Sermon Editor - Real world feedback

Hi there,

I thought I would post about my experience of using the new Sermon Editor to prepare a message for tomorrow morning. I do like the Sermon editor, it performs quickly and with minimum fuss. I like the auto insert of biblical text from a reference, the block quote and ability to simultaneous prepare text, handout, presentation and questions. However there are a few irritations which do make it feel a little unfinished, or perhaps having a fairly minimal feature set. In no particular order:

1) Spell check - there is no spellchecker built in

2) Hovering over a biblical reference shows no preview of the text like is does elsewhere in the application

3) Auto insert of Biblical references only works when the first letter of the book name is capitalised.

4) Images cannot be added from other resources within Logos

5) The resultant PowerPoint is built using images, which whilst it make formatting easy makes adding items such as animation impossible.

6) There is no way to search your text (as far as I can see) which when you've lost something and can't find it is annoying. In the end I had to copy and paste to Word to find what I wanted!

I know that this is very much a first release of the Sermon Editor and therefore I hope we can expect it to improve (particularly without having to subscribe to Logos Now) however I thought it might be helpful to summarise my first real-world experience of using the feature.

thanks

Paul

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Comments

Bob Pritchett

Thanks for the feedback! 1-5 are already on the list to fix, and #6 (adding a 'Find' dialog in the editor?) is a good idea -- thanks!

Mike Binks

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/849342#Comment_849342

Hi Neighbour,

Might I ask that we do not repeat the Proclaim example which highlights words like 'Saviour' as being wrongly spelt.

Bradley Grainger (Logos)

1) Spell check - there is no spellchecker built in

This is planned for a future release: https://logos.uservoice.com/forums/42823-logos-bible-software-7/suggestions/15892426-add-spellcheck-to-sermon-editor

Paul M

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/849342#Comment_849342

Thanks. Regarding the improvements, it is fair to assume that they would be included for all users with the feature set not just Logos Now subscribers?

Paul M

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/849391#Comment_849391

This is planned for a future release: https://logos.uservoice.com/forums/42823-logos-bible-software-7/suggestions/15892426-add-spellcheck-to-sermon-editor

Thanks Bradley, good to know. Although this has been requested since Logos 4 - so I'm not sure how much hope to have!

MJ. Smith

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/849443#Comment_849443

Although this has been requested since Logos 4 - so I'm not sure how much hope to have!

Spell checker was added to notes in Logos 6.0 IIRC; the new sermon editor is still a work in progress ... so I'm not quite sure what you are referring to.

Hans van den Herik

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/849445#Comment_849445

I would like to have the Sermon Editor work with Bibles, compiled als Personal Books.

As a very important Dutch translation isn't available in Logos (Herziene Statenvertaling / Revised Statenvertaling), I had to compile the Bible myself as a Personal Book. It works fine with other Logos add ons, but NOT in Sermon Editor.

Please fix this! Or better: make the said translation available!

Hans

HJ. van der Wal

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/849552#Comment_849552

As a very important Dutch translation isn't available in Logos (Herziene Statenvertaling / Revised Statenvertaling), I had to compile the Bible myself as a Personal Book. It works fine with other Logos add ons, but NOT in Sermon Editor.

Please fix this! Or better: make the said translation available!

[Y][Y][Y][Y]

Paul M

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/849445#Comment_849445

Although this has been requested since Logos 4 - so I'm not sure how much hope to have!

Spell checker was added to notes in Logos 6.0 IIRC; the new sermon editor is still a work in progress ... so I'm not quite sure what you are referring to.

I hadn't realised that MJ, I had understood that this was still outstanding. However I can see looking at one of my notes documents (which I mainly use on a tablet/phone) on my desktop that spellcheck is indeed there. Thanks for putting me straight!

Cromwell

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/849585#Comment_849585

I like the fact that Sermon Editor allows easy insertion of quotes from resources and Biblical text. Then it becomes frustrating because there appears no way to highlight or add emphasis to particular words within these citations.

I would love either

Someone to tell me how to do this if I am missing something
Logos to add this functionality

Currently for me Sermon Editor is tempting enough to try but not yet functional enough to use regularly.

Graham Criddle

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/849607#Comment_849607

Then it becomes frustrating because there appears no way to highlight or add emphasis to particular words within these citations.

I'm not aware of any way to highlight / emphasis words within citations (you can apply bold, underline, italic highlighting to words you have entered yourself)

I don't know why this is the case:

it may be a technical limitation
it may be a concern to accurately preserve the resource that is being quoted
or something else...

Richard Wardman

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/849607#Comment_849607

Currently for me Sermon Editor is tempting enough to try but not yet functional enough to use regularly.

Agreed. I really, really tried last week, but found it was slowing me down. Maybe my laptop isn't powerful enough, but I found the editor was sluggish and not keeping up with my typing speed. I shall, however, persist!

I did eventually make us of the slides from the Sermon Editor, but only after a bit of reworking.

Paul M

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/849629#Comment_849629

A couple of other reflections for you

1) When I first used the document I didn't use the Question style - having now used this I think it is brilliant. Well implemented and useful. However it would be helpful to have a list of just questions without the headings (optionally).

2) It doesn't seem possible from a hyperlinked verse to open the passage by clicking on it or CTL / Shift clicking. Is this just not possible at the moment or am I missing something?

3) One fabulously annoying bug is that when I cut a piece of text from low down in the document the position in the document jumps straight back to start! This is so annoying!

4) Prompt text shows up in a very nice way on the All tab however when I go to the text tab this doesn't appear at all - is this right?

thanks

Paul

Paul M

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/850331#Comment_850331

Whilst I am at it the word count doesn't exclude items flagged as Questions - which I guess is probably not the way it was intended...

Graham Criddle

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/850331#Comment_850331

Well implemented and useful. However it would be helpful to have a list of just questions without the headings (optionally).

You can do this by toggling each heading - see https://community.logos.com/forums/p/130689/849634.aspx#849634 for a bit more detail

2) It doesn't seem possible from a hyperlinked verse to open the passage by clicking on it or CTL / Shift clicking. Is this just not possible at the moment or am I missing something?

It is not possible at the moment in the main editing window - you can in the other "views" (Text, Handout, Question), This is something that is being looked at by the developers

3) One fabulously annoying bug is that when I cut a piece of text from low down in the document the position in the document jumps straight back to start! This is so annoying!

Agreed - it has been flagged to the developers

4) Prompt text shows up in a very nice way on the All tab however when I go to the text tab this doesn't appear at all - is this right?

Yes - it is intended as a prompt to the preacher and not to be exported for "general use"

Paul M

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/850338#Comment_850338

Yes - it is intended as a prompt to the preacher and not to be exported for "general use"

Ok, so the text tab is intended to be a transcript of the notes rather than the text that the preacher works from - correct? If this is the case, how can I view the text with the prompts but without the small group questions? I had assumed, probably incorrectly, that this was what the text tab was for...

Graham Criddle

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/850341#Comment_850341

Ok, so the text tab is intended to be a transcript of the notes rather than the text that the preacher works from - correct?

That is my understanding

If this is the case, how can I view the text with the prompts but without the small group questions?

I don't believe you can - I think we would, currently at least, need to simply ignore the questions when preaching. Although there may be cases when someone might want to mention the questions when preaching as something people will be asked to look at later.

Hans van den Herik

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/850342#Comment_850342

For foreign users: please add spell checkers for other languages than English/Spanish!

I would also recommend a simply modified Sermon Editor for making lesson for students for schools or colleges.

Hans

MJ. Smith

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/850437#Comment_850437

I would also recommend a simply modified Sermon Editor for making lesson for students for schools or colleges.

What modifications would you suggest? (I've been testing it a bit for adult lessons).

Hans van den Herik

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/850441#Comment_850441

Here are my thoughts.

I would like to have a handy tool to prepare and deliver my lessons for youth and students and I would like to do this alongside my study in Logos. I like to work with Powerpont (PPTX) but it's a 'little bit' time-consuming to make slides after you studied the passage.

The Sermon Editor offers such a possibility. But there are a lot of things that doesn't work very well.

You should be able to fill in the topic etc. of your lecture or lesson. Now it's only for sermons.
You should be able to appoint what should be the content of the slide. E.g. I like to project the bible chapter on the screen. In Sermon Editor now it's only possible to project only one verse at a time (without some extra formatting afterwards). You should be able to get a considerable portion of text in one slide!
You should be able to import pictures from logos: maps, artefacts etc.
You should be able to link to personal documents: queries etc.
You should be able to copy text WITH your highlights/markups. Perhaps as a picture..
You should be able to copy text form resources in the slide. Again: a considerable portion in one slide. Now text is divided over several slides.
You should be able to simply make a handout and questions, like that's possible in Sermon Editor now.

Hans

GregW

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/850590#Comment_850590

I've just used the Sermon Editor for the first time to prepare a "live" sermon. I love the development, but do also feel that it needs some rapid development in a number of areas. I'd agree with most of what the OP suggested, and would add the following:

For me, being able to put a map onto a slide is quite important, especially when I'm preaching from the Old Testament.It would be great to be able to do this from within the Sermon Editor.
Not being able to get my output onto my iPad is a pain.
The text doesn't paste bulleted lists into a Word document properly (and I use a lot of bullets in my sermon notes). I had to copy/paste today as the Export.. Option crashed Logos three times before I rebooted my computer to make copy/paste work.
When I cut (cmd-X) it goes back to the top of the document, so I have to scroll back to where I was before I can paste the text.
I'd echo the comments about edibility of slides and being able to get more Bible text onto a slide.
I've had problems today where trying to copy my sermon text and paste it into Word crashed both Logos and Word, although a reboot seems to have fixed that for now. If I could sync to my iPad that would remove the need for me to export to Word.

This is a great new piece of functionality, and when it reaches maturity will be a fantastic boon to those of us who do a lot of preaching. I do hope it receives continued focus in the coming months. I'm a Logos Now member, but I hope that those who have purchased the L7 FFS will also receive some of the updates that make it more functionally useful.

Richard Wardman

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/851245#Comment_851245

If I could sync to my iPad that would remove the need for me to export to Word.

You'll be pleased to know this is already in Beta!

GregW

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/851248#Comment_851248

If I could sync to my iPad that would remove the need for me to export to Word.

You'll be pleased to know this is already in Beta!

[Y]

JoshInRI

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/850590#Comment_850590

I thought this would be a good place to add my .02 about the new sermon creator tool or the updated one in 7.0 (I am using Logos Now).

Where in the software does it permit you to save the work you have done? I was surprised to see that some initial work (including a title and some ideas) just disappeared.

Seriously....I think an easier way to save your work immediately - especially your title, etc is preferred please.

Thanks.

MJ. Smith

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/851508#Comment_851508

It saves your work automatically ... I'd need a video to see how you managed to make it fail - or a screen shot of the sermon documents in the document menu to show that it is there.

Mike Tourangeau

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/851248#Comment_851248

If I could sync to my iPad that would remove the need for me to export to Word.

You'll be pleased to know this is already in Beta!

[Y]

Fr. Nathan R. Hale

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/851245#Comment_851245

Please let me know if I suggest this in another place

I'd also add that the ability to create templates in Sermon Editor is pretty essential. I almost always us the same basic structure for my sermons, so to have this pre-set in document and ready to go would help a lot. This is what I do in Word and it provides a tremendous jump-start for me each week.

Richard Wardman

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/851819#Comment_851819

Welcome to the Forums!

I'd also add that the ability to create templates in Sermon Editor is pretty essential.

There is a slight workaround, as suggested here - https://community.logos.com/forums/p/129241/840788.aspx#840788