Qiblafinder

 New and noted:

Google Qiblafinder

Ijithad in action

Baraka Blue

Iranian teacher builds robot to teach prayer

AP, Iranian teacher builds robot to teach prayer "Rezaei who has built a robot to show to children how to execute daily prayers, has innovated an amusing way of encouraging young children to say their daily prayers by using the science of robotics." (this is the original article: also see my post below - this one has the advantage of a range of photographs!)

Prayer mat designed to light up when facing Mecca

alarabiya.net, Prayer mat designed to light up when facing Mecca "“I was looking at designing flying carpets, but I came to a point where I needed to add a function to the project,” Ozenc told Mashable. “Then I came up with the prayer mat idea.”

"EL Sajaddah is not only functional, but artsy, as it is made mainly to be hung on the wall of the owner’s home. The carpet’s design is based on contemporary vector art, with the mosque on the carpet inspired by the Blue Mosque in Turkey. The base is black -- a nod to the Kaaba --, the motif is green -- the color of Islam --, which radiates light."

Mecca: Live Streaming Prayers

arabcrunch.com, YouTube Starts Live Streaming Prayers from Mecca, 1 Aug 2011 "Google has its ways to greet Muslims during Ramadan, it has announced that it is launching Makkah Live a channel that is video live streaming from Al-Masjid al-Haram in Mecca during Ramadan. The live streaming is done in collaboration with Saudi culture and media ministry." [posted retrospectively] Link:

Google Adds Islamic Prayer Times in Search

ArabCrunch, Google Adds Islamic Prayer Times in Search just picked this one up

"Google shows snippet of movies show times in many countries in its search resluts, today google announced that it launched Islamic Prayer Times in search results highlighted from pages across the web."

'Surfing the App Souq: Islamic Applications for Mobile Devices'

Here's my new article for 'CyberOrient'. Gary R. Bunt, 'Surfing the App Souq: Islamic Applications for Mobile Devices'

Apps

Mary Flynn, abcnews, God? There's an App for That: Apps Are Making It Easier to Access Religious Texts, Prayers and Practices From Anywhere, 22 Jul 2010 following on from my presentation on this issue here at WOCMES, here's a related article. "Most Muslims are raised with family members to guide them through the customs, traditions or even how to pray, she said. She has had to make her own way with the help of Internet research (Islamicfinder.com), and she relies heavily on her iPhone apps for reference. Among her collection of apps is an Islamic dictionary, a digital copy of the Quran and another that helps her learn Arabic."

My article on apps should be out online in a couple of weeks.

Calendars

Telegraph, Ask Rick: online banking, Islamic calendars, faulty batteries, computer recycling and user accounts, 13 Jul 2010 Islamic calendars advice in the Telegraph (also check out my Islamic Studies Pathways pages)

Iran 'prayer sellers'

Reuters, In Islamic Iran prayer sellers' trade is booming, 28 June 2010 "In Islamic Iran where clerics rule, unofficial "prayer sellers," who promise to intercede with the divine to solve all manner of life's problems, are seeing their business boom." Prayers can be purchased online.

'Islam in Cyberspace: South Asian Muslims in America Log In'

Currently reading:

Smeeta Mishraab & Gaby Semaan, Islam in Cyberspace: South Asian Muslims in America Log In, Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, Volume 54, Issue 1 January 2010 , pages 87 - 101 "This study explores how South Asian Muslims in the United States use the Internet for religious purposes. In-depth interviews of 25 respondents show that they used the Internet to listen to religious lectures, look up information about prayer times, holidays, halal food, rules regarding the recitation of the Qur'an, and correct pronunciation of Arabic words. The anonymity offered by the Internet helped them seek Islamic answers to deeply personal questions. Many respondents made lifestyle decisions after accessing multiple opinions on an issue on the Internet. However, it was difficult to definitively conclude whether access to competing interpretations of Islam necessarily led to moderate or extreme lifestyle choices."

Details here

'Jihad by Night' op-ed

Yahya Ibrahim, Saudi Gazette, Jihad by Night, 21 Apr 2010 "Our audacity, at times, tempts us to feel content with our current level of devotion and ‘Ibadah (worship). The internet becomes our Da’wah, the Masjid our hangout, and the brothers – da brothas. Our ‘Ibadah is weak but our talk is uninhibited. Our dreary lives, jobs, lack of jobs, idle free time and stress cause us to have grandiose self-assessments and an over estimation of our true nearness to the Divine."

"Oh Allah, we seek refuge with You from the snooze button"

Aishah, muslimmatters.org, Oh Allah, we seek refuge with You from the snooze button, 29 Mar 2010 "It’s 5:45 and your Fajr alarm has just begun ringing. You tried to be smart and set the alarm and your ringer as the same tone so you’d think that someone was calling you, because, of course, answering a call is much more exciting than trying to figure out how to snooze the alarm this early in the morning. But, you’re smarter than you thought, and caught on to the trick. The reverse psychology failed." non-tech (apart from the alarm clock - but a nice piece)

"US Muslims Debate Choice Of Arabic, English In Sermons"

Interesting article, which reflects ongoing discussions elsewhere:

Rachel Zoll, AP/Huffington Post, US Muslims Debate Choice Of Arabic, English In Sermons, 21 Feb 2010 "On suhaibwebb.com, a Web forum for Muslims in the West, writer Abu Majeed said in a post last month that while his English-language sermons were accepted without protest at several U.S. mosques, he was derided by one South Florida congregation as a modernist who violated Islamic law. Foreign-born imams, or prayer leaders, who moved here to serve immigrant communities, have sometimes reinforced the thinking that only Arabic is acceptable. Other mosques might use Arabic and Urdu – a language from Pakistan, India and elsewhere in Asia – but no English."

See suhaibwebb.com for more information.

Recording the hajj

Anwar Al-Sayed, Arab News, ‘Preserving’ journey of faith for life, 4 Dec 09 "While many pilgrims were raising their hands in prayer, others were lifting cameras and mobile phones, photographing scenes from Haj. A number of pilgrims were keen to take advantage of their presence in Makkah and the holy sites to document life’s most sacred journey."

The use of cameras during the hajj raises a number of interesting religious issues, which have been addressed in various opinions over the years.

'Website closes down for prayer'

Hassna'a Mokhtar, Arab News, Website closes down for prayer, 15 Sep 09 "While the debate on stopping all commercial activity during prayer times continues, one local online newspaper in Hail province has decided to advocate for this pause by taking down its site for 20 minutes, five times a day.

"If visitors to Aen Hail (“Hail’s Eye” at http://aenhail.com) visit the site during prayers, they be met with a message “Closed for Prayer” in Arabic along with a countdown to the end of the prayer break at the bottom of the page."

There's a selection of interesting views on this story; presumably no allowance is made for time-zone shifts. Will it be a precedent for other sites?

Muezzin bot

sabily.org, Muezzin bot, "The Sabily team has just developed a useful jabber bot: the "Muezzin bot". It can send you Instant Messages when it is time to pray. It can also display the prayer times of the day."

Sabily 9.04 released

Softpedia Linux Weekly, Issue 44, Ubuntu Muslim Edition Is Now Known as Sabily "Sabily 9.04 has full support for both English and Arabic languages and comes with customized artwork including Usplash, GDM and Metacity themes, cursors and wallpapers. One of the most important applications for Muslims has to be the Minbar, a prayer time app especially useful for those unable to hear the Azaan. Moreover, monajat will pop up Islamic prayers at specified times and firefox-praytimes will display prayer times directly into the Firefox web browser. The Islamic calendar is available through hijra and there is also an Othman Quran Browser in the form of mus-haf Othman. Zekr is another great Quran study tool that you can find in Sabily 9.04. The powerful DansGuardian web content filtering tool is installed and can easily be configured through the frontend provided by Webstrict."

Useful review. I discuss the earlier edition of this in iMuslims.

Here's Sabily's website, where you can download the product in its various versions.

Sun Dial

physorg.com, Sun Dial uses mobile phones to alert Muslims to prayer "Researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology have developed a mobile application known as Sun Dial, which alerts Muslim users when it's time to perform the five daily prayers known as salat. The device is currently being discussed this week at the human-computer interaction conference, CHI, in Boston."



Also see: GVU Center, Georgia Tech, Sun Dial: Exploring Techno-Spiritual Design through a Mobile Islamic Call to Prayer Application, "Sun Dial is a mobile phone application that supports Muslims’ prayer practices, . Our projects responds to the growing interest in knowing how to appropriately design technologies that account for and support user’s spiritual and religious practices. Unlike similar systems ours relies on imagery, rather than text and graphs to communicate prayer times. The sun’s gentle movement through the sky prompts Muslim users to their five daily prayer times. Users’ drove this choice, by telling us that tracking the sun was the most religiously valued method to determine prayer times. Additionally, our system was developed for Muslims practicing in the United States, who told us that they have different needs from those living in regions where Islam is more widely practiced."

Also see: Susan P. Wyche, Kelly E. Caine, Benjamin K. Davison, Shwetak N. Patel*,
Michael Arteaga, and Rebecca E. Grinter, Sacred Imagery in Techno-Spiritual Design [PDF]