Updated Feature: Reading Plans

What is it?

Logos 6’s updated Reading Plans feature now allows you to create fully customizable plans—use them for personal reading, a Bible study group, class, and more!

You can add readings from multiple resources in a single session. Plans with multiple resources will require Logos 6 or newer.
You can drag and drop selections to a reading session.
You can drag and drop panels to a reading session.
You can add sessions based upon current position and selection in opened resources.
You can add sessions for specific references.
You can add readings from a Passage List or another Reading Plan.

How does it work?

Logos 6 offers a lot more customization for reading plans as well as several new predefined reading plans including Robert Murray M'Cheyne's popular reading plan.

Learn more about Reading Plans, or start a new one in Logos 6.

How do I get it?

New Search features are available in all Crossgrades and all Base Package levels.

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Comments

Fr. Rafal Kandora

I doesn't work with Verbum on IOS

Graham Criddle

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/649766#Comment_649766

HI Fr. Rafal - and welcome to the forums

I doesn't work with Verbum on IOS

These new features are for the desktop platform (Logos / Verbum 6) and are not available on the mobile platforms at the moment (and we don't know which of them will be or when this will happen)

Dan

Is there a shorthand syntax for multi-source reading plans (e.g. comma delimited)?

There is a popular Read the Bible and Catechism in One Year plan, but it looks like I will have to enter all 365 sessions using the user interface. Is this correct?

Andrew Batishko

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/650098#Comment_650098

Is there a shorthand syntax for multi-source reading plans (e.g. comma delimited)?

There is a popular Read the Bible and Catechism in One Year plan, but it looks like I will have to enter all 365 sessions using the user interface. Is this correct?

At this time there isn't a way to do it directly. But... there may be a indirect method that will speed things up.

For custom reading plans, you can add readings from a Passage List (creating one reading per day for each item in the list). Passage Lists can add references from a text file.

So, if you can get the references to a text file, then you can do something like the following:

Create a text file containing all of the references in the first column
Create a passage list and add the references from the text file.
Add the passage list to the reading plan.
Repeat these steps for each of the other Bible columns

After you are finished, you can delete all the passage lists.

Unfortunately, This won't work for the Catechism column. I can't think of an easy way to handle that, so you have to use the interface. I recommend adding all of these readings first, since the Add from Passage List will merge with the readings you have already created, but manual adding of readings will tend to keep adjusting the date to the first date without a reading.

Ron

So is it finally possible to create a Bible reading plan that amounts to "read a chapter a day" instead of Logos arbitrarily dividing the total reading to make the amount of reading per day approximately equal? (Please??)

Jonathan J Watson

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/650383#Comment_650383

Yes! I was really looking forward to this feature. You now have an option to read by "Default," "Chapter," or "Pericope." I've attached screenshots that show the difference.

For this example, I've chosen Proverbs, since its 31 chapters won't quite go perfectly into 30 days of November.

Anthony H

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/650387#Comment_650387

There is far to much of a need to click in several levels to make some of the simpler modification that were available in L5. There needs to be a way, if there isn't already, to turn on and off the visibility of individual reading plans if there is more than one.

see post

https://community.logos.com/forums/t/93618.aspx

Ron

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/650387#Comment_650387

Yes! I was really looking forward to this feature. You now have an option to read by "Default," "Chapter," or "Pericope." I've attached screenshots that show the difference.

Great news, thanks!

Timothy Jang

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/650687#Comment_650687

Is there any way to set an individual reading plan of books from my library by page numbers?

NB.Mick

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/650387#Comment_650387

So is it finally possible to create a Bible reading plan that amounts to "read a chapter a day" instead of Logos arbitrarily dividing the total reading to make the amount of reading per day approximately equal? (Please??)

Yes! I was really looking forward to this feature. You now have an option to read by "Default," "Chapter," or "Pericope."

Thanks again, this is great! It's a small feature but it's so much better to not get angry everyday that Logos breaks the reading midsentence just because some printer ran out of space on the paper.

Willie Morris

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/650804#Comment_650804

How do I go about adding a custom reading plan based on the Septuagint Psalms (Lexham)? I'd like to create a reading plan based on the Kathismata of the Orthodox Church and have it broken into Stasis.

I tried to create a Passage List, and broke it into 59 parts (e.g., Ps 1-3, 4-6, ... 118:1-72, 118:73-131, etc), and then I added that Passage List to a Custom Reading Plan. Now, when I open it up from the home page, the passages are opened in my default Bible instead of the Lexham Septuagint.

Any thoughts on how I can get this to open in the Septuagint and/or make adding a custom reading plan easier?

Tim Hensler

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/650776#Comment_650776

Is there any way to set an individual reading plan of books from my library by page numbers?

Or by chapter for a non-Bible book?

David Miller

I am having a terrible time with setting up a new reading plan in Logos 6 and getting it show up correctly in the Android app. I just set one up for a book and it shows correctly in Logos 6. All is good. On the other hand, in the Android app, it shows the reading plan on the Home page but the first line of it says "null" (I set up a reading plan for Paul and the Faithfulness of God). The next line of text below the "null" shows the name of the reading plan.

Now, when I click the entry, it says "unable to navigate to requested resource". Strike one. If I open the book in the Android app, it's also not showing the "read" and "stop reading" markers where I should currently be. If I open the book in Logos 6, I see them.

This is completely not working on the mobile side. This was working great in Logos 5.

Timothy Jang

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/651308#Comment_651308

Yes, that's exactly what I mean. Thank you for the comment, Tim.

Graham Criddle

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/651416#Comment_651416

I am having a terrible time with setting up a new reading plan in Logos 6

What sort of reading plan?

a predefined one
an auto-generated plan
a custom reading plan

Andrew Batishko

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/650776#Comment_650776

Is there any way to set an individual reading plan of books from my library by page numbers?

Use the following steps to create a reading plan based on page numbers:

Create a new Custom reading plan
Open the book you want to read
In the navigation box for the book, enter the page number range you want to read (such as: Page 3-16)
In the reading plan, click the "Choose an open resource" menu and select the page number range from your resource
Make sure the date for the reading session is correct
Click the "Add session" button to add the session to the plan
Repeat steps 3 - 6 until the plan is complete

I hope that helps!

Andrew Batishko

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/650804#Comment_650804

Thanks again, this is great! It's a small feature but it's so much better to not get angry everyday that Logos breaks the reading midsentence just because some printer ran out of space on the paper.

You will find that Logos no longer generates reading plans based on page number. Books that used to generate page-number based plans will now generate plans based on the table of contents.

Andrew Batishko

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/650844#Comment_650844

How do I go about adding a custom reading plan based on the Septuagint Psalms (Lexham)? I'd like to create a reading plan based on the Kathismata of the Orthodox Church and have it broken into Stasis.

I tried to create a Passage List, and broke it into 59 parts (e.g., Ps 1-3, 4-6, ... 118:1-72, 118:73-131, etc), and then I added that Passage List to a Custom Reading Plan. Now, when I open it up from the home page, the passages are opened in my default Bible instead of the Lexham Septuagint.

Any thoughts on how I can get this to open in the Septuagint and/or make adding a custom reading plan easier?

If you don't want the plan to use your default resource, then I suggest using a method similar to the one I described above for creating a plan based on page numbers. When you select an item from the "Choose an open resource" menu, make sure to select the range that is followed by "LES". Those ranges will open in the specified resource rather than using your preferred resource.

Andrew Batishko

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/651416#Comment_651416

I am having a terrible time with setting up a new reading plan in Logos 6 and getting it show up correctly in the Android app.

At this time, the mobile apps do not support Custom reading plans. Are you creating a Custom or Generated reading plan?

Tim Hensler

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/652040#Comment_652040

Books that used to generate page-number based plans will now generate plans based on the table of contents.

Cool. Thank you.

David Miller

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/652046#Comment_652046

I am creating a generated plan.

Andrew Batishko

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/651416#Comment_651416

I am having a terrible time with setting up a new reading plan in Logos 6 and getting it show up correctly in the Android app.

It looks like there is a bug in both the mobile apps and the desktop application that prevent a reading plan from working correctly if it was created based on the resource's table of contents, and the current resource version doesn't match the version the plan was created with.

The resources where you are having problems are ones where the resource was updated on the desktop but not updated on mobile. Bug reports have been filed for the both mobile and the desktop applications.

Timothy Jang

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/652037#Comment_652037

Thank you Andrew for help. I think your suggestion is the best I can do for now.

Sean

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/652037#Comment_652037

Is there any way to set an individual reading plan of books from my library by page numbers?

Use the following steps to create a reading plan based on page numbers:

Create a new Custom reading plan

Open the book you want to read

In the navigation box for the book, enter the page number range you want to read (such as: Page 3-16)

In the reading plan, click the "Choose an open resource" menu and select the page number range from your resource

Make sure the date for the reading session is correct

Click the "Add session" button to add the session to the plan

Repeat steps 3 - 6 until the plan is complete

I hope that helps!

I would like to repeat the request, made elsewhere, to restore the L5 feature of having the option to auto-generate reading plans by page number for non-Bible resources. If a book does not have fine divisions (i.e., only chapters with no sub-headings), the reading plan L6 generates has little value. For example, I just tried to set a reading plan for one volume of G.C. Berkouwer's Studies in Dogmatics for a duration of four weeks. The book has about 200 pages; this is the plan it generated:

I can't do much with that. Likewise, the steps listed above for making a custom reading plan are, to be blunt, far too much work for too little gain. It would be better just to make a plan on paper or in a spreadsheet or just read freely without a plan. By contrast, L5 could do this automatically in just a few seconds. Please restore this feature.

Matt Hamrick

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/679327#Comment_679327

The reading plans in L6 is my number 1 complaint. It requires more work to make a plan than its worth.

Bruce Roth

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/679327#Comment_679327

I put my vote in for page number based reading plans. I was creating one for one of NT Wright's Everyone series and was trying to figure out why it was created in a strange way. I selected sessions and it generated a breakdown of sessions, and I can see it is based on the Table of Contents.

I like the clean breaks at the end of a chapter, but I think what it does is count up the total chapter type breaks which includes each entry in the glossary as a chapter and then breaks them into a daily dose. It doesn't reflect a number of pages, only a number of sections. Not all that helpful to distribute an equal amount of reading across a number of days.

Mike Binks

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/682895#Comment_682895

Hi Bruce

I read the Everyone series through last year. I found that the best way of doing it was to have a reading plan in a Bible and then read Wright's books along with the reading plan.

In a two (or three) panel layout this works well.

Martin Folley

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/650387#Comment_650387

You now have an option to read by "Default," "Chapter," or "Pericope." I've attached screenshots that show the difference.

I do not seem to have this option when reading commentaries ... should I have?

I would like to set up a single reading plan to look at a pericope in NICNT, then the same pericope in PNTC and the finally NAC. This should then move to the next pericope. I would settle for three different reading plans, one for each resource, split by pericope as defined in the resource.

At the moment, I cannot get beyond having to specify number of sessions (calendar based instead of resource based) and looking at plans that generated so badly that they have the end of a day's reading in the middle of a sentence!!! Surely an algorithm is out there so that it will start/end at paragraph level? Am I missing something obvious?

Graham Criddle

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/697294#Comment_697294

You now have an option to read by "Default," "Chapter," or "Pericope." I've attached screenshots that show the difference.

I do not seem to have this option when reading commentaries ... should I have?

I believe this is only available for Bibles

Martin Folley

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/697324#Comment_697324

Thanks for the Confirmation.

That is unfortunate. I do not want more complex Reading plans, but more usable ones. L6 is no different to L5, as far as I can tell.

What would be good would be the ability to specify a level within a resource, and not a specific date or number of sessions ... the book is read when I get to the end ... however long that takes! To be honest, I have had to train myself to ignore the dates so that I am not reading for 'ticking the box' sake.

At any rate ... back to 'Levels' ... if you open a table of contents, it is split into levels which can be further opened into sub levels etc. I would like the ability to choose a level or sub-level and simply ask Logos to break it down to this level and tell me how long it will take to read! I tend to read by logical blocks of thought, to 'just finish this chapter', and not to read by word or page counts. I would prefer for the author to finish their train of thought. It seems to me that this structural data is already in each resources, and that only the UI would need to be adapted.

For example ... New American Commentary, John's Gospel:

If I choose Level 1, then I would expect to read 'I. An Encompassing ...' in a single sitting, and then'II. The Cana Cycle...' in the next sitting.

If I choose Level 2, then I would expect to read '1. The First Sign...' in a sitting, and then '2. Transition ... ' in the next sitting, and '3. The cleansing ...' in the sitting after that. There would be considerably more, smaller chunks of self-contained blocks of thought to read, structure as the author intended, but where I am choosing the size of the chunks.

If I choose Level 3 then there would be no difference to Level 2 until we get to the section on Nicodemus which would be sub-divided into three further sessions. I do not know why the author chose to sub-divide this section ... it may be because section 5 was too large, or that there is something specific to chew on in each section ... or simply that it was quirk of the creative/editorial process ... the worst that can happen is those level 3 sections are so short that I reading them in one go (and tick three boxes all at once [:P])

Obviously mileage will vary from resource to resource ... but the data for Logos is already there, and a brief glance at the TOC and maybe a quick look as a sample level to gauge 'verbosity' should allow us to choose a level and have Logos generate a reading plan based on that.

Tim Taylor

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/697324#Comment_697324

You now have an option to read by "Default," "Chapter," or "Pericope." I've attached screenshots that show the difference.

I do not seem to have this option when reading commentaries ... should I have?

I believe this is only available for Bibles

This is unfortunate. I really wish they would have extended the "by Chapter" option to any resource, not just Bibles! I can't count the number of times I have wished for this feature only to find it lacking. [:(]

I hope this can be added soon?

Tim Taylor

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/652040#Comment_652040

You will find that Logos no longer generates reading plans based on page number. Books that used to generate page-number based plans will now generate plans based on the table of contents.

I wish this were the case, but it doesn't seem to be so. Am I missing something? Every time I try to create a reading plan on a non-Bible resource, it cuts it up by page number instead of table of content item.

Graham Criddle

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/726827#Comment_726827

You will find that Logos no longer generates reading plans based on page number. Books that used to generate page-number based plans will now generate plans based on the table of contents.

I wish this were the case, but it doesn't seem to be so. Am I missing something? Every time I try to create a reading plan on a non-Bible resource, it cuts it up by page number instead of table of content item.

This was changed (reverted) in 6.1 due to some implementation issues. I believe there are plans to look at this again but I don't know when this will happen

DavidR

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/726835#Comment_726835

I still think it's all a bit odd.

I'm currently using Connect the Testaments, which is a book that contains a "reading plan". Pretty obviously, I'm setting out to read the page for January 1 on January 1, and so on.

However, it's a book, not a Logos reading plan so, to use the reading plan feature, I need to generate a reading plan from the reading plan (had to post in the forums just to work that one out). When I did generate a plan, I quickly found that I was going to be a day or two out (doing the reading for January 4 on January 5, that kind of thing).

I finally realised that Logos was taking me pretty literally when I set out to read the whole book, and using day 1 to do the introduction, and day 365 to do the end notes. In between, two random days played catch-up by doing two studies. To generate a one-year reading plan from this (err) reading plan, you have to go for a 367-day plan starting on December 31 and finishing on 1 January the year after next.

It might be an idea to have an option to leave out the credits? [:P][:D]

Of course, I do realise that this would depend on the level of internal mark-up in each book, so may be harder than it seems to implement.

For a devotional such as that, it would also be nice to be able to start on June 3 with the reading for that day, and finish a year later on June 2. I might not have bought the book for Christmas!

JT (alabama24)

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/771084#Comment_771084

I'm currently using Connect the Testaments, which is a book that contains a "reading plan".

If you are using a calendar devotional, you don't need to set up a reading plan. The book <should> open to the current date, no reading plan needed.

Stephen Boon

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/652595#Comment_652595

I'm having the same trouble with a reading plan using the NET Bible - I've got several of them, and they all seem to work fine except one in Romans, which shows 'null' as in the above user's comment. I don't know how to file a bug report, if that's what needs doing.

JT (alabama24)

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/874160#Comment_874160

Welcome Stephen! Sorry you are having troubles. [:s]

I'm having the same trouble with a reading plan using the NET Bible - I've got several of them, and they all seem to work fine except one in Romans, which shows 'null' as in the above user's comment. I don't know how to file a bug report, if that's what needs doing.

It would be helpful for you to create a new thread, explaining your issue clearly, and providing appropriate details. What OS? What version of the app? Screenshots?

Stephen Boon

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/874160#Comment_874160

I'm having the same trouble with a reading plan using the NET Bible - I've got several of them, and they all seem to work fine except one in Romans, which shows 'null' as in the above user's comment. I don't know how to file a bug report, if that's what needs doing.

Sorry, that was supposed to be linked to Andrew Batishko's reply to David Miller's issue.

In fact, the same error occurs when I try to create a reading plan for Romans in the ESV.

Stephen Boon

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/874164#Comment_874164

Oh - thanks for swift response, alabama24 - even while I was typing my little update! Will try to work out how and where to create a new thread and give details as you suggest!