When released 13+ years ago, ORT’s trope/chanting audio was based on a format called RealAudio. Unfortunately, RealAudio doesn’t work very well on modern devices like tablets.

As of May 2013, ORT has upgraded to MP3 – a more modern audio format. Users can listen to individual verses or download whole readings to listen to on their phones, tablets or other mp3 players.

Our sincere thanks to Vladimir Dribinskiy, ORT’s Chief Program Officer, and to the entire World ORT team!

Previously Hebcal always used the date of the 27th of Nisan.

When the actual date of Yom Hashoah falls on a Friday, the state of Israel observes Yom Hashoah on the preceding Thursday. When it falls on a Sunday, Yom Hashoah is observed on the following Monday.

CONFIGURING

• Under Components choose JEvents
• From the JEvents control panel choose “Manage Categories”
• Click the “New” (+plus icon) from the top toolbar to create a new category
• Name your category, something like “Shabbat Times” (without quotes)
• Set your own parameters (optional) – recommended: set “Check for overlapping events?” to “No” because Shabbat times shouldn’t be effected by other events.
• Click “Save and Close” from the top toolbar.
• From the JEvents control panel choose “Manage Calendars”
• Click the “New” (+plus icon) from the top toolbar to create a new calendar
• Choose a category under which you need this calendar created – ideally the one you’ve just create.
• From the “From file” tab (bottom) choose the file you created on the preparation section of this document.
• Wait patiently for the entire calendar to upload – this stage ends when you’re back in the JEvents control panel with a message under the JEvents logo which reads: “1457 iCal events processed ICS_FILE_IMPORTED” (The number may vary, depending on the amount of records added)

PREPARATIONS

• To create a Shabbat Times calendar, which is based on your preferences, visit this URL:http://www.hebcal.com/hebcal/
• After tweaking the settings to your need, click on “Create Calendar”.
• From the top, click on “Download…”
• From the popup window choose “Google Calendar” and then “Download”
• Save the file where you can find it – you may rename it, but keep the file extension “.ics”

PRESENTING

• To create a module for presentation, choose “Extensions > Module Manager” from the top menu
• Click the “New” (+plus icon) from the top toolbar to create a new module
• Choose “Latest JEvents” from the list of Module Types.
• Name your module – I named it “Shabbat Times” (without quotes)
• Select a position, if you need it anywhere on your website (AcyMailing doesn’t need any position so for that purpose, leave it blank)
• From the “Basic Options”, under “Select Categories” choose “Shabbat Times” or whatever you named the JEvents category..
• Leave all other settings “as is”. Recommended – Control the number of events shown under “Display Mode” – I choose option #0 (current/following week events) for the sake of the weekly newsletter.
• Click Save & Close.

Next year features an anomaly for American Jews – The first day of Hanukkah coincides with Thanksgiving, on 11/28/2013 (meaning the first night of Hanukkah is actually the night before Thanksgiving). I was curious how often this happens. It turns out that it has never happened before…and it will never happen again.

(Correction: it happened once before, in 1888: see Addendum.)

Please let us know what you think — consider posting a comment on our Hebcal Facebook page.

For developers curious about the redesign, we’re using the Bootstrap front-end framework. The functionality of the website is still a mish-mosh of Perl, PHP, C, SQLite and MySQL.

1. Open Thunderbird with Lightning installed.
2. Now, switch to calendar view by clicking the Calendar icon next to the tab bar. Next, go to the File menu, select New and select the Calendar… item.
3. In the Add a calendar wizard, select On the network and click Next.
4. From the Format list, select iCalendar (ICS) and enter the calendar location (with the “http://” prefix) that you just copied into the Address textbox. Click Next.
5. Give the holiday calendar a name or leave the default value. If you want, you can select a color in which all of the holidays are highlighted. Click Next
6. Click Finish to exit the wizard.

Here are some screenshots:

Thunderbird Lightning - Step 1

Thunderbird Lightning - Step 2

Thunderbird Lightning - Step 3

Thunderbird Lightning - Step 4

When this fast day falls on Friday, we do in fact observe the fast on Friday, even though Shabbat follows immediately.

It is only in years when the date of the fast falls on Shabbat that the fast is moved. In this case, Ta’anit Bechorot is moved back to Thursday, because it is preferable not to fast immediately before Shabbat.

Source: Mishnah Berurah: the classic commentary to Shulchan Aruch Orach Chayim, comprising the laws of daily Jewish conduct, Volume V (B), Pesach. §470: “That the first-born fast on Erev Pesach.”

We had a stale copy of the WordPress content management system for our Help and News pages, so some malicious person/machine exploited a loophole. We have upgraded to the latest copy and have removed all traces of the virus from our website.

Our sincere apologies for any inconvenience we may have caused.

Touch Subscribed Calendars to see the list:

Then, tap the Hebcal calendar to delete:

Touch the red Delete Account button, then touch Delete Account again to confirm.