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Scripture Earth App

September 13, 2021 by Leave a Comment

    Chris and his colleagues have been working on Scripture App Builder (SAB) since before its first release in 2015. SAB has been used to create thousands of contextualized Bible apps by many organizations. In 2017, SAB 3.3 added support for building apps on macOS and creating iOS apps. There are many Android apps that have been published to Google Play. However, there have been quite a bit fewer iOS apps published to the Apple App Store created with SAB (some examples: Sylheti, Pertukekem, Dari, Northern Thai, Hindi, and Chin). This is due to Apple rejecting apps if there were too many from the same developer account. As a solution, Apple told publishers to create a single container app that would allow the user to select the content.
    This year, with SAB 9.0, we have enabled our partners to create an iOS container app as Apple has recommended. An organization can take their projects for Android, make a few changes for iOS, and build packages of resources that can be downloaded by the iOS container app. When the user runs the app for the first time, they select a language, download a package of resources, and then the container app becomes like a fully contextualized Bible app for that specific language!
    We have talked with a few of our partners and they are excited about the opportunity to make their resources available on iOS. One of these partners is ScriptureEarth. They publish a website that hosts and links to Scripture resources in thousands of languages. They currently use Scriptoria (the web service that Chris works on) to publish Android Apps to Google Play and then link to the apps on their website. Scriptoria has been updated to support building the language resource packages used by the iOS container app. They will finally be able to provide an iOS app for all of these language communities.

ScriptureEarth Impact
I had the privilege of watching one of the women I am teaching ESL discussion in Laos come to know the LORD! GOD IS AMAZING! Anyhow, I was able to share with her ScriptureEarth to help her find the Bible in her heart language as well as encourage her to watch the Jesus Film and the Mary Magdela Film. It is SO WONDERFUL to have these resources so easily accessible. She lives in Laos and this resource proves to be so practical and beneficial. I literally use it or share it weekly! LOVE IT!

Bill Dyck, a co-worker of Chris’ at JAARS, uses Scriptoria to publish many of the Android apps on ScriptureEarth.
Filed Under: Content, Mobile

EMDC Online

March 12, 2021 by Leave a Comment

    For a few years, Chris has travelled overseas once a year to participate in EMDC, which is a conference where half of the attendees are workers in the field and the other half are those like him providing services and training. Due to COVID-19, it was cancelled last year and some sessions were done on zoom. EMDC has transitioned to doing year-round online training. Chris will be helping with two separate weeks of training on Scripture App Builder. There are many classes to choose from (and recordings are available). In order to protect people working in sensitive places, attendees have to be approved. If you know of global workers who could take advantage of this type of online training, please let them know: https://emdc.online

Filed Under: Content

Ministry Continues During COVID-19

March 12, 2021 by Leave a Comment

    Like many of you, Chris has been able to do his work from home during the COVID-19 pandemic. It is hard to believe that it has been about a year now. Over the past year, Chris and his co-workers have been praying regularly for their overseas colleagues as they are affected by COVID-19. Some have had to return to their passport countries and some have been able to stay. He and his co-workers receive reports and prayer requests from different areas around the world. Obviously, there have been challenges, but there have been new opportunities as well. We would like to share one of those.

“What is currently happening with the Quechua-speaking Church is really something extraordinary! There is revival! New converts are being added to the Church daily. The local congregations are working to disciple those returning to Christ. Although the government prohibits meetings, the Church is meeting in small groups to pray together as well as trekking into the mountains to fast and pray…We passed out the last 600 Quechua Bibles we had and the calls continue to flood in. All of these are for new believers!

A regional director from SIL Americas shared, “Almost everything we do in the [Americas] Area is in partnership with one or more ministries.” This story was shared in late June by the director of ATEK*, one of SIL’s partners in Peru.
Filed Under: Uncategorized

A New App Builder

March 12, 2021 by Leave a Comment

    Chris is on the App Builders team which maintains desktop apps that generate contextualized mobile apps. See the article Why Another Bible App? for more details. These desktop apps are:

  • Scripture App Builder (SAB) – creates Scripture apps that handle the book, chapter, and verse navigation, multiple language translations (including parallel viewing) synchronized highlighting of text with audio, bookmarks, notes, highlighting, verse of the day, sharing verse on image and many scripture-focused features.
  • Reading App Builder (RAB) – creates apps that contain picture books, health and community development materials, song books, illustrated stories and libraries of easy-to-read books for new readers.
  • Dictionary App Builder (DAB) – creates customized dictionary apps with pictures, audio for headwords and example sentences, search, and links between lexical items,

      Last year, Chris was surprised that his colleague had created a new desktop app called … Keyboard App Builder (KAB). From the name it was easy to figure out what it did, but Chris wasn’t sure why he had done this.
    The Language Technology team has a product called Keyman to create language-specific keyboards. There are Keyman apps on Windows, Mac, Linux, iPhone, iPad, Android phones and tablets, and even in a web browser. Our current app builders can include a Keyman keyboard in the created apps to help with text input in the app. So why did we need to create contextualized keyboard apps?
    The keyboard app allows the user to add a system keyboard to their device, enabling them to type their language within other apps such as Gmail, Facebook, and WhatsApp. It also helps users of the keyboard app find the Scripture app in their language. Chris was working with one of the Keyboard App Builder users on an issue and asked him about how KAB is being used. Please read his story…

Discovering Scripture With Keyboards
“Siares” is the code-name for the national language of a small country where being found in possession of the Bible can get you a long prison term. It’s the only country in the world remaining for which the majority language does not have a complete New Testament translation, but several books have been published in a Scripture app. The problem is getting this Scripture app discovered, as an advertising campaign could result in a backlash. Enter Keyboard App Builder: The keyboards available to mobile users in this country are a pain to work with, but we’ve designed a much easier keyboard for the “Siares” language, building it with Keyboard App Builder. Since releasing it a few months ago, it’s become one of the most popular keyboards in this country, with over 5000 users. The keyboard app makes it easy for users to discover the Scripture app. Please pray that many would discover the Scripture app and encounter the claims of Jesus there.

Filed Under: Language Software

AI Lends a Helping Hand

March 27, 2020 by Leave a Comment

    When Chris talks about the work that he does with technology and how it helps accelerate Bible translation, some people ask if Artificial Intelligence (AI) can be used. There are a few of his colleagues who are experts in AI, and they have been researching appropriate ways to use AI in their work. Here is an article by one of these experts, Dr. Daniel Whitenack, who used AI to automatically translate “Wash your hands” in 500+ languages.

TLDR – I used multilingual unsupervised methods to train cross-lingual word embeddings for over 500 languages. These embeddings allowed me to extract components of the phrase “wash your hands” from existing target language documents. I then combined these components to generate something close to the phrase “wash your hands” in 510 languages not currently supported in any public translation platform.

https://datadan.io/blog/wash-your-hands
Filed Under: Uncategorized

Let’s Grow a Library

March 27, 2020 by Leave a Comment

    The About Coronavirus book is just one example of how people are using Bloom, a desktop application that makes it easy to create simple books and translate them into multiple languages. Bloom is designed for new computer users in mind, and it has special features to guide them in simple book making, so people need far less training than alternatives like Word, Publisher, or InDesign. Bloom’s Book Library offers books from around the world for the users to translate into a local language. They can also share books that they have made. Watch the video below to learn more about Bloom!

Why does anyone need Bloom? This video explains the role Bloom software can play in aiding literacy development. It also gives an overview of the key features of Bloom.
Filed Under: Language Software

Wash Your Hands

March 27, 2020 by Leave a Comment

    One of the benefits of Bible translation is that the Bible isn’t the only thing translated into minority languages. Other materials like health information, cultural stories, and trauma healing literature are translated as well. This approach truly impacts every aspect of a person’s life–spiritual, emotional, and physical.
    With the COVID-19 pandemic spreading around the world, there are many language communities who will not hear the same precautions that we are. Read below to see how our organization is trying to help.

COVID-19 doesn’t care what language you speak.
All of us are at risk. But millions of people who speak lesser-known languages don’t have a single resource on COVID-19 yet. The information gap is enormous – and lives are at stake.

“Wash your hands” isn’t enough to combat this pandemic, but it’s already more than some communities are hearing. Below you can learn how to say it in many different languages and countries.

You can also download this About Coronavirus book for kids, with key guidelines translated into several languages. Are you multilingual? You could help us translate the book into more languages.

Spread the word, not the virus.

https://www.ethnologue.com/guides/health
Filed Under: Uncategorized

You Put Our Texts In The Air!

March 21, 2020 by Leave a Comment
Scripture App Builder

    Many users of Scripture App Builder are working in sensitive areas. We intentionally do not track who is installing and using the software to keep users safe. It is so encouraging when we hear stories of how Scripture App Builder is being used to expand access to God’s Word. Please read this story from Africa.

Drew Maust, a Wycliffe member working in central Africa, had the chance to thank God for the good things that He has done. Drew shares with us his wonderful reason for praise:

Since completing their New Testament over a decade ago, the Z* translators have been hard at work tackling the Old Testament book by book. Two years ago I had the pleasure of working with them on Ezra. After finishing my check of Ezra, I showed them how we could make a custom Bible app using their translation.

So we made an app containing their New Testament along with the Old Testament books that were ready to be published. We loaded it onto the only smartphone they had between the three of them and off they went back to their village.

Now, their village is about two days’ journey, tucked away in the mountains, without electricity or phone signal, in a region which is almost like another country. Love for their language is strong there, but it’s generally very difficult to stay in touch with them.

So I almost completely forgot about this app we made until the Z* translators showed up in the capital last year.

Much to my surprise, they approached me, and the first thing they said was, ‘Our whole village thanks you.’

Taken aback, my response was an embarrassed, ‘OK… why?’
‘You put our texts in the air!’
I had to admit (even more embarrassed) that I didn’t know what they were talking about. ‘I’m really sorry, what do you mean?’
‘My son found the app on my phone and has been sharing it around via Bluetooth. Everyone loves it! But there’s just one problem…’

‘Oh no, what’s that?’

‘It’s missing some books!’ He was lamenting that recently completed books weren’t yet available for their digital readership. ‘People want to read Joshua!’ O, that they could have a whole Bible!

This year I look forward to working with the Z* guys on Old Testament books. We’ll put them ‘in the air’ as soon as we can, giving the Scriptures wings to fly.

Facebook Post: Wycliffe Bible Translators UK and Ireland

    With Scripture App Builder, communities can publish early and often. Their village doesn’t have to wait until the whole Bible is translated and a paper book is printed. Updates can be shared in the app as they become available. Isn’t it wonderful when we can thank God for the good things that he has done?

Thank you for partnering with us. Your participation in this work is being multiplied as we pour into others and allow them to flourish.

Man Praying
Filed Under: Mobile

Making Disciples with the Uzbek Bible App

November 27, 2019 by Leave a Comment
Uzbek Bible App in Cyrillic Text
Uzbek Bible App in Cyrillic Text

    We have heard from many workers in the field who are using Bible apps to help unreached people groups to engage with God’s Word. This term unreached people group refers to an ethnic group among which there is no indigenous community of believing Christians with adequate numbers (less than 2% of the population) and resources to evangelize this people group without outside assistance. Language and culture often cause barriers of understanding and acceptance. The Joshua Project provides information about such groups including the Uzbek people group.
    Please read this article to see how God is using technology to help reach the unreached. The Uzbek Bible app in this article was made using Scripture App Builder, the software that Chris helps support and develop.

    A group of grandmothers gather together to study the Bible, pray, sing, and fellowship. They meet once a month to encourage one another and to share the good news of Christ with the new ladies who are brave enough to attend. This is not your typical Bible study. It is special because this particular group consists entirely of Muslim-background followers of Christ. … One of the grandmothers starts to preach. She wants everyone to turn to a certain passage in the Bible. … ‘All of a sudden, these old ladies whipped out their smartphones and quickly navigated to the passage in the Bible. They didn’t miss a beat!’.

(read the full article by Feruza Krason)
Filed Under: Mobile

Partners in Scriptoria

November 27, 2019 by Leave a Comment

    We started work on Scriptoria in the spring of 2018. We completed the minimum viable product (MVP) back in April and made Scriptoria generally available. We are so thankful to Every Tribe Every Nation (ETEN) for providing the funds to hire DeveloperTown to assist with making the software. While working with them, we started to learn what we would need to know to continue the work. Over the summer and fall, we have been working on fixing bugs and adding features to make it work well (more than just the minimum 👍).   
    We have also been making changes needed for our partners: Faith Comes By Hearing (FCBH), Kalaam Media, and Scripture Earth. Both FCBH and Kalaam have hundreds of apps that they are currently maintaining on their own. They have so many, that Chris is working on some special code to make it easy for them to create all the projects and in Scriptoria. We are looking forward to these partners being more productive using Scriptoria!

Filed Under: Language Software
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