iMenorah – Review

Our rating:

By: iMenorah

Version #: 1.1

Date Released: 2008-11-24

Developer:

Price: 1.99

User Rating:

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When I was a kid we took a family vacation most years during winter break. most years that meant that we were on vacation during part or all of the Hanukkah festival.
 
We packed carefully as we were traveling for two weeks and we were a family of five but inevitably there were few things left behind. Suntan lotion was always forgotten. As was at least one person’s pair of sunglasses. No matter how hard we tried and no matter how hard we planned, we always seem to forget to bring the Chanukah menorah (known in Hebrew as a hannukiah). so every year we came up with a different creative way to build a menorah. I remember one year simply putting the candles in the sand. Another year we took nine different orange juice containers (a kind of frozen concentrated orange juice comes in) and use those.
 
If only we’d been living in the age of the iPhone we wouldn’t have had to look far at all.
 
Welcome to iMenorah– a virtual, iPhone-based, menorah. This little app means you’ll never be without a Hanukkah menorah again. and so long as you’ve got your iPhone with you no matter where you go in a matter howr absent-minded you might beyou’ll have your menorah with you.
 
An application like this could be really cheesy or overly quaint or trying too hard to capture that "old world" feel. This doesn’t. This is a nice, relatively simple implementation of the menorah on iPhone. It looks really nice, it actually works, and it allows you to interact with the image of the menorah rather than just look at it.
 
You can like each candle using the Shamash ("user" candle) and even has a "ritual failsafe" whereby you can only like the candles in the proper ritual manner (from left to right rather than right to left).
 
It looks nice and the animation looks realistic enough without "trying too hard". The candles actually burn down and the blessings for the holiday are chanted.
 

There are few other aspects of this application that I really like.
 
I love the fact that the blessings are not sung by someone with a superb operatic voice or by someone who sounds like they came out of the schtetl (not that there’s anything wrong with someone who came out of the sctetl). Rather,the blessings are sung by someone just like you or me (assuming that you and I have neither an operatic voice or came out of the schtetl.)
 
I love the fact that during the eight days of Hanukkah application will automatically show the proper number of candles for the day. That’s fantastic.
 
And I love the fact the proceeds from the sale of the application will, in part be donated to a chart of organization. Better yet, the developers have not only indicated that a minimum of a 10% tithe will be given but they also indicated the specific organization to whom the contribution will be made.
 
When I heard about this application I have to admit I was a bit skeptical. It initially struck me as a little too cutesy to put a menorah on iPhone. But the actual execution of this application is really quite excellent. Moreover, the developers really put the time and thought into creating this as a real, usable, enhancement to the holiday and not some cute holiday curiosity. I’m rather impressed.

Quick Take

Value: High
Would I Buy Again: Yes
Learning Curve: Low
Who is it for: Anyone who will belighting the Hannukah menorah and has an iPhone
What I like:  Well done. Teaches without being heavy handed.
What I Don’t:  Nothing

Final Statement:  A well done, religious-oriented app.