[jsword-devel] Bible Desktop Vision and Strategy

[Jonathan Morgan]

On Wed, Mar 11, 2009 at 2:22 PM, Adam Thomas <adam-thomas at cox.net> wrote:
> This is a great discussion, and one that we desperately needed to have
> if we hope to move BibleDesktop forward. I agree, we are not going to
> get 100% agreement on this list. The nature of Open Source projects is
> diversity in every respect. Let's be careful to focus on important goals
> as a group and not branch off too early.
>
> If we could snap our fingers and have a completely redesigned
> BibleDesktop application what would it need to do? Obviously, presenting
> the Bible is a usable manner is priority one.

One thing that is worth considering is what users will expect.  If you
want to find that, looking at e-Sword and The Word is probably a good
start (though there are some things in them that I refuse to implement
because I don't think they are the best way).

> I agree that we should not approach the redesign with the attitude of
> making this application the swiss army knife of Bible applications. The
> users out of the box experience is crucial and their first impression
> will be based on that experience alone. If they like what they see, they
> may continue digging deeper and learn of the other features such as
> powerful searching, extensibility, and customization.
>
> I was taught that in the Web world you have approximately 5-15 seconds
> to give a user what he/she wants or they will bounce to another site
> that does. I don't claim to know the statistics for desktop
> applications, but I have to imagine that some similar rule exists. We
> need to make sure BibleDesktop impresses the user immediately with zero
> configuration.

I would have put it at 30 seconds, just going from memory.  However,
given that the user will already have spent more than that time
downloading the application, it is almost certain that they will spend
more than that time evaluating it.  At a guess you probably have about
15 - 30 secs on the home page to convince them to look at screenshots,
and if the screenshots impress them they will then look at downloading
the software.

Zero configuration is definitely important (though I suspect you will
need to install modules, is that configuration?)

> "Since neither the Kindle app nor the Kindle iPhone
> is designed for reading the Bible, navigation can be frustrating."
>
> So let's be the application that IS designed to handle Bible navigation
> elegantly.
>
> "The usability problem with non-linear content is
> crucial because it indicates a deeper issue: Kindle's user experience
> is dominated by the book metaphor."
>
> Let's not be "dominated" by the book metaphor, let's simply provide it
> as one way of presenting the Bible. I'll bet as a group we could come up
> with at least 2 or 3 different ways that each of us read the Bible. When
> I am doing my "Read the Bible in One Year" study plan I do read chapter
> by chapter in a linear fashion. However, when I am in Bible Study trying
> to rapidly look up scriptures, I am utilizing full-text searches,
> bookmarks, and index lookups. Those are two modes that BibleDesktop
> would need to satisfy my needs and I am positive that others on this
> list could list different ways they use the Bible. Keep in mind those
> modes have nothing to do with commentaries and other "fancy" features,
> they are simply presentation or "workflow" modes of raw Bible content.
>
> I think the electronic book idea is great. I like the idea of being able
> to flip a page electronically and have a visual representation or my
> relative location within a book. Sure PDFs use continuous navigation by
> default and we can tell relative location by looking at the label that
> says "page 11 of 44" to know where we are. However, many people like to
> feel like they are reading a paper book and I am one of them. I can
> assure you there are many more like me out there and is proven by the
> number of people interested in electronic book format. I also have an
> article from a recent IEEE magazine that discusses electronic books and
> page flipping techniques. This further proves to me that someone out
> there thinks it is worth doing, or at least researching.

I just know from using paper Bibles that pages have limitations that
can be removed by software.  I take your point about indication of
where you are, but I suspect that feedback could be given in other
ways, though it might not be as useful.

Jon