Well done.

Have you tried it with AI assistance?

https://rapideditor.org/

This is a powerful tool, but remember the responsibility is yours, when you edit the map, so don’t just blindly follow the suggestions. For example, a shadow or a group of trees could be wrongly interpreted. Perhaps use it to inform your mapping?

Cheers,

Chris

Well done! Making the world better, one edit at a time. ‘The more the merrier’.

Chris

@kmpoppe Hi, just had a go at a settlement in the UK. Could you consider:

1. Amending the comment that is auto-generated on MapRoulette, so it is more meaningful. At the moment, it looks very automated, and could cause concern from reviewers. I added the additional text “Added buildings to settlement” to my commit.

2. It’s difficult to know when the task is ‘complete enough’, so when saving the edits, I paused when I was deciding to click on the options. The number of houses/ buildings that can be added, could be huge (many hundreds+ ?).

3. Related to the last point, and to avoid change sets that are huge, can tasks be split into smaller chunks, that can be completed? I tend to limit my change sets to 50 ‘commits’. Even using AI to assist in the edits (https://rapideditor.org/) the tasks could be potentially endless, and huge. People contributing, will soon lose interest, if each task seems endless.

This is a really good initiative, and my comments are meant to make this work even better, and are definitely not a criticism.

Many thanks,

Chris.

Hi, K.

This is really good work, and I think the MapRoulette idea is a good one. I’d give the UK a good go, then look at other priorities.

As an aside, the figures for Ukraine may be a false positive, and I believe all map amendments are paused, until the invasion is resolved. This may have changed, but worth checking, before investing any effort.

Well done,

Chris

Thanks, Xvtn; I’ll give this a go.

Chris

Yep, I know that one, from old :-)

Could we have:

historic=animal enclosure,

Then

1. animal enclosure=pinfold
2. animal enclosure=pound

or, similar? This means that the historic dialect variation is retained.

Cheers,

Chris

Hi, Jeff.

I’m not familiar with this device, but have you checked you’ve got the latest firmware?

https://www.locosystech.com/en/product/gps-handheld-data-logger-gt-31.html

Cheers,

Chris

Hi, DK.

This looks really interesting, but not something I can get my head round on a Friday afternoon, at work :-)

I look forward to this tool developing, and potentially being a way to inform my idea, here

I had a quick look at the docs, and it looks like the ‘bootstrap’ page may have a couple of typos, ‘boostrap’ (sic).

Being a long time Linux user, Windoze-free since ‘98, it would be great to see a .deb file being made available, as to many, building from source, may not be difficult, but it’s just another thing to think about. Has consideration been made to releasing the software as a Flatpak?

Great work!

Chris

Hi,

“We care about having the best data. We care about having the map. We care about having the best mapping community.”

I think all of these things are true, but the whole OSM initiative is reliant upon people who regularly, or perhaps only once, improve the accuracy of ‘our’ map.

I’m quick to recognise that my heart is in the right place, and if I make 80 edits/ improvements, I will probably make one or more mistakes. My view is that nobody is perfect, and in that example, me or someone like me will have improved the map, even if all 80 hypothetical edits weren’t perfect.

If I want to see a definitive map, I will use one of the proprietary online sources, or an OS map that hasn’t been updated for years.

If I want maps for routing, including brand new roads, OSM based tools are my ‘go to’.

Our community is very good at intentionally or unintentionally alienating contributors, and the recent ‘robust’ discussion about OSM’s Strategy, was an example of good and bad discussion.

I firmly believe that the community is doing the right thing, and for every ten steps forward, we may take one backwards. A bit like tagging, people can propose a tag, implement improvements to the tag, and then after discussion, realise that the tag isn’t ideal.

To use several clichéd phrases, let’s fail fast and learn and recover; and, let’s not let perfection get in the way of progress. When I edit our map, if I’m unsure, I always try to ‘measure twice, and cut once’. If I’m really not sure about an edit, I will either not proceed, or depending on my degree of certainty, I MAY make an edit, and ask for a ‘second pair of eyes’, to check my work.

Sadly, I think we do occasionally get vandals, but I think these are rare. Most of us are trying to do the right thing, and along with other great open source initiatives, such as Wikipedia and GNU/ Linux, the world is a much richer place for these initiatives. The data or the source code will never be perfect, but that’s why we have bug reporting, mailing lists and a diverse (hopefully increasingly so) community.

Licensing permitting, we can iterate/ evolve with partners like TomTom, and by using the many different OSM data quality tools. We have a lot to be proud of.

Let’s remember that the map will never be finished, and to always treat the community with respect.

Thanks for your diary entry, CJ.

Chris chris_debian

Thanks, AllotmentCyclist; i’ll have a look at the link. Sorry for the delay in replying.

Chris.

Hi, have you thought about using MapRoulette to help with this?

Thanks,

Chris

Hi, Mahjabin.

Thanks for your reply :-)

You mentioned ‘disaster management’, so you may be aware of the ‘ohsome’ website. One of the great things that ‘ohsome’ does, is it enables us to run simple queries, for an area or country, so we can see the quality and currency of OSM data. Obviously this enables mappers (us) to then concentrate efforts on areas that need work.

https://dashboard.ohsome.org/

Something I was thinking about, was combining this capability with a list of (200+) countries/ entities, and producing a (monthly) ‘league table’ of OSM data quality/ maturity. I don’t currently have any coding skills, so doing this manually would be time consuming. I have more good ideas than time :-).

Thanks,

Chris

Hi, Mahjabin.

Great to hear what you’re doing.

I wondered, are you aware of StreetComplete

https://streetcomplete.app

or MapRoulette

https://maproulette.org

to help you with your mapping?

Thanks,

Chris, (chris_debian)

Hi, Josh.

Slightly confused, how is StreetComplete forcing you to add information? If you don’t know the info, or don’t want to add it, don’t.

When you say ‘online editor’, do you mean ID? With an online editor, I suspect you would draw a new ‘area’, then label it, eg “building=yes”.

Have I understood the situation correctly?

Thanks,

Chris chris_debian

Thanks for your diary entry; it sounds like you’re progressing well.

To help the mapping of Moldova, have you considered using MapRoulette https://maproulette.org/ and StreetComplete (Android app)?

Thanks,

Chris chris_debian

Hi, Fizzie.

Thanks for commenting, and apologies for my delay in replying…..work…

Q. Nice idea, but what do you call “quality”?

A. This was what my first question was meant to ponder: How do we gather metrics, to assess the quality of mapping in a given country, so that quality can be improved?

I agree with your points about out of date imagery, and that local knowledge is superior to ‘well intentioned’ foreigners. Conversely, these foreigners often help locals get on to the next rung of the ladder. Obviously, a plethora of exceptions exist. I agree that engaging the locals should be a high priority; the reason it wasn’t number 1 was that it’s probably best to establish what to talk about, before engaging, even if just initial thoughts.

For clarity, my idea of League Tables, wasn’t aimed at African countries, it was aimed at all countries, where map usefulness is welcomed/ encouraged. I’m certainly not ascerting that African countries are ‘backward’ with mapping, it just seemed sensible to try to measure things, so we can work out how to improve them.

Again, thanks for responding, Fizzie.

Chris.

I agree, Vincent.

Chris

Hi, Xvtn.

That’s an interesting idea. At the moment, it looks like accelerometer data would be more easily captured, than LIDAR.

Looking at the two existing options I can see, SmartRoadSense looks like it is open source, but the EU/ University programme seems to have been funded for 3 years, and now looks like it is abandoned. I installed the Android app on my Pixel 6, and gathered data, but I can’t upload it. I’m guessing the target server is no longer accepting uploads. Bit of a shame, as the app has potential.

Roadroid seems to be closed source. The app is available in the Play store, can capture pictures or video, with the option to forward these to Mapillary (Facebook). For some reason, the user needs to submit the devices IMEI number, in order to contribute. This seems to be a failing, and could get confusing, when moving to a new device. I have privacy/ GDPR concerns, too. I’ve contributed a LOT of imagery to Mapillary (pre- Facebook acquisition) and Kartaview and my IMEI was never needed. It’s a shame this app is closed source, as I suspect it could be slightly enhanced to make a good tool for anyone who wanted to gather data to improve our knowledge of roads/ surfaces.

The main requirement for Roadroid, would be to add a map, so the driver can choose to drive along routes that need data. This functionality could easily be forked from Kartaview (was OpenStreetCam). It looks like Lars from Roadroid has done some good technical work.

@Lars Don’t forget that you are allowed to make money from open source software, you just need to share the code.

Chris

Thank you, Tobias.

You’re work has been exceptional, and has made OSM map contributions much more accessible, which has increased the ‘currency’ of the map data.

Looking forward to seeing you in the community, in the future.

Cheers,

Chris, chris_debian 2E0FRU