Paratext 8 and the Jesus Film extraction tool

Question

For a couple of years now, language projects preparing the script of the Jesus Film after having translated Luke and other Scripture portions have been able to use a tool that would extract the relevant Scripture passages mentioned in the script and paste them into notes within the script file. This tool uses a specialized version of the Paratext 6 and 7 “Extract Lectionary” tool that was available in the Advanced Checks menu. (The Jesus Film tool when installed is found in Checking > Advanced > Jesus Film > Verse Extract - JLOT Recording Script).

Programming changes in how Paratext 8 processes Python scripts mean these tools will not work in Paratext 8. I have tested a workaround using a Bible module and this does seem to work.

This is the process:

1. Download the file “VerseExtract-JLOT_Recording_Script_mod.sfm” and place it inside the “_Modules” folder inside “My Paratext 8 Projects”.
   Link to the file
2. Create a Bible module in your Paratext project, (Tools > Open Bible Module). Choose the above file as the specification.
3. In Paratext, go to the module book you have created, and Save to RTF the resulting module. (File, Save as RTF).
4. In Word, open the RTF file, and save as a text file. If Word says some text will not save correctly in the current encoding, change the encoding to “Unicode (UTF-8)”
   
5. Copy or move the folder to the “Scripts” folder inside the Aegisub setup, and change the text file name so the last three letters end in “.ass” (the file extension expected by Aegisub)
6. You can now start Aegisub and select this script file, and the script will have notes of all the relevant verses you have translated in Paratext.

Doug HIgby is also working on a module for the Jesus Film script, but that module has a different goal. That module is to guide teams that have not translated anything, to show them which passages they need to translate to have the relevant parts of the Scripture for the Jesus film. This module is to extract relevant passages that have already been translated into the script format.

Answer 1

Technical note: the important thing needed for the text file is to preserve the existing line breaks and not add any new ones. I added \nb markers at each new line in the source text file to make the SFM file. I also changed the \ref codes from the original file to \refnp so no paragraph marks from the text get added. I also added reference codes so Paratext will put in the reference for each verse or group of verses, using the book names and abbreviations set up in the Scripture References section.

Paratext does put each \refnp at the beginning of a new line in the module, but when you save as RTF, these new lines go away, and so saving as a text file produces the desired output.

Answer 2

This is so cool! It also works in PT-Linux, both PT 7.x and 8, in which the "Advanced Checks" have not been available.

Thanks for working on this, sewhite (and others, perhaps).

  KimB

Answer 3

Is there something similar for the Luke film?

Comments

About the Luke film, I do not know. For your information, the Jesus Film team has now created an EXE file that will find the text from Paratext and put it into the script file. Contact them for access. (If you’ve been given a link to download the latest copy of the script, this file is there as well).