Well beyond the Mac vs. Windows debate, the very best reason to adopt the Macintosh platform may simply be Accordance Bible software. Today, Oak Tree Software released v. 7.2 of Accordance. There's so much here, one might've expected the release to carry an 8.0 designation. Nevertheless, there's plenty here to explore. From the Accordance website:

Major New Features:

• Import of User Bible texts.
• Printing of highlighted text, both of regular highlighting in text and tool panes, and when using Compare Texts.
• Horizontal option for display of the Resource palette.
• Prior and Next buttons appear after using internal hypertext links in a tool pane in a Search window, with control-command left and right arrow key combinations which also work for the Tools window.

General New Features:

• Larger and more colorful text access buttons at the bottom left of many windows.
• Contextual menus: additional menu for More Options in Tools, and Favorites submenu added to contextual menus.
• Up to 512 characters are allowed in Range definitions.
• The CHAR item in the Construct allows multiple entries.
• Pressing shift with command right and left arrow keys selects the intervening text.
• Diagram window exports as an editable PICT image.
• An option in User Notes preferences allows multiple edit windows.
• SBL standard references for abbreviations is an option for display and export of text.
• Command-click on a verse reference in a tool amplifies to all the references in the paragraph.

New Original Language Features/Updates

• Optional modern Greek Polytonic keyboard for text entry.
• Character palette supports modern Greek and Hebrew keyboards.
• Export to Graeca II font is supported instead of SuperGreek.
• Preferences page to reorder the grammatical tags.
• Option to view tags as full words in Instant Details.
• Format of tag display is clearer.
• Export of Helena text converts the "apple" character into a correct rough breathing.

I'm very intrigued to explore the new option to import other Bible texts. What this means is that any freely available texts on the internet can now be imported for use into Accordance.

For more details on all the new features, see the announcement in the Accordance forums and David Lang's post on the Accordance Blog.

Tags: Accordance