Monday, June 23, 2008

Hijaab for women

by Dr.Zakir Naik

Question:
Why does Islam degrade women by keeping them behind the veil?
Answer:
Hijaab for women
The next verse of Surah Noor, says:
" And say to the believing women that they should lower their gaze and guard their modesty; that they should not display their beauty and ornaments except what (must ordinarily) appear thereof; that they should draw veils over their bosoms and not display their beauty except to their husbands, their fathers, their husbands fathers, their sons..."
[Al-Qurâan 24:31]

3. Six criteria for Hijaab.
According to Qurâan and Sunnah there are basically six criteria for observing hijaab:
  1. Extent:

    The first criterion is the extent of the body that should be covered. This is different for men and women. The extent of covering obligatory on the male is to cover the body at least from the navel to the knees. For women, the extent of covering obligatory is to cover the complete body except the face and the hands upto the wrist. If they wish to, they can cover even these parts of the body. Some scholars of Islam insist that the face and the hands are part of the obligatory extent of hijaab.

    All the remaining five criteria are the same for men and women.

  2. The clothes worn should be loose and should not reveal the figure.
  3. The clothes worn should not be transparent such that one can see through them.
  4. The clothes worn should not be so glamorous as to attract the opposite sex.
  5. The clothes worn should not resemble that of the opposite sex.
  6. The clothes worn should not resemble that of the unbelievers i.e. they should not wear clothes that are specifically identities or symbols of the unbelievers religions.

4.. Hijaab includes conduct and behaviour among other things
Complete hijaab, besides the six criteria of clothing, also includes the moral conduct, behaviour, attitude and intention of the individual. A person only fulfilling the criteria of hijaab of the clothes is observing hijaabâ in a limited sense. Hijaab of the clothes should be accompanied by hijaab of the eyes, hijaab of the heart, hijaab of thought and hijaab of intention. It also includes the way a person walks, the way a person talks, the way he behaves, etc.

5. Hijaab prevents molestation
The reason why Hijaab is prescribed for women is mentioned in the Quran in the following verses of Surah Al-Ahzab:
"O Prophet! Tell thy wives and daughters, and the believing women that they should cast their outer garments over their persons (when abroad); that is most convenient, that they should be known (as such) and not molested. And Allah is Oft-Forgiving, Most Merciful."
[Al-Quran 33:59]
The Qur’an says that Hijaab has been prescribed for the women so that they are recognized as modest women and this will also prevent them from being molested.

6. Example of twin sisters
Suppose two sisters who are twins, and who are equally beautiful, walk down the street. One of them is attired in the Islamic hijaab i.e. the complete body is covered, except for the face and the hands up to the wrists. The other sister is wearing western clothes, a mini skirt or shorts. Just around the corner there is a hooligan or ruffian who is waiting for a catch, to tease a girl. Whom will he tease? The girl wearing the Islamic Hijaab or the girl wearing the skirt or the mini? Naturally he will tease the girl wearing the skirt or the mini. Such dresses are an indirect invitation to the opposite sex for teasing and molestation. The Quran rightly says that hijaab prevents women from being molested.

7. Capital punishment for the rapists
Under the Islamic shariah, a man convicted of having raped a woman, is given capital punishment. Many are astonished at this ‘harshâ sentence. Some even say that Islam is a ruthless, barbaric religion! I have asked a simple question to hundreds of non-Muslim men. Suppose, God forbid, someone rapes your wife, your mother or your sister. You are made the judge and the rapist is brought in front of you. What punishment would you give him? All of them said they would put him to death. Some went to the extent of saying they would torture him to death. To them I ask, if someone rapes your wife or your mother you want to put him to death. But if the same crime is committed on somebody elseâs wife or daughter you say capital punishment is barbaric. Why should there be double standards?

8. Western society falsely claims to have uplifted women
Western talk of women's liberalization is nothing but a disguised form of exploitation of her body, degradation of her soul, and deprivation of her honour. Western society claims to have uplifted women. On the contrary it has actually degraded them to the status of concubines, mistresses and society butterflies who are mere tools in the hands of pleasure seekers and sex marketeers, hidden behind the colourful screen of art and culture.

9. USA has one of the highest rates of rape
United States of America is supposed to be one of the most advanced countries of the world. It also has one of the highest rates of rape in any country in the world. According to a FBI report, in the year 1990, every day on an average 1756 cases of rape were committed in U.S.A alone. Later another report said that on an average everyday 1900 cases of rapes are committed in USA. The year was not mentioned. May be it was 1992 or 1993. May be the Americans got bolder in the following years.
Consider a scenario where the Islamic hijaab is followed in America. Whenever a man looks at a woman and any brazen or unashamed thought comes to his mind, he lowers his gaze. Every woman wears the Islamic hijaab, that is the complete body is covered except the face and the hands upto the wrist. After this if any man commits rape he is given capital punishment. I ask you, in such a scenario, will the rate of rape in America increase, will it remain the same, or will it decrease?

10. Implementation of Islamic Shariah will reduce the rate of rapes
Naturally as soon as Islamic Shariah is implemented positive results will be inevitable. If Islamic Shariah is implemented in any part of the world, whether it is America or Europe, society will breathe easier. Hijaab does not degrade a woman but uplifts a woman and protects her modesty and chastity.

Thursday, June 19, 2008

ETIQUETTES OF FRIDAY & The importance of Friday in Islam

Friday is an important day of the Believers. Many important events which become the turning points in the history of Islam had taken place on this auspicious day. Prophet Adam (peace be on him) was created on Friday, the verse declaring perfection of Islam was revealed on this day; and the Day of Resurrection shall occur on Friday. Hence this auspicious day should be observed with sanctity and solemnity, with maximum Divine service.

Allah, the Almighty affirms

" O ye who believe! When the call is proclaimed to prayer on Friday ( the Day of Assembly), hasten earnestly to the remembrance of Allah, and leave off business ( and traffic): that is best for you if ye but knew!" (al-jumu'a 2-) (Read More)


The importance of Friday in Islam

Islam accords great importance to Friday. While all days of the week belong to Allah, Friday stands out for its significance.

1. Imam Moosa Kazim (a.s.) informs:

‘Allah has created the Prophets (a.s.) and the successors (a.s.) on Friday.’ (Behaarul Anwaar vol. 15 pg. 22 narrated from Basaaer al-Darajaat)

2. Imam Muhammad Baqir (a.s.) narrates:

‘Friday has been named as Juma’h (جمعه) because on this day Allah assembled all the creatures and extracted a covenant from them concerning His Unity (Tauheed), the Prophethood of Prophet Muhammad (s.a.w.a.) and the guardianship of Ameerul Momeneen - Ali b. Abi Talib (a.s.).’ (Tahzeebul Ahkaam by Shaykh Tusi (r.a.) vol. 3 pg. 3)

3. The Holy Prophet (s.a.w.a.) informs: ‘Friday is the day of worship. So worship Allah as much as possible on that day.’(Behaarul Anwaar vol. 59 pg. 18, 19)

4. Imam Jafar Sadiq (a.s.) explains:

‘Friday is the day of Eid for the Muslims. It is greater in merit than Eidul Fitr and Eiduz Zoha. The greatest of Eid is Eid-e-Ghadeer which was on 18th Zilhajj and even that incident occurred on a Friday. Our Qaim (a.t.f.s.) will also reappear on Friday. Even the Day of Judgement will come to pass on Friday.’(Behaarul Anwaar vol. 59 pg. 26)

5. The Holy Prophet (s.a.w.a.) declared:‘Friday is the chief of all days.’ (Behaarul Anwaar vol. 40 pg. 47)

6. Imam Muhammad Baqir (a.s.) revealed:

‘The excellence of Fridays of the month of Ramazan over Fridays of other months is like the superiority of the Holy Prophet (s.a.w.a.) over other prophets.’(Wasaailush Shia vol. 10 pg. 363)

7. Friday is associated with Hazrat Wali-e-Asr (a.t.f.s.). Sitr ibne Abi Dalf met Imam Ali Naqi (a.s.) while he was in Mutawakkil Abbasi’s prison (may Allah curse him). Sitr inquired: ‘O my master, there is a tradition from the Holy Prophet (s.a.w.a.) the meaning of which is not clear for me.’ Imam asked him to narrate the tradition. Sitr recounted: ‘

‘Don’t disobey the days, else the days will disobey you.’

Imam Ali Naqi (a.s.) clarified,

‘Yes, in this tradition the days refer to us (Imams (a.s.)) until the time the heavens and the earth survive. Then Saturday refers to the Holy Prophet (s.a.w.a.), Sunday refers to Ameerul Momeneen (a.s.), Monday refers to Hasnain (a.s.), Tuesday refers to Imam Ali b. Husain (a.s.), Imam Muhammad b. Ali (a.s.) and Imam Jafar b. Muhammad (a.s.). Wednesday refers to Imam Moosa b. Jafar (a.s.), Imam Ali b. Moosa (a.s.), Imam Muhammad b. Ali (a.s.) and me (Imam Ali Naqi (a.s.)). Thursday refers to my father Imam Hasan Askari (a.s.) and Friday refers to my grandson (Imam Mahdi (a.t.f.s.)) who will be surrounded by a group of the truthful ones. This is the meaning of the days, therefore do not disobey them, else in the hereafter they shall disobey you.’

After mentioning the above tradition, the eminent scholar and narrator of supplications and Ziaraat - Sayyid Ibne Taoos (r.a.) has recorded the Ziaraat of the Imams (a.s.) for the days of the week. The most reliable of traditionalists - Shaikh Abbas-e-Qummi (r.a.) has also recorded the Ziaraat for various days in his distinguished compilation - Mafaateehul Jinaan.

Source: http://shiaonline.wordpress.com/2006/10/13/the-importance-of-friday-in-islam/

Other Links:
  1. http://www.answering-islam.org/Index/F/friday.html
  2. http://www.islamonline.net/english/introducingislam/Worship/Prayers/article05.shtml

Tuesday, June 17, 2008

"Professional iPhone and iPod touch Programming: Building Applications for Mobile Safari"

Super E-book library

"Professional iPhone and iPod touch Programming: Building Applications for Mobile Safari"
http://www.superbook.org.ua/book/87539/Professional-iPhone-and-iPod-touch-Programming--Building-Applications-for-Mobile-Safari/

Web Development for the iPhone

Source: www.evotech.net/blog/2007/07/web-development-for-the-iphone/

Web Development for the iPhone: Targeting the iPhone Safari browser

Developing for the iPhone
  • The Safari iPhone user agent string is:
    Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU like Mac OS X; en) AppleWebKit/420+
    (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/3.0 Mobile/1A543a Safari/419.3
  • Platform string: (iPhone; U; CPU like Mac OS X; en)
  • Version string: Version/3.0 Mobile/1A543a Safari/419.3

To target the iPhone server-side with PHP you can use:

if (stristr($_SERVER['HTTP_USER_AGENT'], ‘iPhone’)) {}

iPhone Viewport Orientation

The iPhone supports both landscape and portrait views. You can specify CSS based on viewport orientation which you determine via javascript and update the orient attribute of the body element. Target the browser with body[orient="landscape"] or body[orient="portrait"]

iPhone ViewPort Orientation JavaScript

The following javascript snippet detects and sets the iPhone’s viewport orientation by evaluating the innerWidth property of the window object and setting the orient attribute of the body element at regular intervals:

var updateLayout = function() {
if (window.innerWidth != currentWidth) {
currentWidth = window.innerWidth;
var orient = (currentWidth == 320) ? "profile" : "landscape";
document.body.setAttribute("orient", orient);
window.scrollTo(0, 1);
}
};

iPhone.DomLoad(updateLayout);
setInterval(updateLayout, 500);

Hiding the iPhone toolbar

With one line of JavaScript you can hide the big toolbar: window.scrollTo(0, 1); . Include this line of code to your snippet of detecting the phone’s orientation, as the toolbar will reappear when the orientation is changed. Remove it from the snippet above if you want the toolbar to show.

iPhone Viewport Meta Tag

The viewport meta tag properties include width, height, initial-scale, user-scalable, minimum-scale and maximum-scale. The height is calculated based on the width and aspect ratio. The initial-scale is the scale to render when the page first loads; with the default to fit the screen. Unless user scalable is set to no, th user can change the scale through pinching and double tapping of the iPhone.

Property Default Value Minimum Value Maximum Value
width 980 200 10000
height based on aspect ratio 223 10000
inital-scale fit to screen minimum-scale maximum-scale
user-scalable yes no yes
minimum-scale 0.25 > 0 10
maximum-scale 1.6 >0 10

Examples:


Comparisons of Safari on the desktop versus the iPhone.

Safari on iPhone supports:

  • Safari supports cookies on both
  • Safari on iPhone allows up to 8 user initiated browser pages to be open at once.
  • Default user preference is set to block pop-up windows.
  • Safari on iPhone supports many MIME types and rich media, including PDF and media file types
  • Images: Safari supports .gif, .jpg, .png, and .tiff
  • Fonts: The iPhone comes with American Typewriter, Arial, Arial Rounded MT Bold, Courier, Courier New,Georgia, Helvetica, Helvetica New, Marker Felt, Times New Roman, Trebuchet MS, Verdana, and Zapfino; so that’s what Safari on the iPhone supports.
  • Other than the :hover pseudoclass which isn’t supported on the iPhone since mouseover effects aren’t supported, Safari on the iPhone supports CSS1, CSS2 and several selectors and attributes of CSS3

Safari on iPhone does not support:

  • Events: mouseover and mouseout, including :hover styles and tool tips, (but it does support onclick and event listeners). Safari on the iPhone does not support the document events of onkeydown, onkeypress and onkeyup, the form-field events of ondblclick, onmouseenter, onmouseleave, onmousemove, and onSelect, and the window events of onresize and onScroll. This is not an exhaustive list, so test your event handlers before listening to me.
  • window.showModalDialog()
  • Plug-ins: Flash or Java, and plug-in installations. Do not ask users to download Flash.
  • File-size: Non-streaming files of over 10MB. CSS, JavaScript and HTML files are limited to 10MB per file. JavaScript is limited to 5 seconds of execution time. Safari for the iPhone does support gzip compression, so compress!
  • The iPhone does not support gifs, png or tiffs over 8 MB and jpgs over 128 MB (but does support larger streaming media files).
  • You can use iFrames, but avoid framesets.

Other iPhone Safari features

Phone numbers are automatically converted to phone links. You should convert them instead of letting Safari control it for you.
415.555.1212.

For more details check out the Source: http://www.evotech.net/blog/2007/07/web-development-for-the-iphone/

Monday, June 16, 2008

Convert em,px,pt and % in css

Conversion from Points to Pixels (and Ems and %)
Here’s a chart that converts points to pixels (and ems and %). It’s an approximation, which will depend on font, browser and OS, but it’s a good starting point.

Points Pixels Ems Percent
6pt 8px 0.5em 50%
7pt 9px 0.55em 55%
7.5pt 10px 0.625em 62.5%
8pt 11px 0.7em 70%
9pt 12px 0.75em 75%
10pt 13px 0.8em 80%
10.5pt 14px 0.875em 87.5%
11pt 15px 0.95em 95%
12pt 16px 1em 100%
13pt 17px 1.05em 105%
13.5pt 18px 1.125em 112.5%
14pt 19px 1.2em 120%
14.5pt 20px 1.25em 125%
15pt 21px 1.3em 130%
16pt 22px 1.4em 140%
17pt 23px 1.45em 145%
18pt 24px 1.5em 150%
20pt 26px 1.6em 160%
22pt 29px 1.8em 180%
24pt 32px 2em 200%
26pt 35px 2.2em 220%
27pt 36px 2.25em 225%
28pt 37px 2.3em 230%
29pt 38px 2.35em 235%
30pt 40px 2.45em 245%
32pt 42px 2.55em 255%
34pt 45px 2.75em 275%
36pt 48px 3em 300%

Source: http://sureshjain.wordpress.com/2007/07/06/53/

Thursday, June 12, 2008

Tutorial, Tips and Top Resources

Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) is a stylesheet language written in used to describe the presentation of a document written in a markup language. Its most common application is to style web pagesHTML and XHTML, but the language can be applied to any kind of XML document, including SVG and XUL. (More...)

Resources:
CSS Validation Service

Useful Links for PDA Development

Below are some useful links i found when i was looking for PDA web specification for mobile applications:

First Post :)

Bismillah-Hir-Rehmaan-Nir-Raheem
Yesterday i had a conc call with my onsite development and marketing team in US. We're planning to develop one of our existing "Charge capture" module for PDA's.
My task is to gather design requirements/Specifications.
Please share experience if you worked on PDA, Mobiles or any handheld devices.

I am part of shakechilly.com in my free time.
where i am working on Visual design, XHTML and CSS.
And Masood Nasser is busy with content, IA, and Usability etc.