Block or Sentence Flow Diagrams

Another feature in the upcoming LDLS 3.0 release has to do with sentence diagramming.

Yes, we're aware that there are more ways to diagram a sentence than you can shake a stick at (pun intended). One of these methods is the "Block" or "Sentence Flow" diagram.

The linked video presentation walks through using the new feature. It is all contained within the present sentence diagrammer. The steps are simple:

1. Create a New Sentence Diagram document (or open an existing one)
2. Insert a passage
3. When inserting a passage, select the "As Wrapping Columns" option
4. Enter the passage and version information
5. Click Insert Passage

That's it. Now you can click and drag text around as you see fit. I should note that I didn't think too much about this particular block diagram. Looking at it in retrospect, there are things that need to be done differently. But since it is an LDLS document, I can just open the diagram and edit it later to clean that stuff up.

Video: 950x750, Flash, approx. 2 megs.

One cool feature here is that you can insert more than one column of text. So, as I did in the video, you could insert one column of Greek text and another column of English text, and match them up.

Or — hold on to your hats — you could enter different accounts of an event in the synoptic gospels and block-diagram them in parallel. You can use the stick diagramming symbols (like, say, brackets, lines or arrows) to draw attention to parallel groups or features. On top of that, all of the Visual Markup features are available in the sentence diagrammer.

All done? Go to File | Export. Look, you can save it as a PDF to show your friends, or to put on your web page or blog!