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I forgot to get the web url for this article. This is not the complete article it went on to talk about other software etc.. Bible study programs that leave some change in your pocket. by Marshall N. Surratt Having just visited a number of software companies, I am again stunned by the power and "beauty" of commercial Bible study software. Most of these super-programs can not only search faster than a speeding bullet and execute complex commands in a single bound, they do it with an interface that is as well designed as Superman's outfit. Maybe better. However, until these companies offered starter kits,, I could not afford these programs. I know a few of our readers are in the same situation. So, besides the starter kits, what are the options? Freeware and shareware. In fact, one company's president told me, "If people tell me they can't afford my product, I encourage them to at least get started by trying out Bible study shareware." No, shareware can never compete with commercial software (contrary to what some magazines suggest). The old saying holds true: you get what you pay for. But free- and shareware can be an economical way to get introduced to this super Bible study world. To help readers understand their options, we asked Marshall Surratt, a frequent contributor to Computing Today, to evaluate some freeware and shareware Bible study programs now available. --Mark Galli, editor The leader in freeware The freeware program, Online Bible, has assumed a prominent role among computer Bible study programs. The program's author, Larry Pierce, believes the Bible should be freely shared, so he allows anyone to freely copy and distribute everything in his program except for a few copyrighted commentaries and translations (such as the NIV and NASB). Ten years ago, Pierce began by compiling a lexicon for the computer from several nineteenth-century sources, and adding James Strong's numbers to the mix. A century ago, Strong had assigned a number to every word in the Bible. He also prepared Hebrew and Greek lexicons to show the definitions and uses of each word in the Bible. When Pierce embedded Strong's numbers into a computer-coded KJV text, he revolutionized how tens of thousands of people study the Bible. Now anyone can click on a number beside a word in the KJV and see the original Hebrew or Greek (in the original language or spelled phonetically) and a definition for that word. Since then Online Bible has added an amazing number of resources. The latest Windows CD-ROM comes with more than a dozen English translations, more than 30 foreign translations, plus Hebrew and Greek translations, a half-dozen commentaries, and more than 5,000 "topics" (miscellaneous text files and images). "You can let time winnow out the chaff for you," says Pierce, referring to the classic commentaries in his program. As with other freeware and shareware programs, most commentaries are older: Matthew Henry's Commentary, written between 1708 and 1710; John Gill's nine-volume expository on the Bible, published in 1809; and B. W. Johnson's 1889 People's New Testament Commentary. Also typical of freeware and shareware, the user interface in Online Bible is spartan. You won't find icons on the toolbar, only labels, such as "View Passage." Nor is using the program as intuitive as in some commercial Bible study programs. For example, editing notes in Online Bible 7.0 is still a two-step process. First you pull up the notes screen. Then you choose "Edit notes" to activate a note editor. There is also no provision for searching your notes or the "topics." (That will be part of a future release, says Pierce.) The low budget for development shows in the maps too. Online Bible includes 25 maps, but they can't be modified. You can't, for instance, "zoom in" on them or label where certain events took place (as some commercial programs allow). The new version now allows for the extensive use of the right mouse button. You can set up a list of default translations and study aids (i.e., commentaries and dictionaries). Online Bible can do wildcard searches (e.g., enter "lov*" to find instances of love, loved, loving, lover, etc.), proximity searches (to find where two words are used within so many words of each other), and boolean (and, or, not) searches. You can also search for an "ambiguous phrase." Entering "Jesus . . . Christ," for instance, searches for phrases that begin with "Jesus" and end with "Christ." The latest Windows version, Online Bible 7.0, comes in both a 16-bit version, for Windows 3.1 and OS/2, and a 32-bit version, for Windows 95. The Online Bible for Macintosh is nearly identical. A DOS version is also still available. The program and resources can be downloaded and copied freely, but doing so will take hours. That alone might make one of the available CD-ROMs ($30-$79 from Online Bible USA) sound attractive. For more information call 800/243-7124, or check the still-developing Web site: www.biblecd.com. |
