my programming journey

While browsing for a Nias dictionary, I stumbled upon the abebooks website. And indeed it listed the old dictionary I was looking for for puchase. And so I did just that. After the completed transaction I found out, that the seller is in Delhi, India, and it took 25 days for delivery. Hmmm.... Apart from the worst customer service I have ever had (and will make sure I will not purchase anything from them anymore, since they don't deserve my money with such terrible customer service) the dictionary arrived. To my surprise it is not the original print, but a newly printed version of the old book. As you can see at the left page of the photo above, the company is specialised in printing old books. I suppose this is legal, as the author and the print was over 100 years ago, so it should be now on public domain. Despite the turn and twist to Delhi, I have to admit that this is really an extraordinary treasure for Nias language. As far as I am aware of, this is the first proper dictionar...

In the past three months a lot of things happened, but there will be a lot in the future. Last year I started the Nias Keyboard Project , a project to provide Nias typical characters, that are not available on normal keyboard (smartphones and PCs). That's done and the app has been available on Google Play for a few months. That led me to create a dictionary and a language extension for AnySoftKeyboard, the truly open-source Android keyboard project. While I was trying to figure out how to write a hunspell affix file for Nias language (would be needed for the automatic spelling check on the PC), I realised another step is needed: to set the standard of the language itself (or at least a reference I can work on).  And that led me to form a group of enthusiasts to discuss various topics on Nias language. The WA group finally agreed on a five year plan (2020-2025) to document, to set standards and to promote Nias language. In June I realised that it was a huge task to compile new wor...