V'dibarta Bam

@Shokhet Yes, @MonicaCellio, nice idea, especially now that the plural "publications" is more than just minimally justified. Maybe I'll try my hand at it, though I'm no graphical whiz.

@YeZ Spolsky and Atwood are mumchim in "bechol levavecha" blog.codinghorror.com/the-gamification

havarka

@Shokhet do you like the answer?

Shokhet

@havarka I do; it's something I heard before, but hadn't considered with regards to this question. Thanks for answering!

....I'll likely hold off accepting the answer for a bit, give other people a shot at answering (some people don't like to answer questions that already have accepted answers)

Isaac Moses

@Shokhet and the phrase "you make" in the titles

havarka

I didn't want to have my question accepted, just upvoted :D :P

Shokhet

1:40 AM

@IsaacMoses Also true. Do we want/need a new tag for [blessings], that's about "giving a brachah" rather than about "making a bracha"?

havarka

But then, why to mention both? Perhaps cause one was learning with Ya'akov or Yosef?! Don't remember exactly, while the other one doing business?!

@Shokhet Those are two different things, Person makes broche over food, Rebbe gives broche to a person

Shokhet

@havarka Are you asking about the suggested answer that I wrote in the question?

Isaac Moses

@Shokhet Eh. How many existing blessing questions fit that meaning?

Shokhet

@havarka I know; as things are now, they're both under the same tag, blessing

havarka

@Shokhet no

Shokhet

1:43 AM

@IsaacMoses It would make them easier to find, I think. IIRC we have a bunch of questions about "how does giving a bracha work" and such....and mine....it would make it easier to find them. As the wiki is written now, my question actually doesn't fit under the tag.

@havarka Then I have no idea what you're talking about. Can you explain that question a little more?

havarka

According to my answer, it would be sufficent to mention one of them, so why to mention both?! Perhaps, that even when you not learning, you can still stay frum. @Shokhet

Shokhet

@havarka That makes sense.

....but didn't both of them stay frum?

havarka

they did, but even the one who was not learning!

Isaac Moses

@Shokhet Sounds convincing to me. What would you call the other tag? blessings-of-people?

Shokhet

@IsaacMoses Hm.....I don't know

I might raise it on Meta, see what others think about retagging (which might be a major project), as well as about the name of the new tag

Shokhet

2:58 AM

Do we have a Meta post about how "even if the answers to a question will answer another question, that doesn't mean that it's a duplicate"?

.....someone is arguing that this question is a duplicate of this one; I think he's wrong.

Charles Koppelman

3:30 AM

@Shokhet I am just not sure that is based on Judaism, rather on plumbing. And we are not a community of expert plumbers.

or at least that's not why I'm here. If we ARE a community of expert plumbers, have I got a job for you guys!

2

YeZ

NOOOO I lost my hat!

Shokhet

4:03 AM

@CharlesKoppelman I agree, but I wasn't so sure.

@Matt @Yishai @MonicaCellio are the ones (who are pingable in chat) who voted to reopen -- what do you think?

....to recap: I think that this question is off-topic, because it's not about Judaism, even though it asks for experience-based advice

Meta-Man

0

Q: New blessing tag?

Currently, blessing covers questions that ask about two entirely different ideas -- that of (as the tag wiki says) "short prayers called b'rachos ("benedictions" or "blessings"), generally said to thank God for specific events," as well as questions that ask about a bracha that I might give you, ...

Shokhet

....anyone have a Meta post for me?

@Fred The fact that answers to another question will answer a different question does not make them duplicates of each other. ....I went looking for a Meta post to that effect, but couldn't find one easily enough. I think that this is generally how this site operates, though. — Shokhet 13 secs ago

.....I base this on several comments (that I can't find at the moment) that high-rep users and/or moderators here made the above argument in comments to a "possible duplicate" question

YeZ

@Shokhet I've made that argument several times before.

Shokhet

@YeZ Great! So I'll use you as the mekor for that :)

....maybe I'll put up a new Meta post?

YeZ

Secret motivation for this question - some guy called me an "idiot" for not following his (incorrect) understanding of a certain halacha. A grown man actually called me an idiot. I was far too shocked to be offended. But I want to show him a source when I tell him he should probably cease from ever rebuking anyone again.

Shokhet

4:16 AM

@YeZ Wow. ....you should know, though, that this source would probably also tell you not to give tochacha at all, wouldn't it?

YeZ

@Shokhet Yes. I make a practice of not giving tochacha at all. Sometimes, I will show someone in a sefer what it says, as a point of interest, not as "telling them what to do."

Shokhet

@YeZ Hm.

.....I do know some people who have made serious basic mistakes.....thanks for the reminder to try really hard to remain respectful of people, no matter what knowledge they're missing.

Even though I thought they had no excuse to make these mistakes.....that's still no reason to not accord them proper respect.

YeZ

@Scimonster I hereby grant you rights to ask on Meta why I got to keep my hats. :P

Shokhet

4:37 AM

.....as it so happens, blessing is one we should watch -- it currently has 601 questions. 12 more.....

@YeZ here's one: meta.judaism.stackexchange.com/q/1339/5323

meta.judaism.stackexchange.com/q/1569/5323 + meta.judaism.stackexchange.com/q/506/5323 as well

Monica Cellio

@Shokhet I have made that argument. Questions and their duplicity should be evaluated on the question, not possible answers.

@Shokhet it looks like a "Jewish life" question to me, akin to product recommendations (where can I find a thingamabob that satisfies halacha?) or other "how do I do this in a halachically-acceptable manner?" questions. The part about recommendations for installation may be a bit afield, granted.

Shokhet

@MonicaCellio I found several relevant Meta posts, listed in the comment above yours. I agree, I was just wondering if there was a Meta post I could link to for convenience.

Monica Cellio

@Shokhet as somebody who has made basic mistakes sometimes, I appreciate being pointed in the right direction and also appreciate people assuming that it was an honest mistake and not that I'm an idiot or worse. It should be possible to gently guide people without embarrassing them.

@Shokhet ah. It feels like there ought to be, but I haven't gone looking yet. Just catching up on the room now, sorry.

Shokhet

@MonicaCellio I try very hard, but it's difficult sometimes. I will never make fun of someone to their face, but I have to work on how I think of them, behind their backs, also. (I happen to think you're pretty educated, Judaism-wise)

@MonicaCellio That's all right; we all do that, don't we? :)

Monica Cellio

4:54 AM

@Shokhet it is difficult sometimes, yes. Thank you for the compliment. I tend to think of myself as pretty educated for someone who had to figure this out as an adult, but I don't hold a candle to people who had the benefit of a good Jewish education from childhood. And that's fine -- no resentment -- but just a reminder that we don't all have the same background and some will work harder than others at "basic" things.

Shokhet

@MonicaCellio But he's not asking about halachic opinions on the piece -- he wants to know if it works well, as a hot water urn. I think that's more similar to a wine recommendation than to the question about improving tefillah

@MonicaCellio Right.

Monica Cellio

Like, I'm only now figuring out the whole toiveling thing, and that's kinda awkward, but what can you do?

Shokhet

@MonicaCellio ....most of the people who draw my ire for not knowing things are the ones that I tell myself should know better; but who am I to say what they should and shouldn't know?

....but that's really just a weak excuse, is all it is

Monica Cellio

@Shokhet yeah, that's hard. If there are people you went to school with, for example, and you know they learned the same things you did but they weren't paying attention, that's frustrating. I sometimes have to work hard to see the positive explanation for the negative behavior, but I usually find it worth the effort. But I had to learn to do that, too.

@Shokhet hmm, maybe. How would you feel if the question were about learning programs for high-school students, or camps, or seforim?

Shokhet

@MonicaCellio how-to avoid thinking negatively about people? ;-)

Monica Cellio

4:59 AM

@Shokhet if you can distill it down into a question that's answerable and not too broad, go for it!

It's an important topic.

Ohr Somayach used to publish a series of articles called "The Other Side of the Story" that I found very helpful in this, BTW. I don't know if they're archived somewhere; I was getting them by email in, um, the late 90s I think.

Shokhet

@MonicaCellio But those questions ask for things, with Jewish requirements, kinda like a niddah calendar, even if there are other requirements, besides. This is asking "I know this is halachically okay -- don't talk to me about halacha; does it work well?" .....no Jewish requirements there

@MonicaCellio I think I remember reading those. They were printed in the OHRNET newsletter, weren't they?

Monica Cellio

@Shokhet ok, I can see that. (It does also ask if there were halachic issues that came up in use, but I grant that it's an aside.) I'd like to see what the other voters have to say before doing anything unilateral.

Shokhet

@MonicaCellio Fair enough.

Monica Cellio

@Shokhet I don't think I was aware of the OHRNET newsletter at the time, but they had several subscribe-by-email weekly publications. I remember that one and their ask-the-rabbi one, oh and a parsha one.

Shokhet

@MonicaCellio I think the newsletter went out by email; all of those things were in the newsletter. There was also a set of ~20 QnA sets about Rashi on the parsha, right?

and stories about Eretz Yisrael

YeZ

5:05 AM

@Shokhet I am with you, except that his 2. and 4. do seem to be halachically motivated questions. Perhaps it should be fine-tuned?

Monica Cellio

@Shokhet ah. It sounds like there was a "roll-up" of all the weekly publications, but I was subscribing to some of them individually instead of that.

Shokhet

@MonicaCellio Ah. I see.

Monica Cellio

Getting late here and (sadly) I must go to work in the morning. TZT all!

Shokhet

@MonicaCellio Gnight! TZT

....I'll have to leave soon also.

YeZ

@MonicaCellio Goodnight.

Shokhet

5:08 AM

@YeZ 4, I think, is a completely separate question, and should be removed and asked seperately. If we remove everything except 2, then I think it would be a fine question.

YeZ

@Shokhet I hear that. It is somewhat related, and if it was only question 2, then I could hear it being one question - Are there halachic issues with this, and is there an alternative method without halachic issues

@Shokhet And valid question != fine question

Shokhet

@YeZ Fair. We were talking in the context of on- and off-topic, so I thought that "fine" should be read in that manner.

@MonicaCellio I'll give it a try; but it's too late, tonight. Maybe tomorrow.

YeZ

@Shokhet I know. I just wanted to score a pedantry point. cc @IsaacMoses

Shokhet

@YeZ :)

Dec 18 '14 at 19:22, by Isaac Moses

@YeZ So I scored a pedantry point.

I have to go now. TZT @YeZ, @all!

YeZ

nighty night.

Shokhet

5:13 AM

@YeZ Now it appears that I've ~~won~~ scored a pedantry point as well! :P

YeZ

@Shokhet Shh. Go to sleep.

Isaac Moses

2:13 PM

@CharlesKoppelman The question is clearly asking for advice from the point of view of consumers, not plumbers, and specifically, Judaism-observing consumers who purchased this product for use in the observance of Judaism to evaluate it in that context. Not only is that something a collection of experts on Judaism is somewhat likely to produce, it's something that a collection of experts on plumbing is very unlikely to produce.

@Shokhet, I voted to close when the post was much less specific about what it was requesting.

Shokhet

2:26 PM

@IsaacMoses Hm...so what do you think of @YeZ's suggestion of removing all but question(s) 2 (and 4)?

Isaac Moses

2:43 PM

@Shokhet I see no reason to force that on OP. 1 and 3 are both specific to this product, whose users would be pretty much exclusively observant Jews. 4 could be posted as a separate question, as it has nothing to do with experience-based advice about using this product.

Scimonster

3:30 PM

I'm no graphics whiz either, but i'll try my hand at a MYP ad.

Isaac Moses

@Scimonster thanks

Scimonster

4:18 PM

Thoughts?

I am able to change it, so please suggest improvements!

Isaac Moses

@Scimonster It's a little mono-color

@Scimonster The double line under the title looks off

@Scimonster A photo of the three cover pages, arrayed on a table, might look better.

@Scimonster "Edited collections of" instead of "Hand-Picked"?

@Scimonster "From Mi Yodeya" in the text looks superfluous.

@Scimonster I think I'd use a smaller font for the text than the title and increase the size of the pic

@Scimonster Thanks very much for doing this. All suggestions offered in the spirit of making a good ad even better.

Meta-Man

4:33 PM

0

Q: Strange tag synonym behavior

I have seen some strange behavior with tagging this week's parasha. I started typing parashat-s and was surprised to not see parashat-shemot come up as an auto-complete suggestion. What I saw was: So I figured this was one of those cases where we simply don't have the sefaradi pronunciation ...

discussion tag-synonyms tagging

Scimonster

@IsaacMoses What's off about it? It's basically the same as in c-my.

@IsaacMoses I agree. I tried to suggest that, but failed miserably. :)

Isaac Moses

@Scimonster There's a box around the title, and one of the three sides of that box is different from the others.

Scimonster

@IsaacMoses Yeah, the would probably be better.

Isaac Moses

@Scimonster The similar box in the documents is finely doubled all around.

Scimonster

@IsaacMoses I guess i'll have to take a closer.look

Isaac Moses

4:42 PM

@IsaacMoses or "Edited booklets of"

Scimonster

@IsaacMoses Ah, i see. It has a more natural, less sharp look.

Shokhet

5:13 PM

@IsaacMoses Hm. I see you've edited out question 4; I still think that 1 and 3 are off-topic, though. 2 is enough to leave the question open, I think. cc @YeZ @MonicaCellio @Yishai @CharlesKoppelman @anyone-else-I-forgot-to-ping-who's-already-been-pung-about-this

Isaac Moses

3 hours ago, by Isaac Moses

@Shokhet I see no reason to force that on OP. 1 and 3 are both specific to this product, whose users would be pretty much exclusively observant Jews. 4 could be posted as a separate question, as it has nothing to do with experience-based advice about using this product.

Shokhet

@IsaacMoses I saw that already; that's what I was responding to. Is there something I missed? (I know I didn't respond directly to the point that the users of said product would be exclusively observant Jews; I'm just not sure how that relates to the site's scope)

Isaac Moses

@Shokhet Oh, sorry. I didn't look at what you were responding to or who you were. I thought you were CharlesKoppelman responding to a previous message. Did you know that extreme laziness can cause functional myopia?

The previous message is entirely sincere.

Shokhet

@IsaacMoses I didn't think otherwise. I'm still chuckling at "Did you know that extreme laziness can cause functional myopia?" :D

FTR, "Is there something I missed?" was also sincere, though very terse

Isaac Moses

@Shokhet I'm still mentally hanging my head.

@Shokhet It is reasonable to ask a collection of experts on Judaism about their practical experiences with a product that is specifically designed for and marketed to observers of Judaism, for the purpose of observing Judaism.

Shokhet

5:21 PM

@IsaacMoses Don't; I also respond to chat messages without always checking who wrote them, it's something we all do.

@IsaacMoses Couldn't you make a similar argument about Jewish history? (or rather, the history of the Jews?)

Isaac Moses

@Shokhet Go ahead.

Shokhet

@IsaacMoses ?

Isaac Moses

@Shokhet "It is reasonable to ask a collection of experts on Judaism about ..." (complete the sentence)

Shokhet

@IsaacMoses Working on it

"It is reasonable to ask a collection of experts on Judaism about" the history of the Jewish people, because this collection would be well-equipped to answer these questions. Additionally, it's also relevant to those who would like to "[observe] Judaism," isn't it? ....and yet, "history of the Jewish people" has a designated close reason.

(took to long to reword my argument into the form of "It is reasonable to ask...." :P)

Isaac Moses

@Shokhet well-equipped coincidentally, not due to being experts on Judaism. How is Jewish history [directly] relevant to observance of Judaism?

Shokhet

5:29 PM

@IsaacMoses I could ask you the same question about the question "how long does this product go without malfunction?"

Isaac Moses

Note that we're not talking about history of Judaism, which is explicitly in-scope

Shokhet

@IsaacMoses Right. That's why I took care to write "history of the Jewish people," or some such wording

yeah, that's what I wrote :)

Isaac Moses

@Shokhet Maintenance of the product is a component of the person's observance of Judaism. Knowledge of its mean time between failures is directly relevant to and a result of its use in the observance of Judaism.

Shokhet

I have to run (like now now :P); we'll continue this later, okay?

Isaac Moses

@Shokhet later

Charles Koppelman

6:41 PM

@Shokhet I'm not committed enough to fight in any way on this. If the community finds it a valuable question, that's good enough for me.

Meta-Man

0

Q: Why was my comment deleted?

I put wrote relevant comment to this question. It was even upvoted. Now, both it, and DoubleAA's noticing a typo, are deleted. What happened? I am not upset, I just want to understand the process.

support comments specific-question deleted-answers

Charles Koppelman

I think there will be more valuable answers on the Halacha front than on the maintenance front, but.... that's what democracy is for

@Scimonster Make Chanukah, Purim and Hagadah legible at minimum. Also, no need to capitalize "From" or "For"

but great work and truly cool

YeZ

How do I make a link that goes to exactly the part of the page that I want?

Isaac Moses

@YeZ If the part of the page you want is a MY answer, append #123456, where 123456 is the ID of the answer.

@YeZ In general, you can only do that with webpages that have anchor tags in their source code for various parts of the page.

YeZ

6:57 PM

@IsaacMoses How do I know if they do?

I Know Mechon Mamre, for example, does.

Isaac Moses

@YeZ You could do "view source" in your browser and look for tags that start with <a name=

... if you find them, you can link to those spots on the page by linking to that page and appending # followed by whatever comes after name=.

YeZ

@IsaacMoses OK I assume it won't have it if there are no clearly defined breaks in a page of text.

Isaac Moses

@YeZ Usually not

Isaac Moses

7:34 PM

@MonicaCellio Here's the take of rabbinic internet personality R' Eliyahu Fink and my reaction. I haven't yet read this TorahMusings post linked by its author in the same comment thread, but intend to.

Scimonster

@IsaacMoses Please no. <a name> is outdated. Use <anyelem id=""> now.

@CharlesKoppelman I can read it... But i think i'll take an actual photo of the three on a wooden table and use that.

Isaac Moses

@MonicaCellio ... continuing this conversation.

YeZ

@IsaacMoses I only read your response (out of context) and assumed the gist of the post based thereon, but well said!

Isaac Moses

@Scimonster I'm not advocating a coding style. I'm describing how to find something. <a name> is used, for example, in SE pages.

Scimonster

@CharlesKoppelman If it wasn't at the beginning of a line, i would agree, but it looks better capitalized at the beginning.

Isaac Moses

7:38 PM

@YeZ Thanks!

Scimonster

@IsaacMoses But so is id. And id can be used to link to things that weren't intended. I'm pretty sure SE also uses IDs, but I'm on iPad so i can't check.

Isaac Moses

@Scimonster How can you use it to link to things that weren't intended? (That sounds very useful.)

Scimonster

@Shokhet I don't get it.

@IsaacMoses Just find any random element that has an id, and link to that id (in the hash).

YeZ

@Scimonster Please explain as if you're talking to a 6 year old.

Scimonster

Lots of things have IDs for styling and scripting purposes.

YeZ

7:41 PM

@Scimonster And not a 2015 6 year old - maybe a 1999 6 year old.

Scimonster

@YeZ Let me see if the internet connection stretches to my computer.

Monica Cellio

@IsaacMoses "not waste but expenditure" -- very insightful.

Isaac Moses

@YeZ Wouldn't that be ~1991? :)

@MonicaCellio Thanks

@YeZ Looks like you can View Page Source, find anything that says ... id=SOMETHING ..., and then link to that point in the page with #SOMETHING. Right, @Scimonster?

Scimonster

@IsaacMoses Yes, thank you for saving me the explanation. :)

Isaac Moses

@Scimonster ... trying it with random ids on an SE content page, and it's not working

... oh, one sec ...

I take it back.

Here's a link to http://judaism.stackexchange.com/questions/51368/testing-hashem-for-monetary-ga‌in#feed-link, which drops you at the bottom of the page, where the feed link is.

... the footnotes and their backlinks in TorahMusings posts are a good example of the use of ID

http://www.torahmusings.com/2015/01/conducting-business-non-kosher-food/#fn59-‌38361 links to a particular footnote, and the arrow there contains a similar link back to the place where the note is referenced in the document. These backlinks could also be used (in an article as footnoted as this one, at least) to link directly to various parts of the article.

YeZ

8:01 PM

@IsaacMoses I was trying to assess what year a 6 year old would have the amount of computer knowledge that I have now.

Isaac Moses

@YeZ A tricky estimation

YeZ

@IsaacMoses thus בלשונו הזהב נקט "maybe"

Isaac Moses

@YeZ FWIW, my two children who turned six in the past few years have less computer knowledge than is required to be a highly-productive Yodeyan.

Scimonster

Oh know, i started reading this. There go hours of productivity...

827

Q: What is your best programmer joke?

When I teach introductory computer science courses, I like to lighten the mood with some humor. Having a sense of fun about the material makes it less frustrating and more memorable, and it's even motivating if the joke requires some technical understanding to 'get it'! I'll start off with a cou...

language-agnostic

YeZ

@Scimonster and you had to just share it with us, didn't you.

Isaac Moses

8:10 PM

YeZ

@IsaacMoses I'm far too busy answering MY questions to go through programming jokes.

Isaac Moses

@YeZ B"H!

YeZ

I left my Malbim elsewhere. I can't find on chumash on Hebrew books. Help?

Isaac Moses

@YeZ onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/webbin/book/… looks quite promising

YeZ

@IsaacMoses Hebrewbooks also has eretz chemda, but I can't just find the regular perush al hachumash.

Ok I found devarim and bamidbar on hebrew books. No sign of Shemos.

Isaac Moses

8:22 PM

@YeZ Is this ("HaTorah vehaMitzva") not that?

YeZ

@IsaacMoses Do you see it on shemos?

Isaac Moses

@YeZ That doc appears to be the whole Pentateuch

YeZ

@IsaacMoses Hmm I see Bamidbar. Maybe I don't know what I'm doing here.

Isaac Moses

@YeZ oh, wait. me too

YeZ

yay!

YeZ

8:54 PM

NOTICE TO THE PUBLIC: Do to suspicious activities, a 3 hour voting moratorium has been placed on all of YeZ's posts. If you wish to vote on any of his posts, please hold off until the next UTC day. Thank you.

3

Meta-Man

9:24 PM

1

Q: Someone answered a duplicate question

I was surprised when I saw a question rise to the top of Mi Yodeya's stack, that said "answered," while the question title said duplicate. Is this a bug? Here's a link to the question; here's a link to the answer.

bug answers exact-duplicates closed-questions

YeZ

Wow - I wrote "do to" in my big public service announcement.

Shokhet

10:27 PM

@Scimonster I'm not sure what it is you don't get.

@CharlesKoppelman You have opted out on receiving updates for this question. Shokhet (inc) will not send you any more emails about this question.

@IsaacMoses Hm....I'll have to think about that one. If you think that's enough to make it on-topic....

Charles Koppelman

@Scimonster I wasn't sure if this was serious or an homage to The Daily WTF

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