Church software
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Church software is any type of computer software specifically designed for use by a church. There are administrative packages tailored to handle membership databases and finances, and also worship presentation programs to generate images for video projectors.[1]
Contents |
[edit] Worship Presentation Software
A worship presentation program is a specialised presentation program designed for displaying images (primarily song lyrics) during some forms of Christian worship. Some programs also include other features to help plan the service or schedule participants.[1]
Churches adopting a contemporary worship style often project song lyrics for congregational singing. Originally, overhead projectors were most frequently used, but video projectors have become commonplace as they increased in performance and decreased in price.
A resulting need was for a software package to produce the images for display. Originally, general purpose presentation programs such as PowerPoint were used, but these were found to be of limited value, primarily because of the need to display lyrics of a selection from a large number of songs.
Worship presentation programs were developed by a number of vendors to solve this problem. A common feature is a database which stores the song lyrics and enables them to be easily retrieved and projected. This may keep records for copyright licensing. Other features in current programs include the ability to display bible texts (often from a number of translations) and PowerPoint slides (often used for notices and sermon illustrations), as well as use graphics or video clips as a background. Another common feature is the ability to play DVDs or show live video from a camera.
Although these software packages are occasionally used by the person leading the service or speaking, larger churches generally have a computer operator to control what is projected.
There are many programs available both commercially and as shareware. Among the most popular programs are EasyWorship and MediaShout for Windows, and ProPresenter for Macintosh. Free cross-platform alternatives, which operate on both of these systems as well as Linux, include OpenSong and Openlp.org.
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- ^ a b Church Related Software Index at Computer Aided Ministry Society (CAMsoc)
[edit] External links
- Lists of church management, donation management and worship presentation software for Windows (other platforms are also listed), from Computer Aided Ministry Society (CAMsoc).
 |
This Christianity-related article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |
 |
This article related to a type of software is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |
