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iOS, first impressions, affirmations, and wish list


Abram K-J

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I just received an iPad mini for Father's Day, and couldn't be more excited about it. It is truly a work of art--and extremely helpful!

And I really like the Accordance app. With how far ahead Logos is with syncing across platforms seamlessly, I really wondered if that might have a slightly better iOS app, but Accordance takes that title, easily. (E.g., getting at Instant Details is easy in Accordance, so I can quickly look up words in a single step as I read. Unless I'm not using Logos right, it takes an extra step or two.)

A few things I think are specifically worthy of praise:

The MT-LXX Parallel. So great to have a portable (i.e., pocket-sized) version of this, especially since it doesn't exist (as such) in print!

Syncing with a laptop/desktop. Some users walked me through this, and it was easy--no Internet even required! I had to do a bit of research to figure it out (and the forum helped here), but once I did, very easy setup.

Highlights. I haven't gotten to Notes on the iOS yet, but I really appreciated how I could highlight a bunch of stuff on my iPad and then just open that highlights file on my MacBook, for easy copy and paste into Word (or wherever).

Dual texts. I know users have asked on the forums for more of a workspace-enabled setup (i.e., more than two texts/modules at once), and I know Accordance has said no to date… that's fine with me, I guess. What I really like here, though, is that Accordance remembers when you select Text A that you had Tool B open with it in tandem at one time, so it opens both at once when you just select the one. A time saver!

And now, a few things I want to bring up for possible consideration for the future--I always skipped the iOS posts on the forums until now, so apologies if these have been covered already. This is a sort of running wish list I have. But prefaced with the affirmation of "this looks great so far":

A box instead of a colon (typos):
In the Dictionary of Paul and His Letters article "Galatians, Letter to the," at 4.2 (Rebuke), Gal 1:7-9 has a rectangular box in place of a colon. This is repeated throughout at least this module, though not every time there is a colon. This is true in iOS but not in my Mac laptop version of the module.
The behavior is true also in the Tyndale Commentary at Galatians 3:27, possibly others. Which leads me to...

 

Report correction: If there's an easy way to do this from iOS, I'm not aware how. It's really easy on a laptop, and I appreciate that.

Highlighting--more like iBooks?
I know Accordance aims to be as "intuitive" (there's a loaded word!) as possible. With respect to intuition on the iPad, I'd think the iBooks way of highlighting (dragging one's finger over the text to be highlighted) would be the way to go, eventually. Having to choose now whether to highlight word, sentence, or paragraph provides an extra step (then have to select what kind of highlighting--iBooks has a default here, once you pick it), and also leaves other options unavailable (e.g., highlighting 3 sentences only in a 7-sentence paragraph).

Highlighting--sentence-level accuracy
It seems periods throw off the command. For example, this sentence from WBC-NT in Galatians 3:28:

 

Perhaps their inclusion was a conscious attempt to counter the three bĕrākôt (“blessings,” “benedictions”) that appear at the beginning of the Jewish cycle of morning prayers: “Blessed be He [God] that He did not make me a Gentile; blessed be He that He did not make me a boor [ie an ignorant peasant or a slave]; blessed be He that He did not make me a woman” (cf eg The Authorised Daily Prayer Book of the United Hebrew Congregations of the British Commonwealth of Nations, tr S. Singer, 2nd rev. ed [London: Eyre & Spottiswoode, 1962] 6–7).


stops the highlight after "tr S." and before "Singer," mid-sentence.

Similarly, Gal. 3:27 in the same module above highlights a sentence like this, with an extra character at the beginning:

 

” The verb ἐβαπτίσθητε (“you have been baptized”) undoubtedly refers to Christian baptism, ie immersion in water, for this is the uniform meaning of the term in Paul (cf Rom 6:3; 1 Cor 1:13–17; 12:13; 15:29), with the single exception being his reference to the Israelites as “baptized into Moses [εἰς τὸν Μωϋσῆν ἐβαπτίσθησαν] in the cloud and in the sea” (1 Cor 10:2), though even there the term is used of something that is similar in character and significance to Christian baptism.


Highlighting blank indentation
I think this was already brought up on the forums, but if a sentence is indented as at the beginning of a paragraph, the iOS version of Accordance highlights the blank spaces (not so on the one place I tried on MacBook). Not a huge deal, but not a totally clean look, either.

Page number markers
I really hope a future iOS version will have a way for these not to be the bright green that they are. :)

Instant Details
One of the things that sets Accordance apart from all others--it seems a small thing but I greatly appreciate it--is to set up the parsing order of my choice for Instant Details. I don't think this is possible in iOS (right?), but it would be a nice add-on!

Opening Screen re-sizes
This is minor, but strange--the opening screen re-sizes when it first pops up… as if it started out to small, not quite filling the iPad screen, realized it, then filled the screen to compensate. Do any other iPad apps do this? Has anyone else noticed?

Maps/Atlas
I know, I know. This would totally eat up all remaining memory on my 32GB device. But, wow… wouldn't it be great to play with the Accordance maps on an iPad? I just got (computer version) the Atlas/Maps/Timeline (graphics bundle) I'd seen so many people extol… and it does not disappoint!

 

Overall, a great app, and I'm thrilled to have it now. In the end, it's why we spent the extra for an iPad mini over a Kindle Fire.

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When we support arbitrary text selection, i.e. the ability to select any text you want with the standard system selection drag, several of these items will be possible or corrected.

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I love the iOS and use it a lot. I'm not sure how hard this would be for the iOS team to implement, but ...

 

I think it would be amazing if we could sync and search the multiple user tools in our user groups, i.e., multiple user tools (& multiple standard tools for that matter) at one time from our iOS Acc app. For example, all of Philo and Josephus and the LXX at one time from the iOS app.

 

The searching capability on the iOS would be nirvanic! So long as it doesn't brick our idevices...hehe.

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  • 4 weeks later...

Big Wish Item. TAGS. I know next to nothing about Greek or Hebrew and I've heard about tags in that context. This is not about that. Its what Apple is finally doing with Maverick; allowing me to add MY tags (aka labels; topics) to my files.

 

I'd like to be able to add tags to a Bible vs. In fact I'd like to add a tag to an article in a reference book. If YouVersion can do this so simply, its got to be possible.

 

. . .

 

Ditto to underlining. Let's make it like Apple iBooks or Kindle on my iPad / iPhone. I don't always want to underline / highlight a whole verse. Underlining one word at a time is not fun. At 61, I'll forget why I'm doing that after the fourth word!

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