Tech Forum

Odn wrote:this software is already in development though I can't say much more than that. It should be released later this year with functionality I think everyone will be happy with.

Oak

Is it the church that is developing this software or is it a private company that is developing it? Thanks for the info.

Private company.

Odn wrote:Just found this thread and this software is already in development though I can't say much more than that. It should be released later this year with functionality I think everyone will be happy with. I'm not specifically trying to dissuade you from this project, but I think everything you're looking for will be there so you may want to choose to invest your time in another worthy project and wait for this to come out.

Oak

Is it an open source project? Is it web based?

If no to either of these, I think I'll stick with the project we have been planning.

Great, that there will be a release of this software, though I am right in assuming it will be freeware or opensource? Otherwise like mkmurray said, for us college students, who's pocketbooks barely cover the bases, we'll still try the opensource or freeware method.

There will be an open API or SDK to allow 3rd party add-ins and it will have web based features. As for a 100% free version, that's undecided at the moment but is being considered. As a former college student, I understand your feelings and situation, but if something is cool enough and you're a poor college student, you'll still find a way to spend a few bucks on it.

One solution does not fit all. Feel free as a community to develop something.

Tom

Thank you all for you interest. It is great to see that other people and companies see the need for something more to aid them in recording their scriptural insights.

I don't have the programming experience to head this project. I would enjoy trying to support the project, however. If someone wants to head up this project, I would recommend hosting it at sourceforge.org.

I hope that what we create will be able to benefit a lot of other people too.

I am wondering if anything has been done as far as developing an open source solution to this. I would be interested in starting a project. My tools of choice would be eclipse and java - java for the ability to be cross platform and eclipse because that is what I am used to and I don't have a lot of experience programing. I have thought of a simple design, but would be very interested in some help to develop a program to accomplish at least some of these goals. I also wouldn't mind trying to learn C#, so long as it can be complied by mono - I run Linux as my desktop of choice so making something incompatible is not something I am interested in, but I would also like it to be compatible with windows and mac, since I know others have differing opinions about what they feel makes a good computer.

My idea would take the online scriptures (and possibly anything on the church's gospel library site) and format it such that it would be easy to read, study, and record thoughts with. It would strip all of the original html. It would allow for highlighting, underlining, and bookmarks, with each of these being able to be organized in a few different ways. I haven't thought of a particular way of having persistent online storage of customizations, or of sharing these with others, but I would want to have the design such that this would be a possible solution. As far as persistent storage of the customizations, I don't know if a database backend or xml files would be better or easier. It would also be possible to create your own footnotes to reference other scriptures easily.

That is an overview of my thoughts. I know it isn't an online solution, but I would like it to be something like f-spot - a stand alone program that works well by itself, but also integrates with online resources. I haven't really written any code for it yet, and wouldn't have time to start anything until the BYU semester ends, but I am interested in helping to make this sort of program.

A Java-based open source scripture study application would be great. I'd love to help with it if I am able. Java would be the best platform, because it's inherently cross-platform. (I'd be a bit leery of future problems with that platform invented by the big company in Redmond, WA.)

My personal interest would be not so much of a journal for recording my own thoughts but something that would allow easy jumping through footnotes; inserting JST, alternative translations, and etc. inline with color coding; and comparing the four/five gospels, accounts of the creation, etc. If the Church's CD-ROM-based product would work with Wine, that might suffice. However, the closed-source "products" are often lame in an area I think is important and/or bloated in areas I don't think is important. With open source, at least one of those is solvable with some effort.

One thing the Church could do to help with such a project would be to make available an API or other mechanism to allow downloading of the full scriptural text, footnotes, and such.

For XML files vs. a database, with the right abstraction layer, that decision wouldn't even have to be made. Define an interface that would allow either to be used. It may turn out that XML files would suffice initially, but that a database would become more efficient later on.

I personally would like to see this solution be mostly online, as oppossed to mostly desktop. I would like to be able to access all of my notes, markings, cross-references, etc., from any computer with internet access. Perhaps a light-weight client could be written afterward to have a local copy of all your stuff that you could take with you when you don't have internet access, and then sync back up later when you do.