Sefaria is probably best known for its digital Jewish library. And, to be fair, making the Jewish canon accessible digitally is a key part of what we do! But another key part of our mission is supporting Jewish technology development — and the engineers building it!

One way we invest in Jewish tech is by bringing on talented interns to work with and learn from our team of top-notch engineers. Recently, we’ve had the pleasure of working with three fantastic developers, each building technology to make Jewish texts more accessible for millions of learners worldwide. Keep reading to learn more about the trio of creative developers who spent the last few months with Sefaria.

After making aliyah from New York, Hershel began studying computer science at Reichman University. This summer, he’s building a tool to streamline quality testing for every Sefaria mobile app update. This tool replaces cumbersome manual testing with a self-running system that simulates a user using our apps and catches any errors that come up. As a result, our app updates can now be faster and more reliable for hundreds of thousands of users.

When she’s not hanging out with her favorite feline friend, Ukraine-born Margo is getting a master’s degree in computer science at Hebrew University and interning at Sefaria. She has built a tool that uses Large Language Models (LLMs) to help learners more effectively search for user-created sheets. When the tool is implemented later this fall, you’ll be able to sort sheets based on the relevance of their content in addition to sorting by sheet views or publication date.

Father of two and proud member of his Beitar Illit community, Aleksandr balances his family life with Torah study, coding, and military service. His summer project has resulted in a feature that automatically scrolls to and highlights the exact passage in an extended commentary relating to the main text a user is viewing. This feature eliminates the frustration of hunting through lengthy texts to find the relevant paragraph.

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Each of these projects directly impacts how people engage with Jewish wisdom, ensuring that our ancient texts remain vibrant and accessible for future generations. It’s our honor to foster Jewish technology development as part of our mission to bring the people of the book into the digital age.

If you want to stay up to date on all tech-related insider information, make sure you’re signed up for our quarterly Developers’ Digest. In it, you’ll get behind-the-scenes stories of Sefaria fixes, tech tips from our engineering team, and more.

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