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The vector graphic data sets exist freely for anyone to mirror for their own use. The full tool chain of software needed to build your own tile server is available and not very difficult to implement.
I'm aware of more than one ISP using openstreetmap for NOC monitoring of outages, individual customer premises endpoint status, and so on.
Hello, HN. On the rare occasion my writing has appeared on the front page, the tone of some anonymous commenters has left me feeling indignant. Last time, someone called me a dog. Please keep in mind that a fellow human wrote this piece! You don't have to be nice, but at least be constructive.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
That makes no difference: OSM Wikipedia ^ ^ | | | | v v Atlas Encyclopedia It's just which parallels of the commutativity diagram do you focus on. The map-versus-text operator (left to right), or the digital-versus-dead-tree operator (top down).
Do you think the other version is clearer, though? I think he’s right. I will probably update it.
- vs -
OSM:atlas :: wikipedia: ?
Both seem about the same to me(both clear).
I have questions about OSM: 1. Is there any decent OSM app for Windows10 (good UI and offline capabilities is a must-have) 2. How can I display Russian/Chinese/Arabic city names in English? 3. If I create an OSM account will I be able to save routes and addresses? Edit: Thanks for answers.
2. You can't configure the way maps appear on openstreetmap.org. You (or someone) will have to render the map tiles to display all names in English instead of the local language. [1]
3. If you mean keeping a personal list of map and route bookmarks, no. The primary reason to create an OSM account is to contribute data to the map.
[0] https://wiki.gnome.org/Apps/Maps
[1] https://help.openstreetmap.org/questions/60673/display-names...
The two should not be opposed. Rather, the more people are exposed to OSM via Facebook, Apple and so on, the more enthusiast contributors OSM gets. The more rendering tech that Mapbox releases as open source, the more opportunities OSM enthusiasts have to build cool stuff. And so on.
We get a fair amount of sniffiness from some of the more corporate types, denigrating enthusiast contributions as just early-stages stuff that should now inevitably give way to AI-assisted machine mapping. So to read a more balanced view like this is genuinely refreshing.
_But_ it does require both sides to understand the bargain and play fair, and that doesn't happen as universally as I'd like. There are some among the enthusiast community who are unremittingly hostile to corporate actors beyond what anyone should have to put up with, salaried or not. To some degree that's inevitable when you have a project that attracts single-minded 15-year old Linux geeks, maybe, but that explains rather than excuses.
Conversely, corporate OSM too often acts in its short-term interests without a view to the wider good. Attribution is the most notorious example, where Facebook, among others, is basically flouting OSM's attribution requirements. This breaks the "more eyeballs, more contributors" compact. We also see it where corporate editors steamroller some of the nuance from individual contributors' edits (particularly logistics-driven), and I'll confess I'm not a great fan of Mapbox's recent decision to close the source of the dominant in-app renderer, though that's clearly their right to choose.
If this thoughtful article helps both "sides" realise that they're better working together than against each other, that would be a win.
I have questions about OSM: 1. Is there any decent OSM app for Windows10 (good UI and offline capabilities is a must-have) 2. How can I display Russian/Chinese/Arabic city names in English? 3. If I create an OSM account will I be able to save routes and addresses? Edit: Thanks for answers.
Other languages: https://osmap.info/
edit: trying foxtrotgps right now, might be the current best
edit2: can't get foxtrotgps to build, but gpxsee is an ok viewer. It doesn't seem to have any graphopper search or anything tho, so again, not really convincing.
One minor nitpick: measuring the output of a mapper is hard to do on the basis of the number of edits. Local mappers appear to have larger edits where many details in a neighbourhood or some topical regional updates are performed. I think corporate editors focus on fixing bugs and weirdness reported by linters, which are much smaller in scale in terms of changeset size.
Not a nitpick at all--interesting observation. Can you think of a better metric by which to measure contributions? (I'm truly asking out of ignorance)
On the whole it's hard to measure the impact someone has on the project though. Some people tirelessly keep the documentation wiki up-to-date, or paint bikesheds on the tagging mailinglist. Some fix bugs in JOSM, Carto, and anywhere that comes along their path. Some manage to get governments to agree to license valuable data sources for use in OSM (this one is potentially huge), and again others write JOSM plugins to unlock such data or to scratch a common itch improving the efficiency of hundreds of mappers.¹
There is one mapper in the Netherlands who welcomes all new mappers starting of in the Netherlands: that's an invaluable service hard to quantify in data!
1: Or in my case, build a plugin that a dozen or so folk seem to use once a month. :P
One minor nitpick: measuring the output of a mapper is hard to do on the basis of the number of edits. Local mappers appear to have larger edits where many details in a neighbourhood or some topical regional updates are performed. I think corporate editors focus on fixing bugs and weirdness reported by linters, which are much smaller in scale in terms of changeset size.
If you count raw number of features edited, it's way easier to crank up the number by drawing some buildings, forests, lakes, landuse from satellite/aerial imagery.
Whereas things like points of interest (shops, services, tourist-related stuff) won't get you a high number, but arguably are more important.
Corporate editors in under-mapped countries certainly can add much more data than average mappers do.
Of course, they were doing so out of self interest too, and openly acknowledged this. But they openly shared their own datasets and offered resources/advice too.
The OSM data is so powerful (and I don't mean the map - I'm referring to the tags, which are a hidden gem). I'm all for anything that continues to improve this data.