[sword-devel] Print Bible Features

[Jimmie Houchin]

Hello David,

I knew everyone would think I'm nuts, and to quote a little catapiller, 
"but I'm okay with that." :)

There are many Bibles in Sword which are not currently published. I 
believe that will increase over time. As Bibles leave copyright and as 
publishers promote their latest greatest, older ones may leave the presses.

I just saw a hard cover ASV sell for $51 on eBay. I can buy it right now 
from the publisher for $25. The reason, people think the ASV is no 
longer published because it isn't in the stores or on CBD and for a time 
it was unpublished (I think).

Where can I buy a Young's Literal Translation. I might find a used one 
at a considerable price. I would buy one if readily available at normal 
Bible prices.

What about World English Bible? HNV, etc...

Free, readily available texts should be liberating to people with a 
vision for Printed Bibles. But they (okay maybe me someday) would want 
to have the features the Proprietary Print Bible publishers have.

For many people the Big Bible Publishers have left the road we wish to 
travel. That is their right and power. I don't wish to follow them.

Where's my KJV/YLT Interlinear? :)

Yes, regarding dictionaries, concordances and such the software 
implementation is bigger, better and more powerful than the print 
version. But I haven't given up my print Bibles yet. I don't currently 
conceive of a time I will. So these features will need to be 
intelligently restricted for print purposes.

I believe some features of Print Bibles are of value in software form. 
Others are primarily there to reproduce the Print version. I don't think 
that's a bad thing.

Yes, this is an itch I have. I will scratch it. I was exploring what I 
needed to harvest and what was already available, but I couldn't see it 
due to my usage patterns of Sword or the limitations of the frontend in 
presenting what is available in the module.

Comments interspersed below.

David's Mailing-list and Spam Receiver wrote:
> On Monday 19 May 2003 04:42 pm, Jimmie Houchin wrote:
>>What features which are available in Print Bibles does Sword lack?
>>
>>If someone were wanting to take of the Bible texts in Sword and publish
>>(print) a Bible what does Sword not have. (Copyright permitting.)
> 
> Well, I don't really think it would be a wise idea to print sword modules. 
> Even if we could replicate every single feature that print bibles have, the 
> resulting quality would not be as good as a professionally typset and printed 
> bible.

That is true. But nothing prevents anyone from doing a professionally 
typeset and printed Bible other than having the available texts and 
information. (Okay, money might, just might, factor in. :)

>>Subject Headers
> 
> These are supported. But the module must have them. Currenly the ISV is the 
> only one I know that has thse.

The ISVs copyright is not friendly towards harvesting for other uses.

To me this can be and should be an independent feature (module). This is 
general to all Bibles not specific to any. From this module whether on 
not it is view could be toggled in the frontend and viewed in any text.

>>Read-along References 
> Could you explain what you mean by this?

Chris had this correct. This and Center Column are the same, just 
different presentation.

>>Center Column References
> 
> This doesn't make sense in bible software since, the software may or may not 
> display the text in columns (most software doesn't). And personally, I prefer 
> crossrefrences to be in the margin of the Bible rather than a center column. 
> That way pages break the text, which imo is more natural. And you might also 
> want to check out the Treasury of Scripture Knolwedge, it's basically a very 
> thick book of cross references.

I understand what you are saying. But for a moment stop thinking about 
display or presentation. The question really is, is the information 
available for display?

For presentation in Sword it could very easily be placed in the box to 
the right of the text (like where commentaries are in the Windows version).

Nevertheless, references which viewable in proximity to the text being read.

The TSK is a valuable resource, but difficult to constrict in this manner.

>>Concordance
>
> Well, this also doesn't make as much sense in a software environment since you 
> can do searches and find all occurances of each word and generate a 
> concordance if you like. Searches are also more powerful since you can search 
> for more than just single words. Also, concordances in the back of printed 
> bibles are usually incomplete.

Yes all of that is very true. Software is in many ways much more 
powerful than the print counterparts. But I don't have the software in 
my suit pocket, nor in my pulpit or on my desk for general reading. 
Print isn't going away.

>>Harmonies of the Gospels
> 
> This would be a chart, which I would imagine you could do as either a list or 
> table in a general book module.

This is true, but is that list readily available (electronically)?
Or do I need to harvest it?

>>Dictionary (of some Bible terms)
> 
> Already available as lexicon modules. We have several dictionaries avaiable, 
> but as with concordances, most dictionaries are incomplete due to size and 
> printing cost restrictions.
> 
>>Book information (at begin of each book)
> 
> This also doesn't make sense in bible software. I would say that this is much 
> more suited to the environments that it already exits in, commentaries and 
> probably a few lexicons.

I might be missing it, but where in Sword do we have a brief, several 
paragraph, commentary/description of the whole of any book?


>>Messianic Prophecies, ... fulfilled
> 
> While we don't have any modules exclusive to this, I think that such would 
> probably be better suited to either a general book, or to a commentary.

This too would simply be a list with references. Presentation would be 
up to the frontend.

Many of these are readily available visual clues or indicators available 
in the Print Bible but not in Sword.

>>Many of the names in the text have pronunciation helps.
>>    (I'm phrasing that poorly.) ie: Is'ra-el
>>     (where do they get those anyway?)
> 
> This is probably supported in some form or another, but the module would have 
> to contain this sort of information. I would, however, like to see some 
> discussion on possibly adding a pronounciation tag or attribute to the OSIS 
> standard that sword will be supporting in the upcoming release.
> 
>>anything else I'm missing... :)
>>...
> 
>>I know Sword has many modules and texts but not necessarily what people
>>are used to from their print versions.
> 
> This is because doing things the way they're done in print bibles doesn't 
> really make sense in electronic formats. The Sword project isn't a 
> replacement for print bibles by any means. I still use many print bibles and 
> refrences in addition to the sword project. (And some are even duplicated)
> 
> 
>> From my research the ASV has a preface which is not in the Sword module.
>>It is available on the web.
>>It, the ASV, also by default from the authoring committee contained much
>>of the above items. Its copyright has passed.
>>Are those items available electronically?
>>Am I missing them in the Sword project? ie: I don't know where they are?
>>If not available.
>>Does anybody else in the community see value in these items?
>>I know with software version of the Bible we can do much more than what
>>is in the print version. But some of those items we lack completely, yes?
>>I would like us to be able to reverse the process we have advantaged.
>>ie: Instead of going from print to electronic, going electronic to
>>print. Am I alone?
> 
> For resources already available in print, I think that this would be 
> re-inventing the wheel, however if this is your itch you are more than 
> welcome to scratch it. If we got a hold of some resources that were only 
> available in electronic form and someone wanted to print them then I don't 
> see why not, but unless you have something a bit more extensive than a home 
> printer, printing a bible yourself won't give you the quality that 
> professionally printed bibles have. Plus unless you've got a printer with 
> lots of toner or ink and many reams of paper just lying around, you're going 
> to end up spending more on ink/toner and paper than it would probably cost to 
> buy a bible at the store or online.

We already have things available which are not available in print.
So to me the ability to put them back into print would be of value.
Someone may see the value in publishing one of these someday.

Home printing ability is improving incredibly. Bibles are unusual in 
their level of quality of printing and binding. But who knows what the 
home user could do in the future.

>>If I were willing/able to scan an ASV, etc. in order to harvest some of
>>the above items, a few questions.
>>
>>Would it have to come from an out of print, out of copyright (ie: older)
>>print copy in order to be legal? Or would I be able to harvest the
>>identical (if it truly is) material from a more recent printing of the
>>public domain material?
> 
> Well, only those items covered by the original copyright would be useable to 
> us. If a publisher republishes the ASV, for instance and adds his own 
> concordance then he will have the rights to that concordance if it is 
> orignal.

Thank you. That is exactly what I needed to know.

Thanks for your reply and input. I am not meaning to come across 
harshly. My apologies if I do so.

I do have this itch and passion and vision. Just trying to line up the 
tools I need to enable the vision. :)

Thanks again.

Jimmie Houchin