my post is a humbling thought. I was grieved to read Lee's post that due to Logos' complexities he has largely given up on search as a feature. This need not be so. My approach to this task may be instructive, so I will take this opportunity to report on it here.

I gained fundamental exposure to search from Morris Proctor's Camp Logos next in order of instruction was Verbum Advanced Search Training. Next in order is my attention to search questions from forum users. I pay particular attention to KS4J and Dave Hooton they are search gurus with a vast grasp on the topic of search. I work through their answers carefully making sure I grasp the smallest detail of their reasoning. 

Proximity search, Person search, and Right-Click Context Menu search are all powerful and well within the grasp of the common man. Finally, I practice devising my own search queries based on my devotional approach to the study of the Bible. Thank you, Cynthia, for starting this thread.