TIP of the day: Build your own chain reference Bible [well almost] Earnhardt as an example

1. This is the first page of a resource for topic chains marked in one's Bible. How does one convert it into your Logos/Verbum app?

Other possible coding schemes:

• J.L. Shuler
• Daniel Revelation Bible Studies
• Herbert W. Armstrong
• 57 Key chains from the Thompson Chain Bible
• Bible marking website instructions and studies to mark
• Shawn Richardson
• Western Region Church of God
• Sanctuary Bible Study Class
• LDS canon Scripture chains

Note one can simply create a Passage List but this loses the advantage of a chain Bible - the ability to view the context of the verse. Whatever you do, you cannot avoid the Logos limitation on non-tenuous texts.

To Create a chain Bible

2. Create a New palette for the topical chain highlighting.

3. Give the highlighting palette a name that links it to the book Bible Marking Guide by John Earnhardt. I keep hoping Logos will provide the means to tie resources, highlight palettes, note files together ... something they seem to be moving towards. Make the note file palette specific so that the chaining can be shared among users as a single file. Begin to add styles.

4. Create a style for each topic listed in the text.

Give the style its topical name and create the tag in the Insert Text portion of the style. Use the brackets and abbreviations used in the book to simply relating the Logos chains to the book chains. Optionally add color to make the chains stand out.

Add two labels - one for chain position so that you can distinguish the starting and stopping element in the list and on that carries the Bible reference for the next link in the chain. Then save the style.

Final result:

5. Repeat the process for each topic, duplicating the style and modifying it as necessary.

Duplicate the style.

Open the duplicate in edit mode.

Rename the style and change the highlighting text tag (and optionally the color). Save.

6. Highlight the first entry.

Add the highlight which will automatically ask for the attributes. Be careful to select the Scripture reference from the list so that the links are created.

Set the ChainPosition attribute to start, middle or end.

Now you can nicely see the next link in the hover of the selected annotation or in the Note file. This is why the post heading included the words "well almost" ... neither of these are live links. Logos has not fully implemented the required features although this is a great improvement over Logos 5.

7. One you have one or more highlights applied you can open the Note File via the Context Menu.

You can then make the chain reference work in additional translations by using "Edit attachment points" and "Attach to current selection" - note that adding by reference does not work as highlights are by selection only. A useful modification would be to allow highlights with labels to be attached to references.

Why is this "extra work" worth it? When completed, the highlight palette and notes can be shared with others. Only one person needs to do the work and it is easier for them to add additional versions as needed than for someone to rebuild the whole structure from scratch.

8. Add additional links in the same manner. Note the default position of middle is good until you hit the final entry in the topic chain.

9. While one can search for the ChainPosition attribute value start, it is useful to create a note positioned at the beginning of the highlighting Note File that has the names (and perhaps abbreviations) for all the topics in the file together with the first verse in the chain.

10. Note one can run topical guides to get lists of scripture related to a topic and build your own chains. It could be a useful tool for those leading topical Bible studies to lead the participants through the passages being considered.