If this project was really all about data and not about maps then it should have been titled "Open Geodata". But, it's called Open Street Map and, aside from the nerds, most people think of geodata as, quite simply, maps. If the maps created from the data are unusable, then we have a problem.

This project will never appeal to the masses unless we manage to present the data in a way that ordinary people can use. The original diary entry, above, simply points out that the data is not yet in a form usable by jerks like me.

People are going to contribute to the platform that works for them. As things stand now, it is relatively easy to create a clickable map with custom POI's on Google Maps that you can embed in your web site. Google's GUI makes it simple. You can even include pictures and links in the popups all with simple pointing and clicking.

Accomplishing the same thing with OSM data and open layers is much, much harder. (But getting easier, thanks to sites like Easymap: )

To succeed, OSM needs tools for the masses.

Nice going. Keep it up. There's a big world out there.

Do you know how often the database of errors is updated? It would be nice to know how often to check back.

WMS and webkit are working, just not with Yahoo maps. I can get Landsat and a few other background layers, but not Yahoo. The JOSM WMS plugin wiki page says:

"Exception occurred red tiles
This can mean the WMS server is temporarily not available."

But I know that's not true because Merkaartor can download the Yahoo images.

There's something else going on, but darned if I can figure it out.

(harfner - I've got the exact URL for Yahoo as in your comment.)

Thank you very much for this. I see many errors in my own mapping. But, I'm not sure how to fix some of them. Maybe a little tutorial on how to fix common errors would be in order?

"For what it's worth some of those blog postings are probably from countries where major highways still need to be mapped. Some people just aren't interested in mapping big things with little relevance to their personal lives and prefer to map things closer to them."

I'm sure we all do that to some extent. There's a certain amount of satisfaction to seeing the details of your own neighborhood show up on line. I rarely drive a car and am mostly out on a bicycle, so the extent of my ability to map is geographically limited by my strength and undurance.

"Eventually your region will be full of active mappers."

I hope you're right. At the moment I'm the only one within a few hundred K doing any active data gathering at all. There were more, but they seem to have dropped out.

As I've said elsewhere, the current OSM slippy map rendering doesn't do much for those of us in sparsely populated rural areas. I know one mapper who gave up for this very reason.

I have used GT Rider stuff in the past. I did a Laos road trip, pre-GPS, earlier this year based largely on information from their web site.

http://www.mgnewman.com/Travel/show.php?mode=index&show=Lao0902

But, they are a semi-commercial operation, so I doubt they'd be interested in OSM. I'll send them a note, though.

The map I use on my own GPS is from this place http://rotweilermaps.com/. Also semi-commercial

Great news emj. I started out trying to do this myself, but it's a huge task. I actually have mapnik running, both on my Mac and on a linux virtual machine.

I understand the problem of deciding when to use the countryside style. What are your thoughts, so far?

What I'm doing at the moment is looking at the osm.xml stylesheet which I got from here:

http://johnnydobbinscom.s3.amazonaws.com/osm.xml

I need to see how to revise that so that it does what I want with POI's at low zoom levels.

BTW, I got some good hints from this site: http://johnnydobbins.com/2009/05/31/mapnik-ogcserver-setup-from-scratch/

Slow going, but I'm getting there and learning a lot.

Thanks Vclaw. Great stuff. I've now got Mapnik running on my Mac, but the information in that tutorial is quite good and detailed.

The only thing I really want to produce is maps that show POIs at a lower zoom levels than the OSM default. This makes great sense for sparsely populated urban areas. We have lots of areas like that in Thailand.

Unfortunately, the CloudMade customized style sheets do not let you make POI's visible at lower zoom levels. They do let you go the other way: make the zoom level at which POI's are visible higher than the OSM default.

I am now in the process of teaching myself Python and Mapnik. So far I've been able to use Mapnik to generate customs maps with POIs as I want them. Unfortunately, learning Mapnik XML formats that let you customize maps is no easy task. For example, I still haven't been able to figure out how to use TextSymbolizer to draw text on the map. But, for a silly old fart I'm doing OK so far. But, I've spent the better part of three days just getting this far.

However, it is complete folly to expect ordinary people without substantial command line computer experience to actually install and use Mapnik. It ain't easy.

Turns out that the problem is that boost ends up getting linked to the wrong version of Python. No worries, it's easy to fix with this simple little command:

sudo install_name_tool -change /System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.6/Python /opt/local/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.6/Python /opt/local/lib/libboost_python-mt.dylib

Now Mapnik is working on my Mac….

Since I couldn't make heads or tails of the mapnik wiki:

http://trac.mapnik.org/wiki/MacPythonUpgradeIssues

Which contains gems like:

"Mapnik will build just fine with your new python installation will not complain but when importing you get the "Fatal Python error: Interpreter not initialized (version mismatch?)". Check to see what your _mapnik.so is linking against."

and

"If, like the above command result, you see that your mapnik module it linked against 'opt' (the macports dir), then either remove boost from macports or switch to the macports version of python. Even if you pointed the SCons path variables at a different version of boost, the SCons linker found the macports version because it was on the library path of another one of your dependencies (In the above example, the JPEG_LIBS)."

I've decided to completely uninstall everything I installed from Macports and try again.

I hope Zartbitter reads this as it is at his invitation that I'm tilting at the Mapnik windmill….

So, I've searched around the mapnik wiki and found my exact problem. But, this is the….

----
Solution: In general you must rebuild Mapnik to link against what ever version of Python the boost python library linked against, or rebuild boost from source which will likely link boost python against your system version of Python.
The otool command is how you find out what is linked against what library. In the following example, Boost python and Mapnik are both linked against the Python25 Apple installed version of Python on 10.5 (which works):
——

This is all over my head. Once again the geek-kings triumph over the map-serfs….

Thanks for your comments, Daveemtb. I think you're right that there is a definite division between the geek-kings who write code and the map-serfs who gather data for them. I believe, protestations to the contrary, that the geeks look at this as "their" project. As a result, they don't take suggestions kindly:

"Telling us what colour you think the bikeshed should be doesn't get it any nearer to being built."

"Feel free to generate your own map…."

It's definitely off-putting and doesn't do anything to attract people to the project. And, as you noted, the frustration causes many of us to lose enthusiasm for what could be a worthwhile project.

Frankly, I don't have much optimism that things will change in a way that makes me comfortable with continuing to contribute.

Earlier in this diary entry I mentioned a friend who had given up contributing to OSM. Here's what he wrote to me recently:

"For a '60 year old fixed-income retired geezer living in rural Thailand' you express yourself quite articulately. Seems like a lot of people see the same shortcomings in OSM that you do. What to do? Well, first: Don't take it all too seriously. I think I am getting better at sometimes -- perhaps often -- simply saying forget it. It's not worth it and there are so many other worthwhile things to do. Not that I'm suggesting you/we should give up the mapmaking project. Just that we see if we (well you, really) can find a more productive direction to achieve the goal. Enough."

"Telling us what colour you think the bikeshed should be doesn't get it any nearer to being built."

I wasn't telling anyone anything. This is not a forum or a project mailing list. It's a diary. I'm recording my personal thoughts. If others choose to comment on them, fine.

Our product would probably have a lot more volunteers if our product was easier to use and had a friendlier and simpler face. Frankly, I think that the mock-up pages that CloudMade came up with are still too complex, but Fp4 is probably the best of the lot.

Perhaps when I'm a little more confident I'll start participating in the mailing lists. Until then I plan to continue to publish my thoughts here in my Diary….

If I could do any of those things I suggested, I would. About the only thing I can do is contribute data and do some mapping, which I do for many hours each and every week.

I'm sorry you didn't like my mock-up. I did it in about 20 minutes as a quick and dirty exercise to clean up what I think is an overly cluttered homepage.

This rest of today I've spent trying to install mapnik on my Mac. Sadly, the existing instructions:

http://trac.mapnik.org/wiki/MacInstallation

are both out of date and, in places wrong.

After eight hours of trying, I'm still no closer than I was this morning.

By the way, if a user of your product makes a suggestion or request, the best answer is NOT: "If you don't like it, do it yourself."

Kind of reminds me of the right-winger bumper stickers of the 1960's: "America - Love It or Leave It". Is that really the impression you want to leave?

I have a slightly different take on it…

One of the reasons Google gained market share on Yahoo! so quickly was because Google's user interface was clean, uncluttered and unambiguous. It did one thing and it did it well in a simple, intuitive way. OSM's home page should strive for the same thing.

Here's a quick-and-dirty mockup:

http://www.mgnewman.com/sz/osm_mockup.jpg