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Full Description
About - Bar Ilan Responsa 14
The Global Jewish Database (the Responsa Project) contains the world's largest electronic collection of Jewish texts ever recorded, which embody thousands of years of Jewish learning. The database includes numerous works from the Responsa Literature - rabbinic case-law rulings which represent the historical-sociological milieu of real-life situations. In addition, the database includes the Bible, the Talmud and their principal commentaries; works about Jewish law and customs; major codes of Jewish law, such as Maimonides' Mishneh Torah and the Shulchan Aruch with its principal commentaries; midrashim, Aggadah and Zohar.
The database also includes a subject index to some of the Responsa and Poskim, and and index to journal articles which discuss various aspects of Jewish law.
The Responsa CD features the full texts of the relevant databases, accompanied by sophisticated retrieval tools, including hypertext links, which enable users to search, retrieve and compare texts from different periods, displaying them in different windows on one's computer.
Special attention has been paid to minimize typographical errors, and we encourage our users to notify us about any mistakes they have discovered; such errors are corrected in future releases of the Responsa Project CD.
The Project is one of Bar-Ilan University's most impressive achievements. The Project was initiated when the computer was in its early stages. Today, after four decades of work invested in the development of algorithms and digitizing and editing texts, the Project has become an invaluable treasure, accessible to all, and useful to beginners and experts alike.
The Responsa software uses a sophisticated searching engine which is extremely powerful, yet easy to use. It is thus possible to locate material in more than 68,000 Responsa on every facet of Jewish law, and in more than 142 million words of traditional Jewish teaching.
The Global Jewish Database has become an indispensable tool for every student of Halachah - for lawyers, judges, scholars and laymen.
Features - Bar Ilan Responsa 14
For a full listing of included texts in version 14, click here.
For a listing of new texts and features in version 14, click here.
For a listing of new texts in previous versions, click here.
* Search for a word, phrase, or expression in relevant texts. You can also search for a wide variety of variant forms, specify combined search components, etc.
* Using the hypertext links, you can locate and display related sources spanning thousands of years.
* Display on screen hundreds of classic texts.
* Print your search results.
* Save your search results and other texts, in order to view them or print them later with a word processor or use them in other searches.
* Display biographies of hundreds of responsa authors and other Talmudic and post-Talmudic scholars from medieval times to the present.
* Calculate the gematria (numerical value) of any expression of your choice, and find biblical verses or expressions with any specified gematria.
* Compare parallel Talmudic and other texts.
* Display Torah texts which are mentioned by other Talmudic texts with the click of a mouse (hypertext).
* Look up abbreviations in an online dictionary.
* Search for vocalized text (Nikud) in Tanach.
* Display text of the Torah and commentaries according to the weekly Torah portion.
Images - Bar Ilan Responsa 14
Bar Ilan Responsa Hypertext Flowchart
Reviews - Bar Ilan Responsa 14
JUDY SIEGEL-ITZKOVICH (5/1/2004) wrote:
Rating: 5 Stars out of 5
Bar-Ilan's Global Jewish Database (Responsa Project): Version 12 Plus, a set of two CD-ROMs (one for installation only) in Hebrew (menu language only is in English as well), produced in Israel by The Responsa Project, Bar-Ilan University, accompanied by a 120-page user's manual in Hebrew or English, distributed abroad by Torah Educational Software (TES - www.jewishsoftware.com), requires Windows 98 and up and a Pentium 133 Mhz PC or better, for ages 12 through adult.
It isn't often that you can a lot more from a product for a lot less money than it cost originally.
One is the latest version of Bar-Ilan University's Global Jewish Database, which was first priced almost $2,000 when it was first issued in 1990. The largest database of its kind, it includes the full text of the Bible and its major commentaries, the Babylonian Talmud with Rashi's commentary and Tosafot, the Jerusalem Talmud, the Rambam's Mishneh Torah, the Shulhan Aruch with commentaries, midrashim, 369 books of Responsa (halachic questions and answers by sages over the millennia until contemporary times), and the Talmudic Encyclopedia.
Three thousand years of Jewish creativity and more than 142 million words of Jewish law are captured in a single CD-ROM, making it a perfect purchase for Shavuot or any time of the year. Tens of thousands of copies have been sold since its first appearance, and while the customers were at first mostly libraries and yeshivot, at little more than half the original price, it is now purchased more often by individuals than institutions.
Not only do institutions find it increasingly prohibitive to purchase printed volumes, but many of them are out of print and hard to locate. The oldest of the texts were typed into the database by hand instead of being electronically scanned to avoid damaging the fragile pages. But on disk, these classic works can last forever, and texts can be found instantaneously instead of having to spend hours hunting by hand.
The new version allows users to display cross references and commentaries on an individual biblical verse; print multiple texts consecutively without page breaks; view texts either according to their historical period or alphabetical order; customize the appearance of the database trees; scroll the database with a mouse wheel; search notes and annotated texts; and print and save text and notes. In addition, if you lack a Hebrew keyboard attached to your computer, you can enter words with a virtual Hebrew keyboard in the program.
It is certainly very user friendly. You can view texts in any of dozens of Hebrew fonts and in sizes of up to 72 points so that it's suitable even for the visually disabled. The formidable search engine is very speedy, looking for a single Hebrew word or phrase in a specific work or the entire database collection. It's worth "splurging" on the "Plus" edition to get the Talmudic Encyclopedia, whose 28th volume is added to the collection with this latest version.
Among the new books in the most recent version are books by the Rambam and Sefer Hasidim.The Responsa collection now contains more than 68,000 questions (compared to a mere 10,000 only two versions ago) dealing with every facet of Jewish law.
Extra tools include a digital Jewish/Gregorian calendar that covers the years from 1583 all the way to 2239 in the future (perfect for planning your great-great-grandchildren's bar and bat mitzvas). Not only can you find details about a specific lunar and solar year, but also the Shabbat and holiday portions. If you want to find Hebrew words or verses whose numerical value equals that of your name or any other word, these are automatically displayed in a matter of seconds in the disk's Gematriya section. To my astonishment, when I entered the Hebrew names of my eldest child and that of my husband's, out popped my own Hebrew name as one of the alternatives!
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