Assisting your choice

As I mentioned previously (scroll down) WordLive offers a variety of content for you to choose from. But more than that we actually give you a little bit of help in deciding what to choose. This is done quite subtly though and so i thought I'd type a few words on the matter.

As the carousel spins around and you mouseover each of the pretty little icons, you'll notice a lozenge opens in the middle of the carousel. Inside the lozenge you'll see some short text explaining what activity you'll be taken to if you click on the icon. What you may have noticed are that the colours of the lozenge change depending on what icon you mouseover. The colours are very pretty too, and will become prettier in the very near future (more about that in another post). In the meantime let me tell you about the different colours.

Each of the colours represents a particular style of activity. The orange / yellow colour means that the activity is of a general nature. The podcasts, Bible passage and other activities that may relate to a whole week's sessions will be this colour. The purple colour represents activities that we feel are of a practical nature. They won't be too deep or heavy and they won't be overly creative or touchy feely.

On the other hand the green lozenge represents a more reflective approach. These activities may well be creative, meditative and touchy feely. You'll also find a little more music in this stream of activities. That leaves us with the blue lozenge. The activities here are a little deeper in nature and more study based. You may even find the odd theological term thrown in for good measure.

So there you have it. The colours of the lozenge revealed.

Freedom to choose

WordLive offers a large amount of content each day. We do this partly out of love, partly because we can, but primarily because we want to offer the user, you, the best chance of hearing God through the Bible. With this in mind we create different activities for each day, as displayed in the revolving carousel. (If you can't see the revolving carousel, then you'll need to install Flash from Adobe, it is a free plug-in, and makes WordLive even more alive.)

Wordive is built around a central Bible passage. This Bible passage is explored in the activities for that day... BUT you don't have to do everything on offer. Some of the activities will make the same point in a slightly different way, perhaps being more creative, more practical or in a deeper more studious way (it may even use long words). Some activities use music, others images, while others are more interactive.

The point is, there is a lot of material for each day, but you may not find all of it useful. Some content works better for some people while other content works better for others. Of course, you may want to click on everything and that is fine, but after reading the Bible passage, the choice is yours. You can do a little or as much as you like. WordLive is for you.

Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes

WordLive gives you the Bible, prayer and various other items to help you get into the Bible. To help you, understand it a little more, to think over what it said and most of all catch a glimpse of God through its words.


One thing we noticed during our closed beta test was that after the day's Bible passage had been read, and you moved on to a different activity, you couldn't refer back to the Bible passage without closing the activity. This, we thought, and also a large number of you too, wasn't for the best. And so, being the caring souls that we are, we sweated night and day, thinking and creating a solution... actually it wasn't just the royal 'we', it was the rest of the the team at SU and also those lovely people at baigent, but we don't want to give them all the credit (okay, most of the sweating was from them). And that solution is now live on the site.


The first major update to WordLive is now there for you all to use. You'll notice a tab on the top, right hand side of the activity page that is titled Today's Bible Passage. If you click on this, the tab extends and reveals Today's Bible Passage, for you to read alongside the activity you are doing (not too difficult to grasp). Then if you click the little x in the top, right hand corner of the Bible passage window, the window closes. Voila, the Bible passage in all its glory, to be looked at alongside the activity you are doing.

This is the first, but by no means last, development of WordLive.

You talk, we listen and we do our best to improve your experience!

My favourite quote in a coming WordLive activity

What about Christians who are so heavenly minded that they’re no earthly use? Hebrews would regard them as freaks.

I am currently editing material for April on WordLive and the above extract brought a smile to my face. You'll be able to see the whole quote in context in a couple of months, but I thought I'd share it with you now.

WordLive and the mobile phone

Now I need to make sure that I am not a little bitter in this post. You see, a couple of months ago I bought myself a brand new, shiny mobile phone. As we were developing WordLive I looked forward to being able to view it, where I wanted, whenever I wanted, through the power of the mobile Internet.

So imagine my dismay, when I logged onto the mobile WordLive site in January and got an error page displayed. My dismay grew when I noticed others, and here is the merest hint at bitterness, whose phones were older, but of the same make, getting perfect access. What was up? Was the world against me? Was my phone all design over content?

Fortunately, I soon found out that I was not the only one who was having difficulty. It seems that there are quite a few mobile phones that are having difficulty accessing the mobile version of WordLive. However, it is very difficult to say which phones have access and which ones don’t, because the problem is all down to the browser software each phone is using. It doesn’t matter what make of mobile phone you have, it is dependent on the software installed, and this is changed frequently.

But there is a solution. If your mobile phone is unable to access the site, but you can download applications to your phone (most mobile phones with Java can do this), then you should head off and download the Opera mobile browser. All the details can be found at the link below, telling you how to download and install. WordLive will then be totally accessible to you. Opera is possibly the best mobile browser currently available, and that comment is not driven by any personal bitternessJ.

So remember, WordLive is available for your mobile phone. All you need do is log onto www.scriptureunion.org.uk/mobilewordlive and you'll get all the text based prayers, Bible text and activities, whenever and wherever you want (network costs and restrictions apply). However, mobile access to the site can be a little patchy, this isn't anything to with the WordLive site, which is standard compliant, but with the built in browsers of the phones themselves. This can all be solved by installing Opera on your phone. Simply follow the link… Opera Mobile Browser.

Busy, away and a review

I suppose I should apologise for the recent lack of updates... sorry. There, now I have absolved myself I will offer the weakest of excuses. I was on holiday over Christmas, and just before, and since getting back into the office, I have been playing catch-up (that isn't a game, but work). I have also been away at a conference and struggling with getting out of the bed before 9:00am each morning, I suppose that teaches me for not getting up before 9:00am for the three weeks over Christmas.

I'd like to send a big thank you to Lesley who provided all the prayer items for the past few weeks, such a project as WordLive needs a lot of prayer and without the prayer we have received we wouldn't have got this far. However, there is a long way to go, a lot to do and 2008 will keep the whole team extremely busy.

We have also had a great review posted by Mark Brown in Australia. He makes some great points and I wonder whether he has seen our 'to do' list for 2008? I think everything he mentions in his wish list are things that we are thinking about, putting into the mix or are currently covering via Facebook. Anyway, you can read more about what Mark says here.

Now, where is that to do list...

It's live

Well, here we go