The Changes from Logos 7 to Logos 8, Summarized

With Logos 8 comes the most significant changes in an upgrade since Logos 4.

As this article covering all key changes states, “[Logos 8] not only adds many new features, but it also changes existing features and user interfaces in ways that will take some time to adjust to.”

This post is a summary of the full article. Each heading represents the major category of changes between Logos 8 and Logos 7.

It does not account for new features, such as Canvas or Workflows. Rather, it focuses on changes in existing features or alterations to Logos’ layout and design.

User Interface

The main changes here surround Tabs, the Panel menu and the Sidebar menu, and are intended to improve navigation.

Tabs now function more as tabs do in web browsers. Additionally, the Panel menu (⋮) is now at the top right of each panel, and the Sidebar menu (☰) is at the top left of most panels.

Read more.

Home Page

There are 14 changes outlined in the full article, but two big ones are covered right at the beginning:

1. Go box: The Go box, formerly on the Home Page, has been consolidated with the Command box in the main toolbar.
2. Preferred Bible: The new Home Page no longer provides a way to set a preferred Bible. For now, you can do that in the Prioritize sidebar of the Library, which is in the Panel menu (⋮). Logos will be bringing similar functionality back in the near future.

Read more. Note that Logos is continuing to add functionality and options for customization.

Library

One major change is the icon. The Library icon now looks like a stack of books to better reflect what the icon opens.

Additionally, the Prioritize Resource option is now in the Panel menu (⋮), and the Collection picker has been replaced by facets in the new Sidebar (☰). These facets let you filter your library by subject, type, author, and more.

Read more.

Resources

These changes are fairly small, but two are worth highlighting here:

1. Interlinear button: The inline interlinear and interlinear pane have been consolidated into a single split button that allows you to toggle your interlinear display on and off. You can also do this with Parallel Resources.
2. Information: The resource information button has moved to the Panel menu (⋮).

Read more.

Search

Search is largely unchanged, with the exception of Search Templates, which allow you to perform complex searches without using advanced search syntax.

1. Search button: The Search button is now part of the Go box. It has mostly the same behavior, but it now also passes the contents of the Go box to the search panel.
2. Bible search: The first search tab is now Bible instead of Basic. We made this change since Bible search is the most frequently used search type.
3. Search Helps: Search Helps (a.k.a. the Search Cookbook) has been replaced with Search Templates, which you’ll find in the new search sidebar. (Note: Not all Search Cookbook items have been brought into Search Templates. We’ll be adding more in the future based on user feedback, which you can share in the new Logos Search group.)

Read more.

Go Box

There are several changes to this feature/design based on how people were using it. Some highlights are:

1. “Enter Passage; Click Go”: In Logos 7, entering a passage and clicking Go would load the Passage layout. In Logos 8, it opens your preferred Bible to the passage. If you’d like to open the layout instead, you can select it as the second option from the autocomplete menu.
2. Preferred Bible v. Top Bibles: Ctrl+Enter now launches a search in your preferred Bible instead of your top Bibles. We made this change based on data that shows that most users search their preferred Bible more often than their top Bibles.

Read more.

Docs

Some name and navigation changes came to the Documents feature:

1. Documents is now called Docs.
2. Column grouping: The ability to group documents by type has been replaced with faceted browsing in the new sidebar.
3. Note documents are now Notebooks, but they’re not yet integrated into the Docs menu. For now, you’ll create, find, and manage your notebooks in the Notebooks sidebar of the new Notes tool.

Read more.

Guides

Guides got reorganized and now function more like tools than documents. You can also now open a single guide section (e.g. Commentaries) from the Guides menu.

1. Guides menu: The Guides menu has been reorganized to focus on guide (and workflow) templates.
2. Guide as tools: Guides are now more like tools than documents. Saved guides on a particular passage or topic are no longer part of Logos 8, and customizations you make to guides happen to the template instead of the instance or document as in Logos 7.
3. Favorite commentary discussions: Commentary discussions that you starred will be converted to favorites. Logos is still exploring how best to bring these back.
4. Default guide templates: The default templates for Passage Guide, Exegetical Guide, Sermon Starter Guide, Word Study Guide, and Topic Guide have been updated. If you used a custom “My Passage Guide” template in Logos 7, those settings will automatically be applied to Passage Guide. You can reset to the new defaults in Logos 8 by right-clicking on the guide template in the Guides menu.

Read more.

Tools

Not too much changed with Tools, but one thing to note is that the Tools menu (and Guides menu) is now scrollable with collapsible sections and has a Find box and pinnable area for your favorite go-to tools.

Read more.

Notes

The new Notes tool represents the most significant area of change from Logos 7.

Here are the two key differences:

1. Notes database v. Notes documents: Instead of creating note documents to store your notes and highlights, notes are now stored in a single database. You can optionally organize your notes and highlights in notebooks (analogous to Notes documents in Logos 7 and earlier), but notes don’t need to be in notebooks.
2. Tools menu v. Docs menu: While notebooks (the analog to note documents) will be coming to the Docs menu in the near future, for now, the place to create, find, and manage your notebooks is in the Notes tool, which you’ll find in the Tools menu.
3. At present, you can no longer search for your notes using Basic search. Instead, you can search or use filters to browse for your notes within the Notes tool.

See the dedicated Notes FAQ for a complete list of changes and missing features.

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For more detailed information on key changes from Logos 7 to Logos 8, read the full article.