E-sword Bibles 75 Versions

[Hennie Jaffe]

Its not the immediate solution you're looking for, but I've found the quickest way to compare versions is to put my most-used Bibles near the top of the Texts library. Then, tapping the version name at the top of the screen is a faster way to switch than going back to the Library to switch to a different version. Parallel panes will allow you to view two versions at a time and switch them from the top of both panes this way.

Thanks. On the desktop I normally can view about 10 translations at a time (my screen is not that large), I think if I was flicking between translations I would not be able to flick through 10 translations and hold them all in my head at the same time so that I can compare the vocab for each translation.

I realise doing a comparison between a collection of translations of a particular verse is generally only an activity that someone who is doing either bible translation, or exegesis would conduct, but I imagine I am not the only person that does translation and exegesis work. (In fact I believe for people who can't read in the original languages, cross-comparing 10 translations will allow someone to quickly see if there are nuances in the original language that are difficult to translate)

The real limitation is the size of the display on most iOS devices. Just how many columns can we add before the font size is just too small to read? I know the iOS tablets have more room, but the larger ones are close to the size of a small Mac laptop. At that point, we might just as well carry one of those around with us.

You'd be surprised how many versions of a verse can be displayed in one panel at a time. Even on a small screen. My greek lecturer used bible works to show at least 15 verses at a time in one single small panel in BibleWorks. On a phone, I imagine you could scroll up and down if need be, i.e.

And regarding your comment about iPad's and mac laptops, It is true that my iPad is almost the size of my MacBook. But, the iPad is still far more convenient to carry around. Accordance is one of the only reasons I still need to carry around the laptop in addition to my iPad. The sooner I don't need to carry around the laptop the better.

I don't make these kinds of decisions at Accordance, but I can tell you we've had these kinds of discussions. I suspect we are at the point of diminishing returns regarding more platforms at this point.

Switching my family away from Windows has been one of the best IT decisions I made for our household, I don't plan to switch back any time soon. Prior to the switch (XP/Vista days) I was always being asked to help with something or fix something that wasn't working, once or twice per week at least. Post the switch, these types of questions don't seem to arise at all.

Agree! We got a mbp and my wife wanted a windows laptop as well, so we did but she didnt use it and it was passed on to my daughter instead and a second mbp was purchased. (Though i still have to maintain a desktop xp box for my film scanner.)

I really appreciate all the other resorces that are available in accordance like the cultural image photolibrary, atlas of reformation and sacred bridge not to mention all the grammars and linked lexicons.

1) having a commentary or text or lexicon open in a single pane, to open a different commentary or resourceor lexicon, i have to go through recently open, library, reference or general etc and then find the commentary, rather than just select it from the list which i could do if it was a commentary open in a second pane with a text.

2) being limited to text and reference in two panes. Frequently i want to open two resources, ebc and ebc notes; two commentaries, a book or text and an atlas or picture library, a text and lexicon or dictionary or grammar.

Im not convinced apps like e-sword Solution is as comprehensive as accordance but it shows what can be done. the paid for cultural study bible app was certainly one of my rubbish purchases as it is very poorly designed and has been totally unsupported with zero updates despite feedback from their support and i dont use it now as I cant search for what im looking for despite it still being installed.

And i accept that android still needs to catch up and has a larger base of units sold (donk know if they can easily swith non text resources). and we have welcomed bw users and the primary tool is still the full fat version, but I hope more are finding the benefits of tablets, despite their limitations in the operating systems.

I still enjoy accordance on ios and dont use anything else and rely on it despite my moaning. I also have some other fantastic paid for apps like foreScore which i couldnt have imagined 10 years ago and now totally rely on. Exciting times.

Ps, i accept its not ideal and not what is being requested but using interlinear, you can get a flavour of how certain words are translated in tagged versions and use the second pane to flick through specific texts as suggested by rick.

There appears to be some weirdness about how tense is handled. (which is one of the things I am using the interlinear to look for at the moment), so the first thing I look for in verse 2 is how is "compassion" translated, and what translations are translating "I have compassion".

Strangely, the line for ESV doesn't show that ESV includes "have", and the line for NIV-GKE shows "have", but doesn't show the noun (compassion). Although I wonder if it works better with Greek on the top. I'll test it out.

As far as the value of investing in the iOS app goes, I can tell you that the app is the reason why I decided to buy Accordance (hoping also for some future improvements). BibleWorks gives me all I need on the desktop, and I expect it to keep working for at least a few years. The crossgrade offer opened the prospect of mobile access to serious tools, instead of the free/cheap texts I had been using. I considered Logos, but there was no way to get the Bible translation I use on mobile: they don't sell it, and don't sync user bibles to mobile devices.

I do miss BibleWorks's easy way of comparing translations. The Logos iOS app has a compare text feature, which shows the selected verse in all (many?) available versions and highlights words that differ from the selected version (the one that was being viewed when compare text was selected). Showing the same verse in multiple translations works on any screen size, because the list can be scrolled if the versions don't all fit on the screen.

I propose this: when a verse number is selected in the iOS app, there is already a popup menu (Copy Verse, Highlight Verse, etc.). Add to this menu "Compare Translations" or something similar. Selecting it opens a new view with a back button (like Amplify). This view displays the text of the verse from each Text in the library, in the order in which they're found there. For the initial implementation, don't highlight differences, just show the text of each version. That already gets us to the BibleWorks level.

I'm in the process of asking the author of "E-Sword" (Rick Meyers) if he is interested in making his Bible software package portable (or alternately, if he's aware of any way to make it to be portable)

If he replies in a positive vein, I will keep y'all updated on that.

The Sword project has a pocket bible called jsword I think it is if you are interested. Also I have found that Bible link works portable if you want to spend some money - jsword probably the better option

jsword is based on Java and would require some additional help (aka java install on the host OS or java on the thumb.) Open source Java is available and could easily be made portable, so that is a possibility. I too am not a fan of jsword or the SWORD project, because they do not currently have many modern translations, commentaries, dictionaries, etc. E-Sword has them beat on this.

E-Sword does not have a free OSI license, and Rick likes to keep programming tight in hand from what I can tell. It is programmed heavily leaning on Microsoft Access and all its modules use either Access or RTF formats. I have not looked for it recently, but a search of this forum should link you to a portable launcher for e-sword, that I have been using since October or November. It stores the registry info in the folder with e-sword on my USB, but there are a few little issues. I don't know code, so I could not tell you how to improve on this setup, but it is fairly stable and works for me. I believe the actual launcher was called portable e-sword beta 0.7. And a warning, it does require signing up on a yahoo group to get access to the file, but anyone with a yahoo account will find that painless and easily reversible.

"a search of this forum should link you to a portable launcher for e-sword, that I have been using since October or November...it is fairly stable and works for me...I believe the actual launcher was called portable e-sword beta 0.7...it does require signing up on a yahoo group to get access to the file, but anyone with a yahoo account will find that painless and easily reversible."

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Yeah, I remember that - it was that "signup for yahoo groups" bit that turned me off.

Na ga da ("not gonna do it").

If I could find the file somewheres else - where I didn't hafta sign up for anything - I'd go for it. Failing that, I'll hafta wait for someone to come up with some other solution.

Haven't heard back from Rick yet, tho' I requested an e-mail response...

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