\fR oo m-hāk\ n. Any application of ingenuity for those who are committed to observe the 613 Mitzvot. [ORIGIN: Yiddish פֿרום (frum|fR oo m) meaning "commited to observe the 613 Mitzvot, or Jewish commandments" and the English Slang term HACK (hāk|hak) or LIFEHACK (līf-hāk|lahyf-hak) meaning "anything that solves an everyday problem in a clever/non-obvious way or an appropriate application of ingenuity"]
I am happy to announce that HCalendar has released an update! Version 1.0.4.74 is now available for download. HCalendar is a nifty Add-on for Firefox that not only displays the Hebrew date in the lower left of your browser but also provides;
Zmanim (a little off but good enough)
Parshat Ha’Shavua
Gregorian (secular) date
A Gematria converter with a full ‘virtual’ on-screen keyboard (!)
Full Hebrew calendar
Gregorian to Hebrew date conversion (and vice versa).
You can enter your location by city, zip code or even latitude longitude coordinates and it will calculate the zmanim for you, tell you how many days until the next holiday (or shabbos) and can display all of it’s functions in either English, Hebrew or ‘Heblish’ (a combination of the two in English characters).
My wife, thank God, is a great cook and wonderful baker. (really thank God because coming from my mother’s home anything less than great would have been a serious problem) But, as anyone living or spending time in Israel can tell you, baking in Israel can be a pain, not just because of the Celsius/Fahrenheit issue, nor the ounces, grams, mili, cups, kilo, etc. issue. The biggest pain of baking in Israel is the flour checking. Unless you are lucky enough to find pre-checked, vacuum sealed flour you are gonna be stuck sifting flour to check it for bugs.
Now when I say ‘pain’ I mean for me, I am usually the one who usually ends up sifting the flour, because I am the one who does most of the eating. Now as I am sure you are aware the conventional way of sifting is no picnic. In fact it is more like panning for gold than anything else. You have to put some flour in the sifter and shake it back and forth until the flour flows through the holes and you are left with clean, Kosher flour. It is not a fun job, and not a quick one.
On my mother’s last visit to Israel she brought a gift to our apartment. A flour sifter. No, not the kind you use to sift flour to make it Kosher, they don’t have those in America, but the kind you use to aerate flour for some random recipes. Being that we have never encountered such recipes, we never used the thing (sorry mom, you know she is reading, I am her baby).
Until Now.
Welcome to the first Frumhacks DIY (Do It Yourself) Project! [fanfare and trumpets]
Goal: Build an easier sifter to get bug free, Kosher flour.
Things you will need:
1 Israeli ‘panning for gold’ flour sifter (Badatz Certified, of course)
1 American ‘flour aerator’ sifter
A permanent marker
Pliers (needle nose and regular)
Hot glue and hot glue gun
A carpet knife (X-acto knife, or whatever)
Masking tape
Scissors
Screwdriver
Duct tape
Some flour
After taking the whole sifter apart and breaking the thing, I figured out a really simple way of doing this. I will spare you the entire 20 step process that it took me to build this thing, and just cut to the chase with the few steps it will take for you to build yours. If you want more details on the intricate inner-workings of the sifter let me know and I will fill you in…
Step one: Look into the top of the sifter, you will see a bent piece of metal that holds the assembly together (see pic). Take your needle nose pliers, get in there and bend that sucker back so you can remove the top two pieces of the assembly. Use your needle nose pliers to carefully pull out the top two pieces. You need to be firm and gentle so as not to tear the screen, but don’t be afraid to pull hard.
Step two: Take the circle shaped screen thingy and place it on top of your Israeli gold panning sifter. Trace the circle with your marker, and cut it out, make sure to leave a little room outside your circle (i.e. don’t cut on the line but just outside it).
Step three: Tape the mesh circle onto the circle screen thingy you removed from your American flour aerator. Peel back one section and place a nice line of hot glue on the outer edge, push the mesh firmly down (being careful not to BURN yourself! use a Popsicle stick or something, I dono)
NOTE: Before you use the hot glue, make sure it is non toxic. Also put a piece of masking tape down on your workspace for easy cleanup.
Finish gluing down the rest of the mesh by removing the tape and gluing as you go. Finally turn the mesh/screen circle over and glue around the small circular hole in the middle of if the screen.
Step four: Cut off the excesses mesh and poke out/cut out the hole in the middle. You should now have a circle screen thing that is covered in the fine Badatz mesh and ready to be installed in your sifter.
Step five: Reassemble the assembly, remember the screen/mesh thing goes in first than the other piece. Carefully push the mesh/screen piece back into place until it locks in then place the washer and octagon piece on top of it. Make sure the holes line up and everything fits.
Step six: Bend the metal back as best you can, it is kinds hard so: Add a dab of hot glue on the top to hold it all in place. Be careful not to glue the shaft to the mesh/screen or the octagon thing. Doing this will cause your computer to crash, you to lose all your files and the sifter to break.
Final step: Let everything cool and dry. If you are really anxious put the whole thing in the fridge for a minute or so. Test it out, if the top doesn’t stay in place add a little more glue.
Congratulations! You are now the proud owner of a Fancy Sifter. Now when you need to sift flour all you have to do it squeeze the handle and voila! Hope you enjoyed…
Some of you may be scratching your heads, wondering, “but in the things listed that we would need, he listed duct tape. He never used duct tape in this DIY Project” and you would be right. But I didn’t say that list was things you would need for this project, just things you will need, and you WILL need duct tape, everyone needs duct tape!
Ever been working on a really big project, like your Semicha Test, a book design project, or anything else, only to have your computer crash, get stolen, or the like (Chas Ve’Shalom, Lo Aleinu)?
What about a shiur you just downloaded, or a song you just recorded that you want to share with a bunch of friends? Email is a pain, because you have to attach it and it takes forever to upload, download and then most of the time you can’t even send it because it is to big.
Remember the time you were writing a dvar Torah, forgot the whole thing on your desktop at home, and forgot to put it on your thumb drive?
Have you ever accidentally saved something when you didn’t mean to and really, really messed it up?
Also do you like to share pictures easily with your friends and family?
Well this is the coolest tool I have come across in a while. My first reaction when I came across it was the potential awesomeness for file sharing, mainly the painful ones to email, like audio shiurim and videos, but then after watching the below video I realized the amazing potential such a tool offered.
Basically, when you install it, Dropbox creates a folder on your computer and anything in that folder is automatically synced up with its website interface and anyother computer you have registered with your Dropbox account. Plus it has an option to make a file public, meaning you get a web address where that file is located and anyone can access it by going to the link. It also has a built in photo album software (much like Jalbum) and keeps revision info on your files, so if God forbid anything bad happens you can just revert back to an older version. It is sorta like Google Docs, except for all your files, oh yeah, and on steriods.
As you can see from the video, Dropbox allows you to easily transfer, sync ans share files, making the internet sort of like a hub to keep all you files and then allowing you download them from anywhere. Sharing pictures is also a snap with the pictures folder, and the public link folder is much easier than having to upload files to a website or emailing them around.
All in all a really cool tool. The catch is it is still in the Beta phase of its development which means that only those lucky enough to get an invite are allowed to join. I happen to be one of those people and have been using Dropbox for a few days. I love it. With my membership I get 10 free invites, meaning I can invite 10 of my friends to join in the fun. Lucky me right? Lucky you! The first 10 of you that either get in touch with me or post a comment requesting an invite will be so lucky. And of course I will post an update as soon as it leaves the Beta phase. (PS those of you who do get the invites, share the wealth with your fellow Frumhakers, post a comment and invite away!)
A little advice from WiseBread on the best way to complain about defective products, something that we all know is inherently linked with our Jewish identity, Margaret Garcia-Couoh suggests to her reader that calling or emailing a complaint just doesn’t cut it like sending an actual pen and ink letter would.
Her article sounds like it was written about my family, especially my dad (!), and I am sure that it will remind of yours…
The husband thinks all products made now should be made just like they were made sixty years ago. He holds companies—especially old companies to high standards. But he’s also a cheap [mamzer] that predictably buys the same brand over and over again. He’s bought the same model of New Balance running shoes four times and they’ve all worn and cracked in the exact same place. He called and complained a few times, but his last letter earned him a pair of new New Balance shoes free.
If that isn’t my dad…
So next time your [insert product here] fails on you, give it a try and post your success stories here and WiseBread…Here’s the full article link: http://www.wisebread.com/the-letter-always-wins
How great are those database software programs? They are immensely helpful in allowing those of us who learn and use a computer to have a better grasp of texts and find those hard to find things buried in a Rambam, Shulchan Aruch or Tanach. They allow us to find themes, and examine theories, all in all, one of the biggest things to hit Torah learning since, well, actually learning Torah. They are our tool in the fight against yeridas ha’doros, Rashi may have known everything by heart, but at least now we can level the playing field a little by being able to search through everything with a computer as he would have done in his brain. [I mean no disrespect to any gedolim/rabbanim/rishonim, just a little literary license to make a point in jest, don't need the new blog in cherem:)]
But at the same time, how many of us have the few thousand shekel or dollars to drop on all these great software programs? Not me, that’s for sure. Instead I either email/call friends who have them or have access to them, schlep out to a Yeshiva, or University (or a combination thereof) and use theirs, or (the most common) spend time online trying to find texts and using the rudimentary search features I can hack together (see “Let’s just get this out of the way…” for more on sites with texts). Until Now…
Sifrei Kodesh Search is a Firefoxadd-on that allows you to search through seforim (Jewish Texts) right from your browser! It currently searched through:
Tanach (Tanakh or תנ”ך)
Mishna
Tosefta
Talmud Bavli
Talmud Yerushalmi
Mishna Torah (Rambam)
It uses the power of Google Custom Search and is really great!
SKS has a virtual keyboard to allow you type in Hebrew, allows you to nail down a search by section, book, chapter, verse, etc. and is still in development so that means that there will be more great updates yet to come.
Here is a quote from the description on the SKS homepage:
Combining the power of Firefox, Google and the Mechon Mamre text library, this extension allows you to search the Hebrew texts of Tana”ch, Mishna, Talmud Bavli, Talmud Yerushalmi, Tosefta and Mishna Torah. You can search as broadly as all of these sources or as specifically as a single book of Tana”ch, a single tractate of Mishna or a single set of Halachot of the Mishnah Torah. The extension includes an onscreen Hebrew keyboard to assist those who do not know the Hebrew keyboard layout and/or do not have Hebrew input support on their computers. (You can use this keyboard to copy and paste Hebrew text into other things also.)
We all have them, and we know it. That old, dented, barely working fridge in the garage. The grease-soaked, scratched, mismatched oven/stove top. The old dishwasher, that smells and kinda leaks.
Whether you, a friend, a parent or relative has one of these (or similar) items this post is for you. The Handyman Fix Home Repairs Blog has an article on how to refurbish old appliance, make them work and look like new and get your whole kitchen to look coordinated and modern (no pun intended…OK maybe a little pun intended). By cleaning out the entire thing like it’s Pesach, replacing the gaskets, and seals and refacing the appliance with metallic contact paper of your choice, you can save on buying a new appliance and make your place look great!
Here is a quote:
If you’re stuck with some aging appliances and replacing them isn’t in your budget, there are a few tricks that you can use to give them a face lift and make them more energy efficient, on the cheap. For this article, we’re going to focus on refreshing your refrigerator and dishwasher, but these tips will work for just about any large appliance you have in your home.
Sorry, I didn’t mean to get your hopes up (those who live in America), but I have recently made a pretty good discovery for those who live and visit Israel.
Until recently I was under the impression that only ice cream labeled as specifically being ‘Cholov Yisroel’ was Cholov Yisroel, but I was recently informed that all Ben and Jerry’s Ice Cream in Israel is under the supervision of Badatz Machzikei Ha’dat, who only certifies product which are Cholov Yisroel. In the past Ben and Jerry’s Ice Cream was imported, and only certain products were made in Israel, but now all Ben and Jerry’s products are made in Israel and are therefore Cholov Yisroel.
NOTE: Check the hashgacha of any product you buy before eating it, in this case there may be exceptions, perhaps some products from the import days are still around, or who knows what, but if it has the Badatz Machzikei Ha’dat logo on it, it is Cholov Yisroel. (also see disclaimer on the right of this page).
[Full disclosure: I, myself, am not makpid on Cholov Yisroel, but many of my guests and friends are, so we always try to be accommodating.]
Since my days in Yeshiva I have always found the ‘ShtarkMark‘ to be useful tool while learning, reading and researching, however on shabbos, it seems, it may be assur to use them. (although there have been opinions that are matir in various situations, such as a second sticking when attaching to a surface that is not the same material as the mark) But have no fear! Levenger Page Points® Bookmarkers are the perfect shabbos solution to the ShtarkMark issue, not to mention they look a whole lot classier, are better for the environment and are reusable.
The cost $10 for a tin of three dozen and can be purchased at Levenger’s site. Here is a description from the site: Mark the passage in a book and leave no mark Our paper-thin Page Points® mark book pages in the most inconspicuous manner, and their finish is kind to paper. You can move these bookmarks as often as you want or leave them in books permanently, as they won’t harm pages. Get more from your book, without leaving a trace.
Each point measures just 1″W x ½”H
Three dozen come in a tin
“My work requires using various references on a regular basis. These page points are wonderful for marking the frequently used sections for ease of finding. I used to use sticky notes, but they became ragged and were unsightly sticking out of the edges of the books. This is a much improved system.”
- Rae New Orleans, LA
I’ll be honest, I have been using them since high-school and love them, but only recently made the connection to solve this serious issue in Hilchos Shabbos and Kavod for Seforim.
Unless you have been living under a rock for the past few years, (and there are many of you who have been) you have probably already heard of the sites I am going to discuss below. However I felt it necessary to list and profile them on the blog because they fit so well, and I am sure there are those of you out there who have not heard of one or all of them.
That being said this is probably a good time to bring up a point about reading this blog: there will probably some posts for things you already know about, or have already done, this doesn’t mean you should just give up reading and move on, the blog is aimed at the middle of the group so for some of you that means that there will often times be posts that you have heard of, and for others everything here will be new and exciting. Please try and refrain from posting comments like, “DUH! Where have you been??!?” and the like, not only does it make other reader who may have not heard of these things feel bad, but it makes you look insensitive and, well, boorish.
Onward!
OnlySimchas.com Provides free posting of simchas (everything from Weddings, to Upsherins (sp?) to Aliyah) complete with a personal photo gallery of your simcha, message posting (to wish a ‘Mazel Tov’) and video uploads to help keep those Jewish yentahs informed at all times. It has become a staple of frum life. “Yeah, she’s engaged, I just saw it on OnlySimchas!” or “Mazel Tov! Are there pictures on OnlySimchas?” OnlySimchas has added classified ads, business directories and a dating service.
MyZmanim.com Possibly on of the most important sites for frum life. Provides zmanim (Halachic times) for every place on the planet, just by entering your location, zip code, or even latitude and longitude. The site has the ability to adjust for many different shitos, for example sea level vs. actual altitude and has recently added davening directions to help us all face the right way while praying.
GoDaven.com and MinyanMaps.com International minyan databases, let you find a minyan anywhere there is one. GoDaven uses a search engine and MinyanMaps uses a map feature similar to Google Maps.
FiveTownsRadio.com An online radio stations that streams Jewish music and content to your computer 24/6.
MostlyMusic.com Possibly the greatest Jewish media site ever. MostlyMusic sells Jewish music CDs, sheet music, tapes, etc. all on their surprisingly professional site. When I first visited I thought it was a regular site that happened to carry Jewish stuff. They also now have their own Jewish online radio station, JewishBroadcast.com.
HebCal.com Great tool! HebCal generates Jewish calendars for any day, month, year complete with holidays, dates, candle lighting times, sedras days of the omer and more. It also converts Gregorian dates to Jewish ones, lists the Holidays or your personal days (Yahrtzeits, etc.) and has parsha summaries for the weekly parsha. If you visit it from your mobile phone it will ask for your zip code and give you the shabbos times.
And now for some shameless plugs for friends’ sites:
WearMOTS.com My friend Hillel Smith makes T-shirts and the truth is they are pretty good. He spent a really long time in college learning how to do it (and all sorts of other things to do with art) even though he probably didn’t need to… [From the About Us of the site] “So everyone you know, you included, has at some point thought, “Hey, I’m funny. And Jewish. I’ll make t-shirts.” We went through with it. As M.o.T.s (Members of the Tribe, i.e. Jews. That includes you.) we wanted something that’s Jewish, funny, smart, and pretty darn cool. Founded in late 2006, M.o.T.s is headquartered in Los Angeles (home of the short sleeves in winter) and trying to establish branch offices elsewhere. Let us know if you’re interested. Enjoy our M.o.T.s. They are yafeh me’od.”
ShtarkProductions.com The maker of the original ‘Shtark Card’ a credit card sized card with everything from Brachot to Pitom Ha’Ketoret and everything in between. They are full color, pretty (I wonder who designed them?) and laminated so you don’t have to worry about going into the bathroom when they are in your pocket. They are now expanding into Gedolim/Rebbe pictures and a number of other neat innovations for frum life. Their full site should be up soon (I wonder who is supposed to be developing it?). But visit their temporary page to place an order or make a customized card for your simcha, youth group or other event.
Kol Hamevaser YU magazine focusing on Jewish thought, a great read and always entertaining, thought provoking and frustrating. [From the site] “Kol Hamevaser is a magazine of Jewish thought dedicated to sparking the discussion of Jewish issues on the Yeshiva University campus. It will serve as a forum for the introduction and development of new ideas. Additionally, Kol Hamevaser will provide an outlet for the varieties of original thought already existing on campus. The print edition of the magazine will also serve as the centerpiece for the further growth of an exciting community of young scholars and thinkers as they mature and prepare to tackle the issues facing the larger Orthodox and Jewish worlds.”
I hope these links are helpful and now with all of these ‘old things’ out of the way, I hope to begin with some innovations…
Welcome to Frumhacks, a place where we can, hopefully, apply a little ingenuity to your daily life as a frum Jew (or whoever you are, we don’t judge, but if you’re not most of the stuff will probably seem ridiculous to you…).
[I have to apologize in advance it has been a while since I sat down and wrote seriously, so if my grammar, structure, spelling, etc. is WAY off, give me some time, the rust will wear off eventually. Or my wife will start proofing my posts ]
First, a little more information on the name, the word ‘frum’ is intended to mean just what it says at the top of the page, and on Wikipedia (at least today), “committed to be observant of the 613 Mitzvot, or Jewish Commandments”. I had a big issue when choosing the name for this blog in using that word, a lot of the time it can carry a number of other connotations, cultural, derogatory, and even offensive ones. I choose the word because of it’s etymology and not its colloquial usage, I don’t intend it to mean anything other than “observant”, not “holier than thou”, not “charedi”, and actually not hashkafically tied down to anything. In this blog’s context the word ‘frum’ means observant and that is all; that is the one thing that ties us all together, our commitment to observing the commandments, it is “the tie that binds” as the Rabbi Rocker put it. Besides, you have to admit the word frum sounds cool, especially when attached to ‘hack’.
Hack in this context goes beyond the colloquial usage in computer, it fits more into the realm of ‘life hacks’ then actual computer hacks, but realistically computer hacking started off as life hacking and has now come full circle. You see, to ‘hack’ is not so much something one does, but more a way that one thinks. Hacking does not mean, as most people believe, the malicious destruction of property by use of computer software, nor does it mean stealing data for personal gain, not even breaking into a computer server (or any other feat of programing/computing) for the sake of showing off qualifies as hacking. To hack means to use one’s God given talents, whether they be intellectual, mechanical, technical, or otherwise to figure out a new, better, more useful way of doing something. That may mean creating a new type of software that does something better, and it may mean spreading information that will allow the world to better understand some concept and thus make that concept more useful and accessible. In essence hacking is getting thing done in the best way possible. So let’s abandon all stereotypical uses of the word ‘hack’ and try to stick to the real root meaning.
The hope and goal of this blog is to appropriately apply ingenuity to things that effect those of us who are committed to be observant of the 613 Mitzvot. It will, God willing, include, but not be limited to, DIY (do it yourself) Projects, Work Arounds (ways of getting around problems), Hacks (little tweaks that can made to ourselves and/or the world around us to do something useful), Productivity Boosters (i.e. Batala Killers), links to or articles about products/articles/other-things found online or off that fit in and just plain spreading of information and knowledge, with the hope of making the lives of those who observe the Mitzvot, easier, better and more productive so they can better use their time for the proper pursuits.
My sincere hope is that this blog helps people to better understand the world around them and how to relate to it as well as how to better utilize the tools we have been given to accomplish our goals. May it be His will…and may His will be our will…
If you are new to Frumhacks, check out the links below to get a feel for what we do here and feel free to ask any questions of give feedback in the comments!
Frumhacks and all those who write for and are associated with it are not responsible for your actions. Things posted on this blog are not Halachically binding, and although we may or may not have checked with our Local Orthodox Rabbi, you should check with yours. Additionaly certain things posted here may be dangerous to do without proper supervision, knowledge, tools or expertise. Try at your own risk and be SMART! Feel free to contact us with questions or concerns.
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