Bible Tags

The CMS system includes a tagset dealing with the issue of referencing bibles inside website articles. The ability to easily and cleanly quote bible passages was one of the original development goals behind this system. This page explains each of the tags available in the bible tagset.

Like the rest of the Iapetos/cms system considerable attention has been put into making sure that each interesting part of displayed bible quotes is properly spanned with unique class="" attributes. This is deliberate, and allows website style guides to radically effect how bible quotes are displayed. A full discussion is beyond the scope here. Use your browser's "view source" function to see styles around specific parts of displayed bible quotes in order to learn the handles available for style modification.

Enabling bible tagset

All of the tags in this tagset start with <bible: and to use these tags on an article the bible tagset must be enabled. This is done with a PythonOption line in the apache configuration file for the site. (Or the .htaccess file if the apache config file is not available.) An example:

PythonOption cms.tagsets                 "{'base':'base','bible':'bible'}"

This example turns on both base and bible tagsets, which is the normal case. The bible set REQUIRES the base set to function correctly.

In this example, the tagset name, and the prefix found in the files are the same, it is possible, but NOT RECOMMENDED, to change the prefix: {'bbl':'bible'} would cause all tags to be required to start with <bbl: instead of bible. By changing to a non-standard prefix, the HTML of articles cannot be easily moved to websites using a different convention.

The PythonOption value is handled under a Python "eval" environment, and is a dictionary of tagset prefix strings as keys and the values as modules names.

Once enabled, the following tags are available in this tagset.

bible:quote

The most basic and common tag is used to quote single verses. This is done with the <bible:quote/> tag. An example:

<bible:quote book="John" chapter="3" verse="16"/>

This generates an HTML block level element, a quote box, which provides the quote, with the default version displayed and the other available versions as links across the bottom of the box. The sample tag given above renders like this:

There are common variations on this theme. To quote more than one verse, the count of total verses is added as an additional parameter:

<bible:quote book="John" chapter="3" verse="16" count="2"/>

And of course it renders like this:

As a matter of style on most of our websites we allow the person reading the article to select their favorite version. If, for some reason, only a certain version will do, this can be forced by adding the version="" parameter, like this:

<bible:quote version="asv" book="John" chapter="3" verse="16"/>

Which is rendered slightly differently. The box is there, but there is no ability to change versions.

This tag has a natural limit on the amount of text that will be quoted. It will never quote past the end of a chapter, even if the count is higher than the number of verses in a chapter.

The tag requires the book="" parameter, but the rest are optional, and default to values of "1"

<bible:quote book="40" chapter="3" verse="16"/>

Is rendered as:

The book parameter can also be provided as a number from the IBF Book Number series. In that series John is book 40, so the following example works as expected:

<bible:quote book="40" chapter="3"/>

Is rendered as:

bible:quoterange

There are rarely times when a very large passage needs to be quoted, or, when the quote goes past a chapter. The <bible:quoterange/> tag provides support for this type of long quote.

<bible:quoterange bookstart="66" chapterstart="12" versestart="16"
                     bookstop="66" chapterstop="13" versestop="2"/>

Is rendered as the following:

bible:footnote

Full inline quotes are often distracting, especially when the text of the referenced verse is not needed to understand the flow of an article. For this case the bible:footnote tag provides an easy way to get a footnote with the full bible cite, and an optional comment, but without taking up the space for a full quote.

The following is a sample paragraph, the bible:footnote tag provides the information that makes up the note. The content is placed at the bottom of the page, as it is in this page. The example:

<p>One day I was looking for a verse.  Not sure where it 
was.<bible:footnote book="John" chapter="3" verse="16" 
comment="Later I asked a friend where to find it."/>
I was at a loss of where to find it.</p>

Is rendered as:

One day I was looking for a verse. Not sure where it was.1 I was at a loss of where to find it.

Note how the actual foot note is found at the bottom of the displayed page, as it is here. The page foot notes are given numbers, sequentially, starting at number 1, and assigned to each foot note on the page. Non bible footnotes can also be interspersed.2

The major difference between the <base:footnote/> tag and the <bible:footnote/> tag is that the <bible:footnote/> form shows up in the index to scripture references generated using the build tools. So, if you are noting a scripture address the bible form should be used. All other footnotes should use the base:footnote form.

Because the <bible:footnote/> tag is an extension to the <base:footnote/> tag it is also possible to reference a previous footnote. For example:

<p>When someone asked me who helped find the verse I would not
say.<base:footnote repeat="last"/></p>

Renders like this:

When someone asked me who helped find the verse I would not say.2

It is also possible to reference any other previous footnote by number in the repeat="" parameter to the tag. Another example:

<p>The story was getting old.  I would not tell them
the verse.<base:footnote repeat="1"/></p>

Is rendered as:

The story was getting old. I would not tell them the verse.1

bible:cite

An alternative to the use of footnotes is the use of a citation of the direct reference to a scripture address. The <bible:cite/> tag is used in that case.

The appeal of this form is that there isn't a huge list of footnotes, but at the expense of reading past a citation. An example:

<p>Academics is a mixed bag.  Some call it a tradition of
men.<bible:cite book="Mark" chapter="7" verse="8"/>  While others
ask what alternative do we have?</p> 

Is rendered as:

Academics is a mixed bag. Some call it a tradition of men (42 Mark 7:8). While others ask what alternative do we have?

bible:dot

Dots are used as decorations in various ways. As a convention we put book numbers into circles on many of our websites. We do this using a set of shapes provided by the <bible:dot/> tag.

<bible:dot number="55" color="#aaa"/>

Is rendered as:

Notes On Rendering

This tag generates unicode values from the symbols sections in that code system. It is touchy as to support, requiring a browser with both full Unicode support and support in the underlying fonts.

Browsers known to support in their current versions:

• Firefox -- Yes
• Epiphany -- Yes
• Opera -- Yes
• Safari -- Untested
• Konqueror -- Yes
• MSIE -- Untested

Alternative Shapes

The shape can be varied as well.

<p>
Circle: <bible:dot shape="circle" number="11" color="#aaa"/>
<br/>
Diamond: <bible:dot shape="diamond" number="55" color="#afa"/>
<br/>
Down: <bible:dot shape="down" number="55" color="#afa"/>
<br/>
Ellipse: <bible:dot shape="ellipse" number="55" color="#f88"/>
<br/>
Hexagon: <bible:dot shape="hexagon" number="33" color="#faa"/>
<br/>
Left: <bible:dot shape="left" number="23" color="#faf"/>
<br/>
Parallelogram: <bible:dot shape="parallelogram" number="44" color="#aaf"/>
<br/>
Pentagon: <bible:dot shape="pentagon" number="55" color="#aff"/>
<br/>
Rectangle: <bible:dot shape="rectangle" number="66" color="#ffa"/>
<br/>
Right: <bible:dot shape="right" number="49" color="#ddd"/>
<br/>
Square: <bible:dot shape="square" number="23" color="#faf"/>
<br/>
Star: <bible:dot shape="star" number="39" color="#ffa" />
<br/>
Up: <bible:dot shape="up" number="59" color="#fa8"/>
</p>

Circle:
Diamond:
Down:
Ellipse:
Hexagon:
Left:
Parallelogram:
Pentagon:
Rectangle:
Right:
Square:
Star:
Up:

bible:dotdefault

Often the values used for dots are the same across an entire page. The <bible:dotdefault> tag is used to set defaults for use on all following tags. (Until the defaults are changed.)

<bible:dotdefault color="#ff0" shape="hexagon"/>

<p>

<bible:dot number="5"/>  This case...
<br/>
<bible:dot number="10"/> That case..
</p>

<bible:dotdefault color="#faa" shape="square"/>

<p>
<bible:dot number="15" />  This case...
<br/>
<bible:dot number="25" />  That case...
</p>

Is rendered as...

This case...
That case..

This case...
That case...

By Phil Stone
Posted Sunday, Asher 12, 13000

1 John 3:16 -- Later I asked a friend where to find it.   
2 My friend's name was Joe.