[sword-devel] PocketSword status

Fri Mar 13 11:58:42 MST 2020

Actually, web servers don't get corona viruses, and people don't congregate in crowds around them physically, so COVID-19 has no direct effect on web servers or their use. The pandemic, however, does have some serious side-effects due to widespread panic, overreactions, shutdowns, shortages, etc., as well as increased malware attacks aimed at exploiting people's fear. One or more of those could cause a server shutdown. However, in general, electronic Scripture distribution is more robust than physical books
with respect to pandemics.

Case in point: Next week, the Nali half-NT dedication is scheduled on Manus Island. The printed waterproof books on order from Hong Kong will not be there on time. Instead, they will have just 100 print-on-demand paper editions, and will have tables set up to help people with smart phones to download the Nali Scriptures onto their smart phones. The edition on the eBible.org repository is actually more up-to-date and authoritative than the printed books, anyway, due to some corrections the translators sent
to me a few days ago. In that area of the world, it is OK to have the Scriptures online (and I do at https://PNG.Bible/nss/), but being able to download them and refer to them without Internet access later is great, because Internet access in that part of the world is expensive (paid by the megabyte), slow (2G), and intermittent.

So, in this case, COVID-19 has indirectly increased the importance of the ministry we do together.

On 3/13/20 8:38 AM, David Haslam wrote:
> And having multiple repository servers also makes sense in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic.
>
> David
>
> Sent from ProtonMail Mobile
>
>
> On Fri, Mar 13, 2020 at 18:33, Michael Johnson <Michael at eBible.org <mailto:Michael at eBible.org>> wrote:
>> I plan to update PocketSword so that it draws from all official repositories, by default, much like AndBible does.
>>
>> Duplicating works in repositories is helpful, perhaps, for front ends that only look at one repository at a time, especially if the work is kept up to date in both repositories. When presented with an aggregate list, the user would see duplicate or near-duplicate entries. If the UI displays repository source and date of last update, as well as a full description of the module, this could help the user decide which one(s) to choose.
>>
>> As far as eBible.org goes, removing a work from the repository is actually more work than keeping it there, because of the way the automation is set up. Therefore I'm disinclined to remove works unless there is a valid reason other than duplication alone.
>>
>> For the World English Bible and its variants (American/British, standard/Messianic, with/without DC/Apocrypha), the eBible.org repository is the authoritative source with the most current copy. The same is true for hundreds of other translations. That older revisions are "out there" including in Crosswire Main doesn't bother me, really, because the differences generally don't affect meaning, but the English may be less up to date. Staying updated, of course, is better. I'm disinclined to mark any eBible.org
>> translations as obsoleting anything in another repository, absent a specific request from the appropriate pumpkin holder for that repository, lest confusion result. There are, of course, some translations where Crosswire Main is more authoritative. There are also cases where one repository has permission to distribute but the other one doesn't. We have an architecture that supports multiple repositories, although it does look like an afterthought. Still, we can make it work better, either by coming up with
>> standard ways of aggregating them better in the API, or maybe we keep leaving it up to each front end.
>>
>> Supporting multiple repositories is actually a good thing in terms of resilience against server outages, censorship, etc. It also gives more localized control to the various sources of modules. Otherwise, there would be a temptation to make one big super-repository. Maybe that isn't a terrible idea if it were just an automated aggregate mirror of all of the others, and if it could be done without violating copyright agreements. For fault tolerance and improved bandwidth, there could be more than one such
>> super-repository.
>>
>> Any thoughts?
>>
>> On 3/13/20 7:56 AM, Cyrille wrote:
>> >
>> >
>> > Le 13/03/2020 à 12:55, David Haslam a écrit :
>> >> Cyrille,
>> >>
>> >> I’m not in favour of removing modules from CrossWire simply because one of the affiliated repositories has a similar module.
>> > Why not?
>> >>
>> >> Nor should it ever be expected that a module published by eBible.org would include an Obsoletes key with one of CrossWire’s modules as the parameter.
>> >
>> > Idem why not?
>> >>
>> >>
>> >>
>> >> Regards,
>> >>
>> >> David
>> >>
>> >> Sent from ProtonMail Mobile
>> >>
>> >>
>> >> On Fri, Mar 13, 2020 at 08:11, Cyrille <lafricain79 at gmail.com <mailto:lafricain79 at gmail.com>> wrote:
>> >>> Dear all,
>> >>> Actually my worry was about a question between the module team. We have
>> >>> duplicated modules, in Crosswire and in ebible.org. Often the ebible.org
>> >>> are updated and not in Crosswire. And we are very slow to update the new
>> >>> module in Crosswire. Then I proposed to remove in the Crosswire repo,
>> >>> all the old modules with issue reported on the bug tracker. But the
>> >>> question was: What to do if the users don't know how to change the repo,
>> >>> as it happened in the other post on this list, some of us didn't know
>> >>> how to change for IBT in Xiphos.
>> >>> I Bibletime, Andbible and Bishop, the repositories are updated all
>> >>> together, but not in Xiphos. I opened an issue about this on the xiphos git.
>> >>> For this reason I proposed this for Swordpocket, even if it seems to be
>> >>> more or less easier than for Xiphos.
>> >>>
>> >>> Br Cyrille
>> >>>
>> >>> Le 13/03/2020 à 04:14, Nic Carter a écrit :
>> >>> > On the downloads screen, tap on the folder icon in the top right corner, then refresh the source list.
>> >>> > That will show all servers in the Master Server List.
>> >>> >
>> >>> > Sent from my phone, hence this email may be short...
>> >>> >
>> >>> >> On 13/03/2020, at 09:24, Cyrille <lafricain79 at gmail.com> wrote:
>> >>> >>
>> >>> >> Hi Michael,
>> >>> >> Maybe add the updating of all the repositories at once, as with Andbible
>> >>> >> and Bishop. This will help users who don't know they are other
>> >>> >> repository as ebible.org...
>> >>> >> My 2 cents :)
>> >>> >>
>> >>> >> Br Cyrille
>> >>> >>
>> >>> >>> Le 12/03/2020 à 20:30, Michael Johnson a écrit :
>> >>> >>> Hello, my brothers and sisters in Christ.
>> >>> >>>
>> >>> >>> I just thought I should post a status on PocketSword work. I have started on updating it, but haven't yet gotten to a stable point for testing using Test Flight. Right now, it is, unfortunately, on hold, as I have another task in the foreground. I finished the main editing of the World English Bible, with the exception of still correcting the occasional rare typo. (I found one this morning in Ezekiel.) My foreground task at the moment is integrating SILE into Haiola for better PDF generation,
>> especially
>> >>> >>> with mixed complex scripts. After that is done, I hope to focus on PocketSword. In its new incarnation, it will generate its own indexes, and won't need special server support for that. I'll also fix the key problem for when a module goes from locked to unlocked, which of course, will happen as copyrights expire and/or special permission is granted.
>> >>> >>>
>> >>> >>> Thank you for your patience.
>> >>> >>>
>> >>> >>
>> >>> >> _______________________________________________
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>>
>> Aloha,
>> */Michael Johnson/**
>> 26 HIWALANI LOOP • MAKAWAO HI 96768-8747*• USA
>> mljohnson.org <http://mljohnson.org> • Phone: +1 808-333-6921 • Skype: kahunapule
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Aloha,
*/Michael Johnson/**
26 HIWALANI LOOP • MAKAWAO HI 96768-8747*• USA
mljohnson.org <http://mljohnson.org> • Phone: +1 808-333-6921 • Skype: kahunapule