What irks me the most, is the lack of server-side language support for cloud offerings, on-premise Enterprise products, etc. If Microsoft can support Klingon for translation purposes, then just maybe they could support Inuktitut a little better.
What irks me the most, is the lack of server-side language support for cloud offerings, on-premise Enterprise products, etc. If Microsoft can support Klingon for translation purposes, then just maybe they could support Inuktitut a little better.
Food security is a challenge for people who do live here, due to the general high-costs. Interesting fact - at one point in time, Amazon Prime shipping to Iqaluit was 2-3 times the national average for Canada (and that probably increased with their purchase of Whole Foods - items, which may be most expensive through Amazon for the rest of Canada can often be cheaper than purchased 'locally') - https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north/iqaluit-amazon-prime-1....
The landscape is beautiful (personally, I am a sucker for mountainous/rocky terrain and ocean) - it is above the Arctic circle, so - no trees! The weather is currently really nice - a little rainy today, but no snow - the big freeze hasn't happened yet. Myself, I find that even during winter months, the cold is not unworkable - as technically the local climate is considered a polar desert zone, so the reduced humidity helps.
Myself, I don't live here - but I do come up every 2-3 months, primarily working on Microsoft-stack products and technologies.
Most often, one gets here from a flight from Ottawa - almost 3-hours in duration. (And hey... you still get a hot meal in-flight!) However, it is possible that you might fly in from another territory or community - during the summer there are some flights to/from Greenland.
All data/communications connectivity currently occurs over satellite connections (your flight lands, your phone connects to a local "LTE" network, but that is then bridged back over satellite automatically - no extra charges ;-)) - this can be challenging during weather events, heavy rain, snow or fog can often interfere.
There are plans for undersea fiber, but that will take a few years - the upcoming newer LEO satellite networks will bridge the gap until that arrives.
One of the reasons I have a curiosity about learning Inuktitut was its different writing system, so the Inuit officially moving away from it saddens me.
Watch out for airfares, they’re crazy high, $1200-1600 usually round trip on Canadian North out of Ottawa, but they partner with Aeroplan and with enough advance planning Aeroplan only charges 7500mi + $30 each way, and you can transfer from AMEX Membership Rewards. [1]
[1] https://travelupdate.boardingarea.com/first-air-and-canadian...
Oh - and the art is amazing - and yes, when at the Frobisher, local artists will always be showing their work for you to buy directly, but there are stores as well.
Also - make sure you tour the Legislative Assembly (when open) - https://www.assembly.nu.ca/faq
Come in the Winter if you like snow - come in July/August if you want to get out on the water or like rocky hiking.
Get some coffee at the Black Heart Cafe - https://www.facebook.com/BlackHeartCafe/
There are about 4-5 good restaurants, 2 attached to the current hotels, but I also recommend "Yummy Shawarma" and "Big Racks BBQ".
Something interesting for the HN crowd - a new hotel is going up, built from modular shipping-container sized units - https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north/iqaluit-hotel-rooms-bui...
Just fyi wikipedia says "the city is well south of the Arctic Circle" and ".. has a tundra climate, featuring long, cold winters, and brief summers that are too cool to permit the growth of large trees." [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iqaluit]
[1] https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north/air-greenland-cuts-nuuk...
I've noticed that in terms of language support in general. Of course, languages with Western and/or wealthy populations seem to have better support. In Elasticsearch, I can set up a field for Irish or Latvian or Basque analysis out of the box (each with ~1 million speakers or fewer). But Zulu or Uzbek or Malay (each with 10 million+ speakers), and sorry, no support.
The custom keycap business is booming. It shouldn't be too hard to make a batch of physical keyboards and then a software map to support it. There was just a story last month about some guys standardizing the writing for an African language, including getting its own Unicode set finally, and the Microsoft guys helping to to support it.
If you have any links related to this I would love to read more!
Maybe give these guys a ring and see if they can recommend who they work with for non-Latin caps: https://mechanicalkeyboards.com
And also hang out on https://www.reddit.com/r/keyboards and /mechanicalkeyboards.
https://www.wasdkeyboards.com/
Some random examples:
http://www.wasdkeyboards.com/index.php/products/make/wasd-87...
http://www.wasdkeyboards.com/index.php/products/make/104-key...
I love languages Canada is amazing there are so many languages here it should be a priority to support their use. That's a very good point you made about Klingon being supported but not actual languages. I was talking to a friend of mine who is Mi'kmaq about Linux. I said maybe it supported his language but I guess it's more of a
ADLaM is another language that has had a rough history but eventually recognition. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20702404
This whole thing fascinates me. I studied a small amount of linguistics in university and have long been in love with Inuit artwork so several years back I started work on a typeface that loosely emulated the syllabic glyphs for the Roman alphabet.
http://cng.rockylaurentian.info/
If it’s of any worth to anyone I might be able to dig up the source. Not sure.