Updating OSM, Updating the Wiki, and oh yeah… Building a Virtual tile server on Gentoo.

I’ve spent the last couple of weeks updating the map, mostly around the Chullora Railway Workshops in Sydney. Fixing broken ways, adding a lot more detail, etc. There’s more to do, but I’m dividing my time a bit more now.

I’ve also been doing bit of work on the Wiki, mainly centred around the Gentoo Linux operating system, and setting up my own user space, but also a few corrections and updates here and there.

I spent a bit of time building a virtual tile server on Gentoo, which was inspired by an ubuntu based one that was recently made by Andrew Buck. I’ve written a HowTo which (for the moment) is still under my wiki user space. I’ll be moving it to the main wiki once I’ve edited it a bit more - look for it under the Gentoo category, once its ready. I hope to use it as the base for a project I’m working on. (More on that later). It uses the latest versions of mapnik and mod_tile, and I have created a Gentoo Overlay (also in my user space) with updated ebuilds for these, which others can use.

I have a keen interest in New South Wales railways, and I’ve spent more time than I care to admit following the rail lines along the map to see where they go. I’ve noticed quite a few places where the ways are broken, cross over each other inappropriately, are jagged, or have gaps where segments are missing, so Ive added a to-do list item to fix them in a few places where they need some love. That project I mentioned will rely heavily on these ‘ways’, so its in my interest to get them fixed, and it improves the accuracy and usefulness of the map.

Re-reading the above, it seems ‘all about me’ but I guess that what ‘my diary’ entries are for. It’s really intended to point to a few things I’ve been working on, after all, it’s all about contributing things that others can use.

Ok, maybe that title didnt translate well - its a paraphrase on a common lolcats saying. If you dont know about lolcats… OMG!

So, anyway… Im here, and I must say i’m impressed! I discovered OSM recently while looking for some Australian TIGER data… needless to say, I didnt find any, but OSM has pretty much what I need - now, if only I could figure out how to export it to a TIGER compatible shape file…. I’ll work on that.

Meanwhile, Im going to update some missing stuff in my local area - taking it slowly at first, but hoping to build up steam as I go.

Looking at the map I had a brilliant idea for a web application that would basically do what I need that TIGER data for, all with a single click. There’s another project for me to build. sigh I have too many already.

Basically the idea is to combine the map data for a selected area with SRTM data (Im guessing thats probably in there already, but if not - no biggie) and produce a custom file that can be loaded into a particular simulation to generate real-world terrain, with a map overlay that can be used as a template for adding the details on top of that. Sound familiar? Feel free to point me to any open source you may have come across that does something similar.

Ive still yet to get my head around rendering, so it may be a while before I get to that.