[sword-devel] KJV Beta issue

[Greg Hellings]

On Sun, Jun 14, 2009 at 7:31 PM, Ben Morgan<benpmorgan at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Mon, Jun 15, 2009 at 10:15 AM, Greg Hellings <greg.hellings at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>>
>> On Sun, Jun 14, 2009 at 6:59 PM, Ben Morgan<benpmorgan at gmail.com> wrote:
>> > BPBible 0.4.4 currently displays a pilcrow without a space after it, as
>> > that
>> > is what is in the text.
>> > BPBible 0.5 will turn these into paragraphs, as that is what they
>> > represent.
>>
>> This should DEFINITELY be an option, as they don't actually represent
>> paragraphs.  They represent printed Pilcrow characters in the KJV
>> text, not paragraphs.  The reader should understand they indicate the
>> beginning of a conceptual paragraph according to the translators'
>> intentions, but they do not actually represent paragraphs in the
>> printed text.
>
> I'm not sure how much I care about the printed text; if the printed text is
> verse-per-line, this doesn't mean that I have to restrict the users to this.
> Similarly, if the printed text uses pilcrows, it doesn't mean that users
> have to see them.

I'm not saying you force them to see the Pilcrows.  And obviously,
BPBible is your baby, so you're free to do whatever you would like.
However, the KJV has been in print for 398 years now, and those who
like it often get very touchy about ANY changes to it.  To force them
to see typographic paragraphs where the generally accepted version has
printed Pilcrows will certainly upset many of that faction.  I was
just suggesting you have a setting that could be toggled for the KJV
texts that more or less has "Show in verse-as-paragraph with
Pilcrows/Show in verse-as-paragraph without Pilcrows/Show in
Pilcrows-as-paragraph" settings that the user can chose.  Then, those
of us who care more about the "conceptual" paragraph than about the
"typographic" paragraph can choose that option, and people who want to
see the faithful-to-print version with Pilcrows can see that as well.

Speaking completely personally, I think the paragraph view you're
suggesting for 0.5 is far superior to verse-as-paragraph, which is one
of the most ridiculous ideas I can imagine.  However, there are people
who disagree, and they do so quite fervently.

>
> I'm not sure what distinction you are drawing between "conceptual
> paragraphs" and "actual paragraphs" unless it is just talking about
> representing the text exactly.

As the original Greek text lacks any paragraph boundaries, all
paragraph markings in translations or even in printed Greek texts is
someone's attempt to discern the authors' intentions to group related
material.  Those are the "conceptual" paragraphs.  The "actual"
paragraphs I mentioned should probably have been called "typographic"
paragraphs.  The KJV translators felt that it was proper to indicate
each verse as a typographically unique paragraph.  They then inserted
Pilcrows (at least as I understand it) to attempt to give their
understanding of bodies of related sentences in the works.

>
> I could put an option in to let people display the pilcrows... and then
> maybe put some title text explaining them on mouseover...

Personally I think that would be better than just forcing either one,
and is a feature I've often thought would be well received.
Personally I think it might be interesting to see where the
translators thought these paragraphs ought to be as compared to more
recent translators, etc.  The more user choices, especially useful and
well explained choices, the better (in my opinion).

--Greg

>
> God Bless,
> Ben
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Multitudes, multitudes,
>    in the valley of decision!
> For the day of the LORD is near
>    in the valley of decision.
>
> Giôên 3:14 (ESV)
>
>
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