Gospel Library 4.0 for Android

Gospel Library 4.0 for Android is now live on the Google Play store.

Here are some of the changes:
* All content is now annotatable, including lists, chapter headings, hymns, etc.
* Added in-app training through video "Tips" and “What’s New.”
* Choose between male and female voice audio recordings for English scriptures.
* Redesigned the audio playback experience.
* Redesigned related content sidebar for easier viewing of footnotes.
* Redesigned bookmarks, screens, and history management.
* Redesigned “Notes” experience (Notebooks, Tags, Recent).
* Added rich text formatting to notes (bold, italics, lists).
* Redesigned experience for creating user-created linking, including making links bi-directional.
* Four color themes in Settings.
* Provided access to calling-specific resources, like Handbook 1.
* On Android 5+ you can show screens as separate windows in the Android overview.
* On Android 7+ you can run Gospel Library side-by-side (split screen) with another app or with another Gospel Library screen.

A lot of things were moved around with this release. Feel free to ask any questions!

Off hand, do you know how to force the Play Store app to refresh? Mine seems to be pulling cached info.

russellhltn wrote:Off hand, do you know how to force the Play Store app to refresh? Mine seems to be pulling cached info.

You could try force closing Google Play (swipe it out of the Android overview screen), then reopening. It's possible that the app could take some time to propagate to various servers.

And will it just show up automatically on my device, if I do not do anything?

lajackson wrote:And will it just show up automatically on my device, if I do not do anything?

If you've got auto-update turned on, it will (eventually) update itself automatically.

sbradshaw wrote:You could try force closing Google Play (swipe it out of the Android overview screen), then reopening. It's possible that the app could take some time to propagate to various servers.

Tried that - didn't work.

I figured out how to force the update. Open the Play Store to "All" apps and then search for Gospel Library. At that point, you'll be given the option to update (instead of install). I had been searching under "My apps".

How do I get Handbook 1 to show up? I updated GL. I look at settings and see my account listed. It's done a sync. But I don't see Handbook 1 where I'd expect to see it (next to Handbook 2 under Leadership). I do have access to Handbook 1 via the Help Center on lds.org using the same LDS Account.

russellhltn wrote:How do I get Handbook 1 to show up? I updated GL. I look at settings and see my account listed. It's done a sync. But I don't see Handbook 1 where I'd expect to see it (next to Handbook 2 under Leadership). I do have access to Handbook 1 via the Help Center on lds.org using the same LDS Account.

Yes, you are looking in the right place. Are you connected to the internet? Maybe it hasn't had a chance to download it since you signed in (the role-based content download is kicked off separately from the annotations sync). How about closing and reopening the app?

Can anyone else with a bishopric/presidency role confirm whether they're able to see Handbook 1? I'm able to see it as a stake assistant clerk, but my account isn't completely in the "real world" because of my Gospel Library QA responsibilities.

sbradshaw wrote:Are you connected to the internet?

This is on my phone. I have the LTE indicator. Under settings, "Limit Mobile Network Use" is gray (off). I'm able to sync.

It's possible that the upgrade didn't go smoothly. The icon disappeared off my home page, but didn't not reappear. I had to manually add it.

russellhltn wrote:It's possible that the upgrade didn't go smoothly. The icon disappeared off my home page, but didn't not reappear. I had to manually add it.

Mine updated automatically within the last hour. But my icon disappeared as well. Maybe something to do with the major version update.

I just watched it download files. One of the files was 'Gospel Library Catalog - local-leader'. Now I show Handbook 1 under the Leadership and it just downloaded without a problem.

I don't see a menu option to re-download the catalog but swiping downward on the catalog screen shows a refresh indicator so you might try that. Or maybe you could sign out and sign back in.

Or maybe the access rights to match lds.org for some reason. I'm a Ward Assistant Clerk - Finance and Ward Assistant Clerk.

eblood66 wrote:I don't see a menu option to re-download the catalog but swiping downward on the catalog screen shows a refresh indicator so you might try that.

Tried that.

Is there a way to display the footnotes on the same screen as the main screen as in the previous edition? It was super useful to see the footnotes on the same screen instead on having them hidden on the side.

Also, the ability to move the bookmark by dragging it has gone away. Please tell me it will be brought back.

cbradford wrote:Is there a way to display the footnotes on the same screen as the main screen as in the previous edition? It was super useful to see the footnotes on the same screen instead on having them hidden on the side.

Yes, on a phone in landscape mode, or on a tablet in portrait or landscape mode, you can pin the sidebar open. The sidebar was moved to the side to allow displaying more dynamic content – some design compromising was required.

cbradford wrote:Also, the ability to move the bookmark by dragging it has gone away. Please tell me it will be brought back.

This will probably be brought back at some point; however, it's not on the near-term roadmap. It's not a feature that was used very often because most users weren't moving a bookmark within a chapter – instead, they tended to move them between chapters. That, combined with the complexity of the interaction (for programming) and the tight deadline, required the feature to not be ported over for now.

If you updated bookmarks using the bookmarks menu before, you will probably notice that updating a bookmark is done using the bookmark's contextual menu instead of long-holding like it used to be. This allowed long-holding for dragging and reordering the bookmarks (which wasn't possible before).

Another feature I forgot to mention in the first post that I'm interested to see people's thoughts on – the main developer put a lot of work into an intelligent search suggestions feature to quickly jump to a chapter or verse. Try hitting the search button and type, for example "n37", "tg faith", or "oct". In addition to chapters and verses, book titles and notebook titles also show up in the suggestions. This works in other languages as well. I think this is a killer feature for quick lookup!

russellhltn wrote:How do I get Handbook 1 to show up? I updated GL. I look at settings and see my account listed. It's done a sync. But I don't see Handbook 1 where I'd expect to see it (next to Handbook 2 under Leadership). I do have access to Handbook 1 via the Help Center on lds.org using the same LDS Account.

I updated my old phone running 4.4 and that went well. I waited for everything to download before diving in. Since that worked, I uninstalled/reinstalled my current phone (7.1.1). All is well. I have Handbook 1.

sbradshaw wrote:
This will probably be brought back at some point; however, it's not on the near-term roadmap. It's not a feature that was used very often because most users weren't moving a bookmark within a chapter – instead, they tended to move them between chapters. That, combined with the complexity of the interaction (for programming) and the tight deadline, required the feature to not be ported over for now.

I would say most people to whom I have questioned about this used the feature regularly. My young family reads together daily, but we only read a few versus at a time because of the age of my children. As far as I can tell, because this feature has been removed, it is now impossible to easily bookmark the end verses of a chapter. So now we will likely go back to a printed copy of the scriptures and use a sticky note to mark our progress. Absurd (I know, first world problems ). If there is another way to bookmark a verse, particularly at the end of a chapter, I would love to know about it.

sbradshaw wrote:Gospel Library 4.0 for Android is now live on the Google Play store.

Here are some of the changes:
* Redesigned related content sidebar for easier viewing of footnotes.
* Redesigned “Notes” experience (Notebooks, Tags, Recent).

Even with the new "Related Content" pinned, it does not scroll with content like the old footnote pane used to. For this reason alone, I will be side loading the previous version. If they never fix this, I won't upgrade to the new version until forced to. Maybe some people only look occasionally at footnotes, but I have them open all the time when reading and always watch for language notes, JST links (always read them), explanations, and similar content over there. Having to scroll both windows separately is asking too much, IMO.

I worry about the missing "subscribe" option - if I download everything am I automatically subscribed, or do I have to manually choose "download all" every now and then to ensure I'm getting the latest content?

Also, there's no longer a way to view all highlights - only the ones that are either tagged or in a notebook. If you had highlights that were neither tagged nor in a notebook, you cannot pull up a list of them in the app.

Finally, you can no longer choose the font type face (serif vs sans serif) to use - the app decides for you, ignoring all the research about on-screen fonts vs in-print fonts. I don't care about branding or styling, I care about my eyesight.

Beyond that, it's beautiful, the other new features are great. But the footnotes not auto-scrolling is a deal-breaker for me.

I've sent feedback about the footnote issue and the inability to view all highlights. I know it's futile to send feedback about the font issue, branding is more important to them - they've said that already in regards to the website.

Liz

russellhltn wrote:The icon disappeared off my home page, but didn't not reappear. I had to manually add it.

For the Gospel Library app (but not others) this is standard. The home page icon always goes away. That has become one of the ways I know GL has updated. It happens for every update, large or small.

lmcguire wrote:Even with the new "Related Content" pinned, it does not scroll with content like the old footnote pane used to.

We were hoping to get this completed in time for the update, but we had to push it off if we were going to get the update out (and still have time to respond to major issues) before Christmas. This will be fully functioning in the next release (4.1). I think we were able to get it in for Android 6 and 7 devices, but auto scrolling for older devices is still in progress.

lmcguire wrote:I worry about the missing "subscribe" option - if I download everything am I automatically subscribed, or do I have to manually choose "download all" every now and then to ensure I'm getting the latest content?

This is on our list, though not on a clear roadmap yet.

lmcguire wrote:Also, there's no longer a way to view all highlights - only the ones that are either tagged or in a notebook. If you had highlights that were neither tagged nor in a notebook, you cannot pull up a list of them in the app.

You can see all your annotations, including plain highlights, under Notes > Recent (from the main library).

lmcguire wrote:Finally, you can no longer choose the font type face (serif vs sans serif) to use - the app decides for you, ignoring all the research about on-screen fonts vs in-print fonts. I don't care about branding or styling, I care about my eyesight.

There are several reasons for this, and branding is definitely one of them. With the new HTML5 content format, each department that produces a book or manual is able to have stylistic control, to keep the visual branding consistent between Gospel Library, LDS.org, and in print. See, for example, Preach My Gospel – serif, sans-serif, font colors, boxes with background colors and curved borders, etc. This type of rich content wasn't possible before, and as it is it would make for a poor experience if the fonts could be switched out programmatically without also redesigning the layout of the elements on the page. It's arguably a better experience on high-resolution phones, but of course in lower resolution (which still represents a lot of users) is where the serif vs. sans-serif debate comes into play.

Switching fonts is still on the list of items being considered, but it would require some creativity and a lot of custom CSS to make sure everything still displays well across the board. We have gotten a lot of feedback about it, so we'll see if they decide to make it a priority...

lajackson wrote:

russellhltn wrote:The icon disappeared off my home page, but didn't not reappear. I had to manually add it.

For the Gospel Library app (but not others) this is standard. The home page icon always goes away. That has become one of the ways I know GL has updated. It happens for every update, large or small.

I've heard reports of LDS Tools doing this as well. If anyone knows how to fix this, it'd be helpful.

sbradshaw wrote:

lajackson wrote:For the Gospel Library app (but not others) this is standard. The home page icon always goes away. That has become one of the ways I know GL has updated. It happens for every update, large or small.

I've heard reports of LDS Tools doing this as well. If anyone knows how to fix this, it'd be helpful.

True. In fact, it is only Gospel Library and LDS Tools that do it among my admittedly small set of apps.

I do not think there is anything you can do about it. I think the provider has to include the step(s) to replace the home page icon. I do not know what it takes to program it. Some of my updating apps never move the icon. Others stick it up in a corner somewhere and I have to find it and move it back where I wanted it on the home page. Then GL and LDS T just drop it.

I happened to be on the home page with the GL icon when the app finished updating and watched the icon go away. Oh yeah, I remembered. Have to go get that one again, which I did immediately.

Where are the color marking options, when I tag a scripture? They used to be included in the interface.

First feedback: so glad that the Church continues to invest in this app. I love it. However this new interface will take some time to get used to.

zoomiest wrote:However this new interface will take some time to get used to.

Yes, as always. My bug will be the updating of bookmarks, which I use extensively for reading. Before, if you opened something through the bookmark, there was an Update Bookmark function right at the top. Now, I have to scroll down through my bookmarks and find it again, click the three-dot menu, and select Update.

Not to mention that the bookmark menu moved from the bottom left to the top right, so it is a two-handed operation now.

sbradshaw wrote:

lmcguire wrote:Even with the new "Related Content" pinned, it does not scroll with content like the old footnote pane used to.

We were hoping to get this completed in time for the update, but we had to push it off if we were going to get the update out (and still have time to respond to major issues) before Christmas. This will be fully functioning in the next release (4.1). I think we were able to get it in for Android 6 and 7 devices, but auto scrolling for older devices is still in progress.

lmcguire wrote:I worry about the missing "subscribe" option - if I download everything am I automatically subscribed, or do I have to manually choose "download all" every now and then to ensure I'm getting the latest content?

This is on our list, though not on a clear roadmap yet.

lmcguire wrote:Also, there's no longer a way to view all highlights - only the ones that are either tagged or in a notebook. If you had highlights that were neither tagged nor in a notebook, you cannot pull up a list of them in the app.

You can see all your annotations, including plain highlights, under Notes > Recent (from the main library).

lmcguire wrote:Finally, you can no longer choose the font type face (serif vs sans serif) to use - the app decides for you, ignoring all the research about on-screen fonts vs in-print fonts. I don't care about branding or styling, I care about my eyesight.

There are several reasons for this, and branding is definitely one of them. With the new HTML5 content format, each department that produces a book or manual is able to have stylistic control, to keep the visual branding consistent between Gospel Library, LDS.org, and in print. See, for example, Preach My Gospel – serif, sans-serif, font colors, boxes with background colors and curved borders, etc. This type of rich content wasn't possible before, and as it is it would make for a poor experience if the fonts could be switched out programmatically without also redesigning the layout of the elements on the page. It's arguably a better experience on high-resolution phones, but of course in lower resolution (which still represents a lot of users) is where the serif vs. sans-serif debate comes into play.

Switching fonts is still on the list of items being considered, but it would require some creativity and a lot of custom CSS to make sure everything still displays well across the board. We have gotten a lot of feedback about it, so we'll see if they decide to make it a priority...

1) Good to know, but it my experience, that means the feature might be available next Christmas. What is is, and I understand the limitations they're working under, just stating facts, so I'll still be side-loading rather than waiting.

2) I could deal with manual "download all" (even for a year).

3) Interesting - cuz my untagged stuff is most certainly not "recent" - so maybe they should have rethunk that label.... (And holy cow, could they not give us a collapsed option to save scrolling time?! We used to have options to view collapsed / expanded. Holy cow. I click one to look at it, then go back to the list, and I'm back at the top. Ack. Ugh. There's no way to click on one of my tag / note things in the "Related Content" pane and have it emphasize the corresponding highlight in the text, so there's no way to tell which item in the "Related Content" pane goes with which highlight - the "Related Content" pane no longer shows the color of the highlight. I am _so_ going back. This whole "Related Content" thing stinks (sorry guys, but it's useless to me now). I also can't pin it in portrait - annoying, but tolerable if not for the rest.

I truly appreciate all the info you are providing, and I really am very grateful for the Gospel Library app, and I hope they are able to restore the old footnote functionality, but in the meantime, I'm going back to the tool that let me actually study.

In my experience, any app that does a major revision change (first number in the revision numbering) does this.

lmcguire wrote:

sbradshaw wrote:This will be fully functioning in the next release (4.1). I think we were able to get it in for Android 6 and 7 devices, but auto scrolling for older devices is still in progress.

Good to know, but it my experience, that means the feature might be available next Christmas.

Release history would definitely suggest that, but never fear – you can expect a patch release with minor changes and bug fixes sometime in January. I expect that auto scrolling on all devices will make it in by then.

zoomiest wrote:Where are the color marking options, when I tag a scripture?

When you select/highlight text, the annotation bar appears at the top of the screen. The "A" icon in the annotation bar has a dropdown to choose styles. The dropdown shows recent styles, or you can click the palette icon to see all styles.

hi there,

i just migrated to 4.0 and all my notes and stuff came over but my footnotes didnt. is there anyway to get them to sync from the old version to this one?

cheers

HarveyJM wrote:hi there,

i just migrated to 4.0 and all my notes and stuff came over but my footnotes didnt. is there anyway to get them to sync from the old version to this one?

cheers

Harvey,

It's called "Related Content" now, and you can open the pane by either tapping on a word that's got a footnote, or using the menu button and choosing "Related Content". To pin the pane open, and have it not covering the main content, you have to be in landscape mode, then the "Related Content" pane has it's own menu with a "pin" option.

If no words are showing footnotes, it could be that in the "Settings" you've got Hide Footnotes or Hide Annotations on.

FWIW,

Liz

The listen feature no longer lists text-to-speech as an option. Anyone figured out a way to use text-to-speech to listen to content, or has that feature been completely removed? If so, that's a real loss, I used it a lot when driving in areas without mobile data coverage or trying to limit mobile data consumption.

I just downloaded the Book of Mormon audio to my Android device because when my library was automatically updated all my audio that was in the android/data/org.lds.ldsa/files/1/media file is now gone. (So is the directory). We're does this version store the audio files when you download it. I can not find them. I saw the download occur but they don't show up in recent downloads or any place else I have looked.?

peter.robison wrote:The listen feature no longer lists text-to-speech as an option. Anyone figured out a way to use text-to-speech to listen to content, or has that feature been completely removed? If so, that's a real loss, I used it a lot when driving in areas without mobile data coverage or trying to limit mobile data consumption.

Yes, text-to-speech has not been implemented. The update was written from the ground up, so each feature has been recreated from scratch. I agree that it's a useful feature. Thank you for providing a good use case – I will forward it to the designers and we can hope it returns in a future update!

stullv wrote:I just downloaded the Book of Mormon audio to my Android device because when my library was automatically updated all my audio that was in the android/data/org.lds.ldsa/files/1/media file is now gone. (So is the directory). We're does this version store the audio files when you download it. I can not find them. I saw the download occur but they don't show up in recent downloads or any place else I have looked.?

You can see your downloaded audio under Settings > Downloaded Media. Note that there is a bug we discovered that prevents playing some downloaded audio files directly from the Downloaded Media screen (any audio with multiple voices – like the English scriptures – will cause the app to restart if you try to play it from Downloaded Media). This is a high-priority bug that will be fixed with the next patch release. In the meantime, you should be able to still play your downloaded scripture audio from the chapter itself, when you're offline.

I see that you can now speed up the audio but the recordings are so slow to begin with that moving up to 2 on this system is not sufficient. I use a third party audio player. I would like to try it on the new files, however your answer above only got me to the list of files and I still couldn't find where those files reside on my device. (You were right, though, every time I tried to play them from that list, the system crashed.). Can you give me the path to the location where the files are stored.

stullv wrote:I see that you can now speed up the audio but the recordings are so slow to begin with that moving up to 2 on this system is not sufficient.

Note that the changes won't take effect until you pause and press play again on the audio. This is something that "feels like a bug" that I'm hoping will get fixed with the next release.

stullv wrote:I would like to try it on the new files, however your answer above only got me to the list of files and I still couldn't find where those files reside on my device. ... Can you give me the path to the location where the files are stored.

Media is stored at these locations:
/data/data/org.lds.ldssa/files/content/content-audio
/data/data/org.lds.ldssa/files/content/content-video

sbradshaw wrote: Release history would definitely suggest that, but never fear – you can expect a patch release with minor changes and bug fixes sometime in January. I expect that auto scrolling on all devices will make it in by then.

Auto scrolling doesn't do a any good if the tray covers the text. I know on my tablet I can rotate my screen to see the text and the tray but it doesn't work on my phone. While there are some nice things about this release, I've hated it ever since I saw the first alpha version. The tray, bookmarks changes and the highlight styles really ruin it for me.

jasonhyer wrote:Auto scrolling doesn't do a any good if the tray covers the text. I know on my tablet I can rotate my screen to see the text and the tray but it doesn't work on my phone. While there are some nice things about this release, I've hated it ever since I saw the first alpha version. The tray, bookmarks changes and the highlight styles really ruin it for me.

If you turn your phone to landscape mode, you have the option of pinning the sidebar open.

sbradshaw wrote: If you turn your phone to landscape mode, you have the option of pinning the sidebar open.

That's a workaround though. Before I could hold my phone in a normal position, read text and footnotes, and my footnotes scrolled. I can't even look at a footnote that is highlighted without having to choose which I want to look at in another dialogue box. I get that you want Android and iOS to look and feel alike but the redesign pretty much broke the last six years of work on the app.

It's less user friendly and intuitive to use, it offers less functionality, and is a resource hog. I can't even open it on my phone without having to wait for it to try and load updates and after it never opens I have to close it and open it again.

I don't know what drove the timeliness for release but it was a poor decision from a user view.

I've taken some time to use the new app. Although I do appreciate some of the new features which look like they have a lot of potential, the basic usability for me is a step backwards. The biggest struggles for me are the quickness and ease of the basic functions (e.g. multiple screens, highlighting, bookmarks and footnotes). The menu-driven interface adds extra steps to this process making these basic functions much quicker (trying to use all colors to do highlights for example).

The biggest issue for me is the pale highlighting colors which are difficult to see vs. the bold colors in the previous version. It was easy to distinguish between orange and yellow before, but now it is hard to tell which color is which unless they are next to each other. For someone who has thousands of highlights and underlines color-coded by topic and application this is a huge deal for me. I used to be able to open a page and go right to the topic I needed, but its more challenging now.

BTW... Is the old version still available anywhere? I'd probably be better served with the old app right now at least on my android tablet.

Please! Let me have the old version. I can't see my footnotes, links, or tags on the same screen. I can't do a quick search so I can link things easily. The menu is not nearly as intuitive as the 3.0.3 version.

Is it possible to post a link to download the old GL apk? I know a few folks have asked me about some of the missing features mentioned in this thread.

As another idea, is it possible to have a beta GL app for 4.0? That way those that use GL 3.x features that are missing in 4 can still have 3.x.

Personally, I love 4. Bluetooth audio controls finally work! Big deal for me. I can listen to the scriptures while I run and still pause with the push of a button in my headset.

Keep up the good work. Have a great Christmas break!

Downloaded the app this morning as recommended a couple of weeks ago by tech support. Wish I hadn't done it yet. I need the 2017 Primary Sharing Time resources, which I had in the old app. Well, it isn't available in the new app. Primary Presidencies are going to be frustrated all through the church, we need to plan!

winonadavies wrote:I can't see my footnotes, links, or tags on the same screen.

There are two ways to see the full list of related content: 1) in the overflow (three dots) menu of a chapter, choose Related Content, or 2) after opening a footnote in the sidebar, tap the list icon at the top of the sidebar to see all. On a tablet, or on your phone in landscape mode, you can pin the sidebar open so you can see the main content and all of the related content at the same time.

winonadavies wrote:I can't do a quick search so I can link things easily.

Do you usually link by searching for a word or phrase, or do you know what specific chapter/verse you want to link to? If you know the chapter/verse, as you start typing in the Link screen, suggestions will appear below the search box. You can tap those suggestions to link quickly. For example, if you type something as simple as "n37" it will suggest 1 Nephi 3:7, etc.

I'm missing the ability to open the related content screen and scroll the book and the footnotes etc side by side. When we study the scriptures together, it is nice to be able to scroll through the chapter and have our thoughts and comments scroll along with the text. Is this view still available?

dsesplin wrote:I'm missing the ability to open the related content screen and scroll the book and the footnotes etc side by side. When we study the scriptures together, it is nice to be able to scroll through the chapter and have our thoughts and comments scroll along with the text. Is this view still available?

Yes, if you rotate your phone to landscape mode, or if you're on a tablet, you can pin the sidebar with related content open.

sylviachristensen wrote:I need the 2017 Primary Sharing Time resources, which I had in the old app. Well, it isn't available in the new app. Primary Presidencies are going to be frustrated all through the church, we need to plan!

It's hidden. I mean, why would you put it where you would expect to find it?

Under the Teachings group select Lessons.
Under the Organization group select Primary.
It is at the very top under Sharing Time.

At first my droid said it was not available and was downloading. Then it said the download failed. Then the document opened.

winonadavies wrote:Please! Let me have the old version. I can't see my footnotes, links, or tags on the same screen. I can't do a quick search so I can link things easily. The menu is not nearly as intuitive as the 3.0.3 version.

You can get the old version here, and side-load it: https://tech.lds.org/dl/android/org.lds ... 60913-1723

dsesplin wrote:I'm missing the ability to open the related content screen and scroll the book and the footnotes etc side by side. When we study the scriptures together, it is nice to be able to scroll through the chapter and have our thoughts and comments scroll along with the text. Is this view still available?

NOTE: While you can pin the "Related Content" pane in landscape mode, it does not scroll along with the text - you have to scroll it separately.

Liz

lmcguire wrote: NOTE: While you can pin the "Related Content" pane in landscape mode, it does not scroll along with the text - you have to scroll it separately.
Liz

on my phone when I stop scrolling the related content will update

I also used text to speech on Android for listening to audio of manuals while driving or walking/riding a bike. I agree that this was a very important part of gospel library to me.

Awesome app!
I'm still exploring the new capabilities and interface. Two questions:
Can I lock the orientation to portrait mode?
I use Google keyboard (Gboard) on my android. While in the app, I seem to be unable to enter text via swipe. Anyone else seeing this?

Thanks!

I am trying to use the app in church today but can't. None of the content is downloaded and when trying the wireless at church is so slow that I can't get any content downloaded in time to use it for my classes. Because I use my phone and tablet I don't use one device or the other all the time so while I think I may have downloaded content before I get to church, unless I remember to check, I may not always have started the app before church on one of the devices.

Back to my paper scriptures so I can follow along in class.

I can get used to everything else, but the new related content sidebar is a pain. I have long and detailed footnotes throughout the entire Book of Mormon. I used to press 1 button and be able to read it all comfortably, with it following along as I worked my way through the chapter. Now I have to scroll in from the side of the screen, scroll through all my footnotes to find the right one and read about 4-5 words per line and then close it again before I can move on. The alternative being to rotate my device landscape and pin it every time. That still doesn't solve the 4-5 words per line problem because I can't resize it like the old one and it's a lot more uncomfortable to read that way.

Functionally-speaking, I feel like this is a massive step back. I understand a lot of work went into this and I still love the app and appreciate all the work that goes into it, but at the moment using the footnotes I've spent many hours on is such a pain that I don't even want to bother. Please add an option to use the older system.

sbradshaw wrote:Another feature I forgot to mention in the first post that I'm interested to see people's thoughts on – the main developer put a lot of work into an intelligent search suggestions feature to quickly jump to a chapter or verse. Try hitting the search button and type, for example "n37", "tg faith", or "oct". In addition to chapters and verses, book titles and notebook titles also show up in the suggestions. This works in other languages as well. I think this is a killer feature for quick lookup!

Love this feature!!! Works great for jumping around the scriptures. One letter and a number and you are there.

bpurser wrote:

sbradshaw wrote:Another feature I forgot to mention in the first post that I'm interested to see people's thoughts on – the main developer put a lot of work into an intelligent search suggestions feature to quickly jump to a chapter or verse. Try hitting the search button and type, for example "n37", "tg faith", or "oct". In addition to chapters and verses, book titles and notebook titles also show up in the suggestions. This works in other languages as well. I think this is a killer feature for quick lookup!

Love this feature!!! Works great for jumping around the scriptures. One letter and a number and you are there.

Maybe bringing up the search feature and typing "tg faith" and selecting a result is more efficient than drilling down Library>Scriptures>Topical Guide and scrolling to Faith. But maybe not for all content. It is nice, then, to have the choice to do one or the other. Unfortunately, that choice doesn't exist when creating a link.
D.G.

Wow, there is alot that has been changed. I don't like to sound like a complainer - but - now on my phone instead of being able to view content with a section below showing related content, the related content now expands over 80% of the screen from right to left so that I can no longer view content and related content. Very disappointed to see it become less useful.

ebyers wrote:Wow, there is alot that has been changed. I don't like to sound like a complainer - but - now on my phone instead of being able to view content with a section below showing related content, the related content now expands over 80% of the screen from right to left so that I can no longer view content and related content. Very disappointed to see it become less useful.

If you rotate your phone to landscape mode (or on a tablet in portrait or landscape) you can pin the sidebar open so you can see the main content and the related content at the same time.

sbradshaw wrote:If you rotate your phone to landscape mode (or on a tablet in portrait or landscape) you can pin the sidebar open so you can see the main content and the related content at the same time.

That's somewhat helpful -- thanks for the suggestion. However, the related content doesn't change as you scroll through the main content, like the previous version did. So you have to notice another footnote or annotation and tap on it to see the related content for the portion that just scrolled onto the screen. That's a huge step backwards from the previous version.

It would sure be nice if the pinned related content would change as you move through the content. I guess it could occasionally be useful to pin a particular piece of related content, so that it remains visible as I move around to various pieces of main content where I might want to still refer to that pinned note. But I found the previous version's related content window's dynamic updating at least 10 times as useful.

bruderbell wrote:I use Google keyboard (Gboard) on my android. While in the app, I seem to be unable to enter text via swipe. Anyone else seeing this?

I tested with Gboard on a Pixel with Android 7 and the Samsung Swype keyboard on a Galaxy S5 with Android 5. Both allowed me to enter text by swiping. I tested by creating a new note / editing a note. Is that where it wasn't working for you – in the note editor – or is it somewhere else in the app?

Trying to figure out how to download all the audio for a session of general conference rather than one talk at a time...

amandamallett wrote:Trying to figure out how to download all the audio for a session of general conference rather than one talk at a time...

Go to a talk, then choose "Download Media" from the overflow (three dots) menu. You will see a dialog box with a few options. Tap "All audio."

Hi,
I have a Samsung S5 phone and since upgrading I've found an issue that I can't seem to solve. I love to listen to the audios of the conference talks and scriptures. But when I bookmark in the middle of a chapter (Let's say 3 Nephi 3:17), it bookmarks the text, but when I go back to listen, the audio always starts over. In the previous version, the audio was bookmarked too. Any way to bookmark that? The only workaround I've found is to just fastforward till I get to where I was, but that's a pain - especially if I don't remember where I was. And for long chapters like Jesus the Christ. Thanks for any help on this!

dmchr3 wrote:I love to listen to the audios of the conference talks and scriptures. But when I bookmark in the middle of a chapter (Let's say 3 Nephi 3:17), it bookmarks the text, but when I go back to listen, the audio always starts over. In the previous version, the audio was bookmarked too.

Not resuming audio where you left off is a known bug – it's on the developers' list and will likely make it into an update in the next couple of months. Thanks for the feedback!

aebrown wrote:It would sure be nice if the pinned related content would change as you move through the content.

The full related content is supposed to scroll with the main content, but currently the feature is flaky and only works on certain devices. This is a known bug and should be fixed sometime in the next few months.

I just solved all of my Gospel Library problems. No more tray that obscures the text, no having to rotate my device to not have a tray obscuring my text, I can see all my footnotes and highlights in one place. It is a little harder to jump to references but this solution is awesome.

I just pulled out my paper scriptures and my user experience just went through the roof. Thank goodness something doesn't change.

All of the annotations that I had saved in notebooks in the older version of Gospel Library have all turned into unassigned types in the new 4.0 version, however the notebooks themselves (empty of content) have transferred over. Now I have thousands of unassigned annotations, which I can only see by going to lds.org in a browser, that I will be forced to reassign to these notebooks. Is there an easier way/something that can be done? I've logged in/out several times as well as uninstall/reinstall the app to resolve this issue, but it persists.

LeeJS wrote:All of the annotations that I had saved in notebooks in the older version of Gospel Library have all turned into unassigned types in the new 4.0 version, however the notebooks themselves (empty of content) have transferred over. Now I have thousands of unassigned annotations, which I can only see by going to lds.org in a browser, that I will be forced to reassign to these notebooks. Is there an easier way/something that can be done? I've logged in/out several times as well as uninstall/reinstall the app to resolve this issue, but it persists.

Have you updated to Gospel Library 4.0.1? This is one of the issues that was fixed in 4.0.1.

EDIT: It looks like the cause of the problem was fixed in 4.0.1, but updating might not fix the problem by itself for some users who've already hit the bug. Could you send me a private message with your email address? I'll talk to the developers and see what we can do.

sbradshaw wrote:

LeeJS wrote:All of the annotations that I had saved in notebooks in the older version of Gospel Library have all turned into unassigned types in the new 4.0 version, however the notebooks themselves (empty of content) have transferred over. Now I have thousands of unassigned annotations, which I can only see by going to lds.org in a browser, that I will be forced to reassign to these notebooks. Is there an easier way/something that can be done? I've logged in/out several times as well as uninstall/reinstall the app to resolve this issue, but it persists.

Have you updated to Gospel Library 4.0.1? This is one of the issues that was fixed in 4.0.1.

EDIT: It looks like the cause of the problem was fixed in 4.0.1, but updating might not fix the problem by itself for some users who've already hit the bug. Could you send me a private message with your email address? I'll talk to the developers and see what we can do.

I have version 4.0.1.2 so it appears that I do unless there is a newer version than that.

The previous version of GL allowed me to listed to the scriptures and stop wherever, and then be able to resume from that exact spot when I returned to that chapter when I saved the screen or bookmark (not sure which one). Is this still possible, because thus far I can't find how to still use that great feature (the audio for the chapter saved returns to 0:00).

ycougarz wrote:The previous version of GL allowed me to listed to the scriptures and stop wherever, and then be able to resume from that exact spot when I returned to that chapter when I saved the screen or bookmark (not sure which one). Is this still possible, because thus far I can't find how to still use that great feature (the audio for the chapter saved returns to 0:00).

This bug has already been identified and fixed for the next update (4.1.0), which will most likely be in January or early February.

I create my own links alot and I have a problem in GL 4.0 for Android in that if I want to create a link from a scripture to an Ensign Article I can't find a way to do it. In the former versions when you chose to create a link it allowed you to navigate to the destination. In 4.0 it asks you to enter the reference. I can't seem to figure out what the reference would be for an Ensign article or one of the chapters of the Teachings of one of the prophets.

Does anyone know how to create the reference so someone can link a scripture to an Ensign article?

Thanks in advance for any help anyone has with this problem.

piercem wrote:I create my own links alot and I have a problem in GL 4.0 for Android in that if I want to create a link from a scripture to an Ensign Article I can't find a way to do it. In the former versions when you chose to create a link it allowed you to navigate to the destination. In 4.0 it asks you to enter the reference. I can't seem to figure out what the reference would be for an Ensign article or one of the chapters of the Teachings of one of the prophets.

Does anyone know how to create the reference so someone can link a scripture to an Ensign article?

Thanks in advance for any help anyone has with this problem.

Because search only returns results like chapter titles for items that have been downloaded, search first for the book name (like May 2013) and choose the Ensign from the search suggestions. If it's not downloaded, the app will prompt you to download the Ensign. After it's downloaded, you can tap on it again and you will see the list of articles. You shouldn't actually need to press search if you know what you want to link to – start typing the book name and it will show up in search suggestions, and browse from that point.

Gospel Library 4 has several new "features" that make it nearly unusable for me, especially knowing how well the previous version worked. Can you help me determine which of these will be fixed in future releases and which are permanent conditions?

1) There is no ability to hide undownloaded content.
2) The annotations and footnotes appear at the side of the screen, covering up the scriptures you're trying to read. Consequently, you can either have annotations/footnotes, or you can read the scriptures, but not both. (Previously they were unobtrusively located at the bottom of the screen.)
3) There is no way to adjust the margins. On a larger laptop, this leaves a lot of unused real estate on the screen sides that I'd far rather have text in.
4) The combined bookmarks and screens/tabs menu makes it more difficult to switch between tabs/screen and to bookmark things, requiring extra steps. This is a minor issue because, unlike the other issues, we can still perform the same thing, albeit with additional steps.

The church is still true and the Book of Mormon still the word of God, even if it's more frustrating to read on a tablet now. Please help me figure out how to fix these. Thank you!

1) I don't know.

2) You can pin it in landscape mode and then it takes up half the screen. There is no solution in portrait mode.

3) I don't know.

4) Agreed - annoying. Burying useful things under more clicks is not helpful.

The more I used it, the more problems I found. The more I read here, the more problems I learned I would find. I reverted to the old version - there's a link to it in this topic if you wish to do the same.

"Notes experience" - Is there no way to show Notes at the bottom of the screen? It appears that user added Tags and Notes show only when Related Content is selected. Is that correct?

All of my previous annotations disappeared in this latest update. Previously they were clearly displayed in the cross reference column on the right hand side of scriptures. Where are they now and how can I retrieve them?
Roger and Moira Head

I found that if you rotate your phone or tablet to landscape mode then tap the three dots on the right and open related content then tap the three dots on that screen you can choose pin sidebar and then the text will move to the left and as you read and scroll the text the references will move with the text like it did in the former version.

sbradshaw wrote:

aebrown wrote:It would sure be nice if the pinned related content would change as you move through the content.

The full related content is supposed to scroll with the main content, but currently the feature is flaky and only works on certain devices. This is a known bug and should be fixed sometime in the next few months.

This seems to have been fixed (at least for my Nexus 5X) in the 4.0.1 update that came out a couple of days ago. That's a lot quicker than "the next few months" -- but you won't hear me complaining!

aebrown wrote:

sbradshaw wrote:

aebrown wrote:It would sure be nice if the pinned related content would change as you move through the content.

The full related content is supposed to scroll with the main content, but currently the feature is flaky and only works on certain devices. This is a known bug and should be fixed sometime in the next few months.

This seems to have been fixed (at least for my Nexus 5X) in the 4.0.1 update that came out a couple of days ago. That's a lot quicker than "the next few months" -- but you won't hear me complaining!

Unfortunately, it hasn't been completely fixed – but I'm glad it's working for you!

Hi
Where can I report bugs?
I use the app dayly and am quite unhappy with following behaviour of the 04.0.1.2 on my Android Samsung Galaxy S5 with Android 6.0.1.
- a notation can not be set as easy as before.
- bookmarks can not be refresh by long clicking
-can not set font to Arial.

This is only after my first morningstudy today. More might follow soon.


Is there a way to downgrade on my phone?
Best Regards
Thomas

kayvon wrote:Can you help me determine which of these will be fixed in future releases and which are permanent conditions?

All of the feedback we've been receiving through various channels so far has been gathered together and forwarded up the line. As the QA engineer for Android Gospel Library, I've seen a lot of feedback during the past 2 weeks, and I've made sure that the most common items are at the top of the list. The development team and the designers haven't received specific direction yet for 4.1. Until then, the developers are cleaning up bugs (mostly non-visible changes).

donald_duck wrote:Where can I report bugs?

The best place to report bugs or crashes – issues that only a developer can solve – is to send feedback through the app (Settings > Send Feedback). On the other hand, the forum is the great for interacting with other users, asking general questions or learning how to use the app better.

I have a RCA tablet - https://www.walmart.com/ip/45804384?wml ... 3=&veh=sem

The old version of GL worked fine. This new version will not play audio. I have tried scriptures and Ensign. When I push the play button, no sound comes out and the progress bar does not move.

robertcc wrote:I have a RCA tablet - https://www.walmart.com/ip/45804384?wml ... 3=&veh=sem

The old version of GL worked fine. This new version will not play audio. I have tried scriptures and Ensign. When I push the play button, no sound comes out and the progress bar does not move.

Are you connected to the internet? If not, have you downloaded the audio files to your device (after the upgrade)?

The new version really sucks up my data plan. Not sure why. I used to listen to a lot of audio with the old version, and it didn't seem to be a problem. Now after only a week with the new version and listening in my car, just like I always did, my data plan is maxed out because of Gospel Library. i wish I could go back to the old version, but can't figure out how.

In the past month, it's pulled 25MB. That's without any audio or video. Just one handbook and a couple of issues of the Ensign. I'm not sure what the baseline should be. I opened it recently and it seemed to have re-downloaded content for some reason. It's not set to auto-update.

rvwright wrote:The new version really sucks up my data plan. Not sure why. I used to listen to a lot of audio with the old version, and it didn't seem to be a problem. Now after only a week with the new version and listening in my car, just like I always did, my data plan is maxed out because of Gospel Library.

Did you have the audio downloaded before, or have you always just streamed the audio? You can download the audio by opening a chapter, then from the overflow menu choose Download Media and tap the option to download all audio for the book. If you have the audio pre-downloaded, it won't need any data to play.

rvwright wrote:The new version really sucks up my data plan. Not sure why.

I suspect it is partly because every time you open GL it goes out and synchronizes your annotations. Mine also downloaded the complete library three times before it settled down, but I forced two of them to happen on WiFi.

I'm sure someone has already talked about this, but I can't see it in this forum, so I'm bringing it anyway.
The current version can not search non-roman characters, it won't even let me switch the input method.
I am a Chinese user. Although searching Chinese in the previous versions of GL is not ideal, it was usable.
(Chinese searching is based on the index, you have to search as they expecting you to search. For example, there are results for "Atonement", but no results for "Jesus Atonement")

rvwright wrote:The new version really sucks up my data plan. Not sure why. I used to listen to a lot of audio with the old version, and it didn't seem to be a problem. Now after only a week with the new version and listening in my car, just like I always did, my data plan is maxed out because of Gospel Library. i wish I could go back to the old version, but can't figure out how.

There's a link to it in this thread (posted by me, on p5, 17 Dec 2016). Here are instructions:

1) Uninstall the Gospel Library app. (You'll have to re-download everything.)

2) Download the file at the link in this thread.

3) Open the file - it should give a security warning, with an option to choose "OK" (or similar) to change the settings, which will take you to the setting you need to change, and you can check the box to allow installs from "Unknown sources", and when you check it, it should give you the option to do it just for this one install. Then it should install the old version.

4) You'll have to do the setup and downloads again.

After this, you have to be careful not to allow automatic updates on this app, and not to "update all" via the store (or it will install the new version). This makes updates a pain as you have to opt to do each one individually (unless your version has different options than mine), but since the GL is my primary app, and the new one is not in an acceptable condition for me, I deal. (At least, if there's a way to say "never update this app" (which is not the same as "don't automatically update this app"), I can't find it.)

Liz

I have a question. Is there a way in Gospel Library 4.0 to show scriptures in two languages side by side, for instance in Japanese and in English?

JohnDyson wrote:I have a question. Is there a way in Gospel Library 4.0 to show scriptures in two languages side by side, for instance in Japanese and in English?

Yes – if you are on Android 7 (Nougat):

1. Make sure you have the scriptures downloaded in both languages. Also, make sure the "Show Screens as Separate Windows" option is enabled. This allows each "screen" to appear as if it's a separate app in the Android overview.
2. Open a second screen. The fastest way to do this is from the overflow menu (three dots in the top right corner) > New Screen.
3. Activate Android split screen and place the two Gospel Library screens side by side.
4. Navigate to the same content (in different languages) in both screens. If you already have the content open in one screen, a fast way to get the same content open in the other screen is by opening the chapter from Saved Locations (combined screens/bookmarks icon) > History, then switching the language.

On a Chromebook that supports running Android apps, the separate Gospel Library screens can be resized and dragged around like regular windows.

If you're on a previous version of Android, or on iOS or Windows, there's not currently a way to do this.

Please bring back the text to speech feature. Not only valuable when traveling outside of coverage, but also for any and all content (family proclamation as and example) that do not feature voice over.

I can't see the audio speed control on my new download...

sschraedel wrote:I can't see the audio speed control on my new download...

What version of Android are you on? Only Android 6 and above allows you to control the audio speed. Audio settings are found by tapping the three-dots overflow menu on the right side of the audio player. Hope this helps!

I have two issues that I have not seen mentioned elsewhere.

First I had downloaded all audio, but now when I try to get to the audio for a specific chapter it insists on counting up to Moroni 10 and only lets me listen to that chapter. I have tried removing the Book of Mormon and reinstalling it, letting it read to the end of the chapter, all to know avail and have no idea what to try next..

Second when I update an existing bookmark it does not change the name to the new verse like it used to, so I have to update, then rename it manually, BUT that puts the old verse in one place and the new in the other, and only when I rename it a second time does it get the correct verse in the top and Book of Mormon in the second line. Any ideas?

I buy a new phone is Huawei GR3 is Android 5.0 ,and I install the update of GL , but when I tried to download anything from there the GL app freeze completely and the app get close if , I use the older version of the GL I don't have this problems , this only happen with GL and hymnbook app too anybody knows how to solve the problem? , I tried with a different SD card because I read that may be the problem , but I have the same result the app closes automatically.

sbradshaw wrote:

cbradford wrote:Is there a way to display the footnotes on the same screen as the main screen as in the previous edition? It was super useful to see the footnotes on the same screen instead on having them hidden on the side.

Yes, on a phone in landscape mode, or on a tablet in portrait or landscape mode, you can pin the sidebar open. The sidebar was moved to the side to allow displaying more dynamic content – some design compromising was required.

cbradford wrote:Also, the ability to move the bookmark by dragging it has gone away. Please tell me it will be brought back.

This will probably be brought back at some point; however, it's not on the near-term roadmap. It's not a feature that was used very often because most users weren't moving a bookmark within a chapter – instead, they tended to move them between chapters. That, combined with the complexity of the interaction (for programming) and the tight deadline, required the feature to not be ported over for now.

If you updated bookmarks using the bookmarks menu before, you will probably notice that updating a bookmark is done using the bookmark's contextual menu instead of long-holding like it used to be. This allowed long-holding for dragging and reordering the bookmarks (which wasn't possible before).

How do you set a bookmark at the bottom of a page? I'm on a pixel tablet, and that leaves about 15-30 verses/page that can't be bookmarked. Our family reads a page a day, bookmarks are now marginal. Also, can't use them teaching. They no longer point to the scripture, but the top part of the chapter.

Did text to speech go away for audio playback? I'm forced to stream or download. Sometimes I don't want to do either or can't.

Thanks for this information. I could not figure it and probably would not have without this message. To me it would seem the top level item should show up in the search. Whenever I go to the bookshelf, I do not go looking for may 2016, I go looking for ensign. I think it would be fine to leave the functionality as is but please add top level we can find that in the search.

sbradshaw wrote:

piercem wrote:I create my own links alot and I have a problem in GL 4.0 for Android in that if I want to create a link from a scripture to an Ensign Article I can't find a way to do it. In the former versions when you chose to create a link it allowed you to navigate to the destination. In 4.0 it asks you to enter the reference. I can't seem to figure out what the reference would be for an Ensign article or one of the chapters of the Teachings of one of the prophets.

Does anyone know how to create the reference so someone can link a scripture to an Ensign article?

Thanks in advance for any help anyone has with this problem.

Because search only returns results like chapter titles for items that have been downloaded, search first for the book name (like May 2013) and choose the Ensign from the search suggestions. If it's not downloaded, the app will prompt you to download the Ensign. After it's downloaded, you can tap on it again and you will see the list of articles. You shouldn't actually need to press search if you know what you want to link to – start typing the book name and it will show up in search suggestions, and browse from that point.

Feedback on using on a kindle fire hd:

I liked being able to move the bookmark by tapping it and pulling it where I wanted but can no longer do that. I also liked the old default of updated bookmarks moving to the top of the queue. When my daily reading or class bookmarks move too far down the queue, I have to delete them and then add them again to get them back to the top.

I *really* like how uncluttered it is with not having all the highlights annotated(?) on the side bar. I do have problems tapping the link or note icons and getting them to come up (I usually have to try three or more times). I also liked being able to see my notes and link along with the original footnotes. It was more like writing in the margins of my paper scriptures. I also appreciate being able to annotate *all* of the content, and I like the new search format for linking.

Where can I find directions to make links bi-directional? I also imagine I can't use multiple screens because of my platform.

Thank you,

tracibill wrote:I also liked the old default of updated bookmarks moving to the top of the queue. When my daily reading or class bookmarks move too far down the queue, I have to delete them and then add them again to get them back to the top.

I liked the old default of updated bookmarks to the top, as well. However, you can move bookmarks. If you press and hold it, the bookmark will pop up slightly, and you then can move it up or down. I actually like this, because I have some one-time only bookmarks for future use loaded way down the list. I can move them up near the top when needed, then delete.

Problem: my wife has an Ipad and I have a Samsung tablet. Unfortunately, we are both signed into Gospel Library on my membership number, so that whatever annotations one of us make, it affects the other's annotations. How can we separate at this stage? My wife has far more annotations than I have as hers is years longer than mine - but she is signed in via my membership number. Any suggestions please? Thank you

rogerandmoira wrote:Problem: my wife has an Ipad and I have a Samsung tablet. Unfortunately, we are both signed into Gospel Library on my membership number, so that whatever annotations one of us make, it affects the other's annotations. How can we separate at this stage? My wife has far more annotations than I have as hers is years longer than mine - but she is signed in via my membership number. Any suggestions please? Thank you

Since most of the annotations are your wife's, I'd recommend creating a new account for yourself, then working with your clerk who can call the Global Service Center on your behalf. The Global Service Center can switch your membership record number to your new account.

On your new account, you will be starting with a blank slate. If you have any important notes on the old account (which will become your wife's account), you'll need to email them to yourself, then copy and paste them into Gospel Library under your new account.

Is there any way to pre download the audio files? Been listening on the way to work for a while and just noticed the amount of data that it was consuming. Would be nice to download at home on wifi instead of streaming on cell data.

h82run wrote:Is there any way to pre download the audio files? Been listening on the way to work for a while and just noticed the amount of data that it was consuming. Would be nice to download at home on wifi instead of streaming on cell data.

Yes, go to a chapter/article/talk in the book you want to download audio for, then go to the overflow menu (three dots in the top right) and choose "Download Media." From there, tap on Download All.

sbradshaw wrote:

dsesplin wrote:I'm missing the ability to open the related content screen and scroll the book and the footnotes etc side by side. When we study the scriptures together, it is nice to be able to scroll through the chapter and have our thoughts and comments scroll along with the text. Is this view still available?

Yes, if you rotate your phone to landscape mode, or if you're on a tablet, you can pin the sidebar with related content open.

On my tablet (Samsung Galaxy Tab S 10) I don't see the option to pin the sidebar in portrait mode. There is no overflow menu on the sidebar like there is in landscape mode. Am I missing something? In landscape mode I do get the option to unpin the sidebar, but nothing in portrait mode.

The dp resolution of the Galaxy Tab S 10 falls just under the minimum dp width for pinning the sidebar. Because Android phones and tablets come in all sizes, resolutions, and pixel densities, the line had to be drawn somewhere, and it unfortunately isn't perfect for every device. Basically, the code that decides whether or not to allow pinning thinks your Galaxy Tab S 10 is a phone, so you'll need to be in landscape mode to pin.

sbradshaw wrote:The dp resolution of the Galaxy Tab S 10 falls just under the minimum dp width for pinning the sidebar. Because Android phones and tablets come in all sizes, resolutions, and pixel densities, the line had to be drawn somewhere, and it unfortunately isn't perfect for every device. Basically, the code that decides whether or not to allow pinning thinks your Galaxy Tab S 10 is a phone, so you'll need to be in landscape mode to pin.

Thank you for replying. What is the minimum resolution required? According to my information my device is 2560 x 1600 pixels. I looked at the specs for all of the Samsung galaxy tabs and even the newest Tab S3 released last month only has a 2,048 x 1,536 pixel screen. So I am confused at what the requirements are.

I'm not sure exactly. But the unit of measurement is Android's "dp" unit of measurement (density-independent pixels), which is a derived unit, so a lot of it is behind the scenes. I'm told that there will be improvements to the sidebar in the future (such as being able to change the sidebar width) that will likely affect those calculations, and will hopefully allow more flexibility for your device.

Thank you for the suggestion of creating a new account for myself re my annotations, but what will happen to all my wife's annotations which are tied to my account and therefore my membership number. How does she retain all her annotations? If my membership number is eventually swapped to my new account surely she will lose her annotations? I hope this makes sense!

I used a Galaxy S5 running Android v6.01 with Gospel Library v3.2.13.0... I prefer to add conference talks one month at a time in a folder using my preferred music player... I would move the audio files from android/data/org.lds.ldssa/file/1/media to /music and everything worked fine.

I replaced my phone with another Galaxy S5 running the same Android v6.01.... I installed Gospel Library v4.0.4.2... I have searched and cannot find the downloaded audio files anywhere.... Where are the Conference Audio Files located in Gospel Library v4.0.4.2 ?

rogerandmoira wrote:Thank you for the suggestion of creating a new account for myself re my annotations, but what will happen to all my wife's annotations which are tied to my account and therefore my membership number. How does she retain all her annotations? If my membership number is eventually swapped to my new account surely she will lose her annotations? I hope this makes sense!

Annotations aren't tied to your membership record number – they're tied to your LDS Account (rogerandmoira). Your membership record number is just a setting on your account.
So, annotations will remain tied to rogerandmoira even if your membership record number is removed from rogerandmoira.

nclhowell wrote:I used a Galaxy S5 running Android v6.01 with Gospel Library v3.2.13.0... I prefer to add conference talks one month at a time in a folder using my preferred music player... I would move the audio files from android/data/org.lds.ldssa/file/1/media to /music and everything worked fine.

I replaced my phone with another Galaxy S5 running the same Android v6.01.... I installed Gospel Library v4.0.4.2... I have searched and cannot find the downloaded audio files anywhere.... Where are the Conference Audio Files located in Gospel Library v4.0.4.2 ?

Audio files are stored as private app data. Android doesn't let you access app data unless your device is rooted. This keeps media playback in Gospel Library stable and reliable for most users. If you listen to audio outside of Gospel Library, I wouldn't recommend downloading the audio through Gospel Library – it's not designed for that. Instead, you can download the audio from LDS.org/general-conference.

Thanks sbradshaw...

The ability to bulk download the entire conference audio in a batch was key, plus being able to download directly to the same device and simply move the files from the default download directory straight into the /music location was efficient. Hiding audio files from the end user is ridiculous. I will either find the previous version of Gospel Library or download using my PC and transferring to the SD card on the phone.

Thanks for the info and your expertise though.... all questions were answered thoroughly!

nclhowell

You're welcome! You can download all of the audio for each session as a .zip file from LDS.org, by tapping on the "..." button to the right of each session's name, on the page linked above, then choosing "Talks and Music." Also, you should be able to download the .zip files directly to your phone, using your phone's web browser – no need to go through your PC.

I'm sorry if this has been covered already, but has the "Download all" option been removed? I regularly have to re-download everything in the app (scriptures, books, magazines, etc) and I miss the ability to easily download everything in one go. I currently have to select each category and select Download all for them and it takes a while to complete.

No, it's still there. Click on the 3 dots at the right-hand end of the bar directly below the language, and "Download All" will be the first menu item.

joachimvalgren wrote:I regularly have to re-download everything in the app (scriptures, books, magazines, etc) and I miss the ability to easily download everything in one go.

It sounds like you're running into a bug if you have to regularly re-download all of your content. I'd suggest sending in-app feedback to the support team to see if they can help get it fixed.

You were far too kind in your assessment of the feature set change. The wonderful 3.x app has morphed into something largely unusable for all the reasons you listed above. In addition, the performance has taken a significant hit. Startup is slow, etc. So after a single day of use, I reverted to the previous 3.x version (using some links I found here in the forums). So if anyone is reading who is on the development team, please just revert your production release to the 3.x tree, and go back to the drawing board. The Android users will breathe a collective sigh of relief.

When I have highlighted a passage, how do I change or remove the highlight? In the old version, I could touch an icon on the right, and it would open the highlight and notes for that passage. I don't see such an icon now, and when I touch the highlighted passage, it gives me an opportunity to highlight on top, but not change the existing highlight.

namsden wrote:Did text to speech go away for audio playback? I'm forced to stream or download. Sometimes I don't want to do either or can't.

I have this same issue. I need text to speech. I was forced to uninstall 4.0 and reinstall an older version of gospelare library app. Need it back please!

pearsongregoryscott1 wrote:When I have highlighted a passage, how do I change or remove the highlight? In the old version, I could touch an icon on the right, and it would open the highlight and notes for that passage. I don't see such an icon now, and when I touch the highlighted passage, it gives me an opportunity to highlight on top, but not change the existing highlight.

To modify a highlight, tap on the highlight itself. If you hold for more than a second, it will begin a new highlight, but if you just quickly tap without resting your finger on the screen, the current highlight will be selected, and you can resize or delete it.

If you have created several highlights on top of each other by accident, you may need to repeat a few times to delete the overlapping highlights.

Please bring back the icon for highlighting.

can someone tell me the link to revert from version 4 to version 3 of the Gospel app

Where can we download the version latest 3.x
I can not change font on the new version 4.x

I have tried selecting and shrinking the highlight to eliminate it several times. The app will only allow me to reduce it to a single character, then rated than eliminating it, it increases the highlight to encompass the whole word.
Any other ideas?

1kcm wrote:I have tried selecting and shrinking the highlight to eliminate it several times. The app will only allow me to reduce it to a single character, then rated than eliminating it, it increases the highlight to encompass the whole word.
Any other ideas?

Are you trying to delete (eliminate) the highlight?
If so, rather than shrink it away, tap on the sandwich menu (three vertically stacked dots in the upper right corner) and "Delete". Do this, of course, while the highlight is selected--the end handles showing.

Good luck,
D.G.

Great, except that once the highlighted portion is selected, the three dot menu is so far to the right at the edge of the screen that it can't be selected. Even with a fine point stylus, it keeps selecting the "share annotation" option next to it. Does anyone else have this problem?

1kcm wrote:Great, except that once the highlighted portion is selected, the three dot menu is so far to the right at the edge of the screen that it can't be selected. Even with a fine point stylus, it keeps selecting the "share annotation" option next to it. Does anyone else have this problem?

I don't have that problem. But one idea is to rotate your device to be in landscape. That might make it easier to select the option (and there probably will be a trash can icon that you can select directly).

I had the same problem. In portrait mode, the three vertical dots icon and the share annotation icons are so close that you cannot pick the three dots. I finally figured out that I could select them if I changed to landscape mode.

However, it should work in portrait mode as well. Can this be fixed? It is very frustrating to someone when you accidentally create a highlight and cannot figure out any way to remove it. Thanks!

Be sure to send feedback from the app.
It sounds like the design interacts with various devices differently (works for some of us, not for others). The in-app feedback will include technical details of the device and environment, which can give the team clues how to tweak it.
Wooten is right: it should work in either orientation. Until a fix is made, though, at least landscape offers a workaround.
Good luck.
D.G.

Landscape is nice for study because it allows you to pin the sidebar open, so you can see the main content and the related content (footnotes, tags/links/notes, etc.) at the same time.

Looking to hear about when I will be able to change the font type in the app. Any ideas?

Gospel library will not load on my Motorola droid phone yes it is old but it still works. Any help

shawntayannmcarthur wrote:Gospel library will not load on my Motorola droid phone yes it is old but it still works. Any help

Take a look at the thread Supported Android versions for Gospel Library - Updated Oct 2018. There is a minimum Android version and a minimum Gospel Library version for you to load the application. If your Android version is old but still supported you should be able to load the app for your version. But note that Gospel Library versions older than version 5 will not receive content updates.

shawntayannmcarthur wrote:Gospel library will not load on my Motorola droid phone yes it is old but it still works. Any help

What version of Android is your phone running (usually there's an "About" section under Settings)?

sbradshaw wrote: Fri Dec 23, 2016 10:02 pm

kayvon wrote:Can you help me determine which of these will be fixed in future releases and which are permanent conditions?

All of the feedback we've been receiving through various channels so far has been gathered together and forwarded up the line. As the QA engineer for Android Gospel Library, I've seen a lot of feedback during the past 2 weeks, and I've made sure that the most common items are at the top of the list. The development team and the designers haven't received specific direction yet for 4.1. Until then, the developers are cleaning up bugs (mostly non-visible changes).

Has this calmed down any over the past 5 years? I'm still on the same tablet and still hoping these will be fixed someday.

1) There is no ability to hide undownloaded content.
2) The annotations and footnotes appear at the side of the screen, covering up the scriptures you're trying to read. Consequently, you can either have annotations/footnotes, or you can read the scriptures, but not both. (Previously they were unobtrusively located at the bottom of the screen.)
3) There is no way to adjust the margins. On a larger tablet, this leaves a lot of unused real estate on the screen sides that I'd far rather have text in.
4) The combined bookmarks and screens/tabs menu makes it more difficult to switch between tabs/screen and to bookmark things, requiring extra steps. This is a minor issue because, unlike the other issues, we can still perform the same thing, albeit with additional steps.

kayvon wrote: Sun Aug 29, 2021 10:09 am

sbradshaw wrote: Fri Dec 23, 2016 10:02 pm

kayvon wrote:Can you help me determine which of these will be fixed in future releases and which are permanent conditions?

All of the feedback we've been receiving through various channels so far has been gathered together and forwarded up the line. As the QA engineer for Android Gospel Library, I've seen a lot of feedback during the past 2 weeks, and I've made sure that the most common items are at the top of the list. The development team and the designers haven't received specific direction yet for 4.1. Until then, the developers are cleaning up bugs (mostly non-visible changes).

Has this calmed down any over the past 5 years? I'm still on the same tablet and still hoping these will be fixed someday.

1) There is no ability to hide undownloaded content.
2) The annotations and footnotes appear at the side of the screen, covering up the scriptures you're trying to read. Consequently, you can either have annotations/footnotes, or you can read the scriptures, but not both. (Previously they were unobtrusively located at the bottom of the screen.)
3) There is no way to adjust the margins. On a larger tablet, this leaves a lot of unused real estate on the screen sides that I'd far rather have text in.
4) The combined bookmarks and screens/tabs menu makes it more difficult to switch between tabs/screen and to bookmark things, requiring extra steps. This is a minor issue because, unlike the other issues, we can still perform the same thing, albeit with additional steps.

(4) (Good news first!) Gospel Library 6.0 will be in beta soon – in Android Gospel Library 6.0, screens, bookmarks, and history have been broken out into separate sections again.

(3) is unlikely to change in the short term. The margins on chapter/talk content pages aren't controlled by the app developers, but instead are controlled via CSS stylesheets by the team that prepares content for Gospel Library on all platforms (including Gospel Library Online), and that team is bound by the Church's style guide.

(2) The reason this change was made in 4.0, is because before 4.0, "related content" was primarily a list of abbreviated scripture reference links, the same as appears in printed scriptures, and that list can easily display in a small area. Starting in 4.0, related content was expanded to replace abbreviations with full references, to include actual snippets of linked content, and more recently, videos and images are included, too. More interactivity and content in the related content area requires more space to a) keep things visually uncluttered, and b) support those with accessibility needs (larger text sizes, larger tap areas). I agree that it would be nice to have the option for related content to be at the bottom, for users who aren't personally concerned about clutter or accessibility, but it would need to be implemented in a way that a user could choose/customize, and customizability doesn't tend to be ranked as high in the priorities list as other things. (In case you're wondering – I don't fill in the priorities list. But in my quality assurance role, I certainly do my part to fill in the bugs list. ) As mentioned above, the workaround for seeing the main content and related content at the same time on a small screen is to rotate to landscape, and choose "Pin Sidebar" from the overflow menu at the top of the sidebar.

(1) This was considered for 6.0, but the idea was abandoned along with other 6.0 ideas that were too ambitious to undertake all at once. In the meantime, if there are only a few books you care about, you could consider using custom collections. I agree that this would be a nice feature, and it could be implemented in a simple way if it were deemed a priority.

Continue sending feature requests through in-app feedback, as common feature requests are batched together and included on a report that's reviewed regularly.

jake.ev88 wrote: Sat Jun 03, 2017 1:18 pm Looking to hear about when I will be able to change the font type in the app. Any ideas?

Watch for some good news coming in Gospel Library 6.0 on this as well (or if not 6.0 – 6.1).

> I agree that this would be a nice feature

Everything I listed used to be a feature of the app, including the margins problem. Since that time, these problems have been introduced, which makes me worry that fixing them again isn't really a priority. (Well, that and the 5-year gap since I first requested them.)

I think it is interesting that the Gospel Library for IOS team has figured out how to display related content on the right side of the screen without obscuring the main content while in portrait mode. Unless Android has some sort of limitation preventing this, it can be done.

mwestout wrote: Sun Feb 27, 2022 10:44 am I think it is interesting that the Gospel Library for IOS team has figured out how to display related content on the right side of the screen without obscuring the main content while in portrait mode. Unless Android has some sort of limitation preventing this, it can be done.

Related content on iOS and Android behaves mostly the same. On a phone in portrait mode, the related content sidebar will slide over, covering the main content. To see them side-by-side, you need to be in landscape mode, or on a tablet or larger device. In previous versions of the app (before Gospel Library 4.0, which was released in December 2016), related content showed in a drawer at the bottom of the screen on a phone in portrait mode. However, before Gospel Library 4.0, related content also did not include actual content snippets, videos, or images – it was a list of abbreviated scripture reference links only – so, it was easier to display the related content in a smaller space.

The best way to send a feature request is using the in-app feedback (Help > Send Feedback). The support team keeps track of common feature requests and provides regular reports to the Gospel Library product manager.

I just got a new android tablet (galaxy S8) and was expecting to be able to pin the related content sidebar in portrait mode, but it only works in landscape.

sbradshaw wrote: Mon Feb 28, 2022 4:54 pm

mwestout wrote: Sun Feb 27, 2022 10:44 am I think it is interesting that the Gospel Library for IOS team has figured out how to display related content on the right side of the screen without obscuring the main content while in portrait mode. Unless Android has some sort of limitation preventing this, it can be done.

Related content on iOS and Android behaves mostly the same. On a phone in portrait mode, the related content sidebar will slide over, covering the main content. To see them side-by-side, you need to be in landscape mode, or on a tablet or larger device. In previous versions of the app (before Gospel Library 4.0, which was released in December 2016), related content showed in a drawer at the bottom of the screen on a phone in portrait mode. However, before Gospel Library 4.0, related content also did not include actual content snippets, videos, or images – it was a list of abbreviated scripture reference links only – so, it was easier to display the related content in a smaller space.

The best way to send a feature request is using the in-app feedback (Help > Send Feedback). The support team keeps track of common feature requests and provides regular reports to the Gospel Library product manager.

mojoteri wrote: Sat Jan 21, 2017 11:26 pm

sbradshaw wrote:

cbradford wrote:Is there a way to display the footnotes on the same screen as the main screen as in the previous edition? It was super useful to see the footnotes on the same screen instead on having them hidden on the side.

Yes, on a phone in landscape mode, or on a tablet in portrait or landscape mode, you can pin the sidebar open. The sidebar was moved to the side to allow displaying more dynamic content – some design compromising was required.

cbradford wrote:Also, the ability to move the bookmark by dragging it has gone away. Please tell me it will be brought back.

This will probably be brought back at some point; however, it's not on the near-term roadmap. It's not a feature that was used very often because most users weren't moving a bookmark within a chapter – instead, they tended to move them between chapters. That, combined with the complexity of the interaction (for programming) and the tight deadline, required the feature to not be ported over for now.

If you updated bookmarks using the bookmarks menu before, you will probably notice that updating a bookmark is done using the bookmark's contextual menu instead of long-holding like it used to be. This allowed long-holding for dragging and reordering the bookmarks (which wasn't possible before).

How do you set a bookmark at the bottom of a page? I'm on a pixel tablet, and that leaves about 15-30 verses/page that can't be bookmarked. Our family reads a page a day, bookmarks are now marginal. Also, can't use them teaching. They no longer point to the scripture, but the top part of the chapter.

It has been 5+ years and the Android version still lags majorly behind because verses/paragraphs at below the top of the viewport that are at the end of chapters/readings cannot be bookmarked.

lmcguire wrote: Sat Dec 17, 2016 7:00 pm

winonadavies wrote:Please! Let me have the old version. I can't see my footnotes, links, or tags on the same screen. I can't do a quick search so I can link things easily. The menu is not nearly as intuitive as the 3.0.3 version.

You can get the old version here, and side-load it: https://tech.lds.org/dl/android/org.lds ... 60913-1723

dsesplin wrote:I'm missing the ability to open the related content screen and scroll the book and the footnotes etc side by side. When we study the scriptures together, it is nice to be able to scroll through the chapter and have our thoughts and comments scroll along with the text. Is this view still available?

NOTE: While you can pin the "Related Content" pane in landscape mode, it does not scroll along with the text - you have to scroll it separately.

Liz

Note to Church employees. We can no longer sign in via this page to get this older Android release. Hitting sign in just bounces or loops back to the same page. So it is now imperative to bring back this feature so I can access to features that supposedly were going to be added back (5+ years ago!) like tapping to drag and move to update bookmark. Nothing but radio silence and frozen in time on this important request. I have no idea who is managing the Android version because they add other features from the other OS releases like music bar and font resizing and the home page, amazing features in their own right, but leave more important daily used features like the bookmark system years behind the others. Please do the work necessary to bring the Android version up to speed with the other releases!.