Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Rob Barrett/Almaden/IBM" <barrett AT almaden.ibm.com>]

>> The original form of the OTA BHS text as contained in the archive
>> http://www.pemberley.com/janeinfo/bigpersonal/bhs-text.zip doesn't
>> have any lines longer than 60 characters, as verified with the
>> following AWK program:
>>
>> {if (length($0)>x) {x=length($0)}};END{print x}
>>
>> --
>> Henry Churchyard   churchh AT usa.net   http://www.crossmyt.com/hc/

> This may well be true, but by the time the earlier CCT files have done
their
> work there are a good 50 or so lines that are well over 60 characters -
as
> looking at the text in a word processor very clearly shows

I think the confusion here lies in the difference between line breaks in
the raw text vs. line breaks in the resulting Hebrew text.  The BHS line
breaks are *not* encoded as line breaks in the original raw text.  The BHS
line breaks are marked with other characters (presumably to avoid the
problems with varying conventions of <CR> vs. <CR><LF>).  Thus, Henry's
file may very well have no lines longer than 60 characters, but it doesn't
necessarily mean that the Hebrew text it encodes has no lines longer than
60 characters.


> Furthermore with the present choices offered by
> the OTA site (HTML or ASCII and no option for right click + Save As)
there
> is no option but to load the text into a browser to start off with -
which
> is even less desirable. This is why I have so urgently wished that
pressure
> could be put on OTA to offer both a ZIP file and the right click + Save
As
> option.

I had to go back and look at the OTA site after I read this.  My download
(January 2000) came as a g'zipped file "0525_1_txt.gz".  This avoided any
mangling-during-download problems like the ones John has been raising since
it downloads as a binary.  Does anyone know if the text has been changed or
just the downloadable formats?

> I am glad to see though that someone has got permission to make make a
ZIP
> version of the OTA file available. I have been warned that I was breaking
> OTA conditions by doing so without permission.

When I downloaded it from OTA, the license information read:

  Freely available for non-commercial use provided that this header is
  included in its entirety with any copy distributed.

  From the printed Code manual deposited with the electronic text:
  "The project was made possible ... by the gracious release granted
  by the Deutsche Bibelstiftung, Stuttgart, publishers of Biblia Hebraica
  Stuttgartensia."

  Source:
  Transcribed from: Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia quae antea cooperantibus
  A. Alt, O. Eissfeldt, P. Kahle ediderat R. Kittel / editio funditus
  renovata, adjuvantibus H. Bardtke ... [et al.] cooperantibus H.P.
  Rüger et J. Ziegler ; ediderunt K. Elliger et W. Rudolph ; textum
  Masoreticum curavit H.P. Rüger, Masoram elaboravit G.E. Weil. ? Stuttgart
  : Deutsche Bibelstiftung, 1977. ? Prolegomena in German, English, French,
  Spanish and Latin. ? Added title and text in Hebrew: Torah, Neviim
  u-Khetuvim. ? ISBN 3-43805218-0.

  Compiler : Whitaker, Richard E.

This seems to tell me (a non-lawyer) that it can be re-distributed and (I'm
guessing here) that derived works would also be allowed, such as zipping,
incorporating into Bible software, etc. as long as it were non-commercial
and the header was included in some viewable way.  Any comments?

Rob Barrett

> John Richards