this post was submitted on 01 Sep 2023
5 points (100.0% liked)

Open Source

30364 readers
856 users here now

All about open source! Feel free to ask questions, and share news, and interesting stuff!

Useful Links

Rules

Related Communities

Community icon from opensource.org, but we are not affiliated with them.

founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
 

Today I found out that it's actually a lot easier to contribute to Open Street Map than I thought. There are some serious gaps in house addresses in my area and I was painstakingly using the built in browser editor in the browser.

But, you can use a FOSS app (available on fdroid) called StreetComplete that makes it a lot easier to help out filling in the gaps in your local map data.

It's really fun - kind of like Pokémon Go but you are actually making an impact 😁

top 23 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Oh heck yea! My neighborhood is better mapped on OSM than Google Maps even now! Very fulfilling to see.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

My shed is mapped in OSM.

Meanwhile Google maps has not got the shed and has the entirety of my property about 10 ft east of its actual location. Essentially terraced up to a neighbouring property even though it's not connected to that property and there is an alleyway.

But I suppose I could say that doesn't really matter for street navigation, which is what Google maps is actually for.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago

Naaah mate... it can matter a lot lol. We have a road closure (for the past few months) in our neighborhood. Google maps still hasn't updated it. I routinely see drivers driving up to it and getting annoyed for having to turn back. This wouldn't have happened had they used OSM tho!

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

I don't really know or use Open Street Map, so I wonder:

Can everyone just manipulate the map data? Is there some sort of control mechanism or is it easy to incorporate fake data?

I'm asking because this seems to be a really fallible concept, where people with malicious intents would have an easy way to disturb Open Street Map.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago

Yes, but similar to Wikipedia (where the same holds true) the forces fo good and honest seem to prevail.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Does anyone know of OSM street view equivalents like KartaView allow for campus street view? It seems like it's only available for roads you can access with a car.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

If you're asking about more imagery coverage, Mapillary has a lot. The wiki has a list of street-level imagery articles.

OpenStreetMap is more about the map database, so any imagery association tends to be loose, and is more for use as a useable source for ground truth.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

Wow, cartography is a whole thing I have never really taken a look at. This is super cool, thanks for the share! I don't like that Mapillary is owned by Facebook/Meta :/

I will take a look at the resources you have sent though!

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago

This is my pastime whenever I don't have anything to do online. It's fun to point something on OSM and remembering the establishments you've walkthrough.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (3 children)

I'm addicted to Streetcomplete. I'm 20.000+ edits in. I make about 100 with ease on my commute to work.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

I installed it. Judging by the mass of blank info, I guess I'm the only person around here using it lol. 😳

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

iOS apps generally require a $100 yearly fee to post to the app store and if they submitted a waiver as a nonprofit apple would probably take years to accept it.

Also apple has a tendency to quietly kill and/or stall small apps that pose a threat to features they incorporate into their os from what I've heard.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Ugh yeah the small 4-person worker cooperative I'm part of has been trying to get Apple to let us enroll in their developer program for literally weeks now. Every time we clear some other nonsense requirement, there's a new one right behind it; and we haven't even gotten to the "pay $100 for the privilege of undergoing this process" part yet.

I can't believe Apple ever managed to build an application ecosystem around their products when they are so unfriendly to developers.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago

What? If you’re going to pay for it you just sign up and pay… If you don’t have your company registered before attempting that that’s on you. And if you’re really desperate you could just use a personal developer account which you can set up in like 1 minute. Not sure how this is an issue for you.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

once you complete every quest on your commute, what do you do?

parallel streets βœ…

and then?

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

that turns the commute into a promenade

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago

That's exactly what happened. Fortunately I have 4 different offices and I can work from 'home' anywhere so sometimes I go work at a friend's place instead of working at my place.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Is there an open street map based map app that shows live traffic? I'm trying to get my grandfather to switch to open source, and he says it's the one feature he needs.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

MagicEarth has got a live traffic layer for you.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Unfortunately, it's not open source though.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago

Indeed it isn't. But is privacy focused and sort of the best next thing.