Map Updates and News – 18 January 2012

(für Deutsch - bitte dem Link oben folgen und den Artikel auf openmtbmap.org/de lesen) - Well long time no see, here are News from Openmtbmap and Velomap again. I know it's been a long time, but I just didn't find the time to write down all the news during the last weeks.

Largely responsible for this is, that as I couldn't really do sports over the last 8 weeks. Due to my ankle still not fully recovered, I fell into a bit of a motivationless hole. But well, in 1-2 weeks my ankle will have recovered so far, that I can go mtbiking, skiing and boarding again - I just hope that there will be another big fall of snow - like the last 2 days here in Vienna, where around 30cm of snow fell even in downtown Vienna.

My main work during the last weeks, was focussed on bugfixing on the server side, and on making the maps for Mac OSX easier to use -  here is now a guide for Dummies on Mac OSX

 

Besides the Newssection below the picture - I put up a promotion special - hoping to convert some of the readers of this newsletter to donate a bit to openmtbmap / velomap. If you're already a member - the news continue after the picture. (Offer terminated)

 

Thanks a lot for your Support - I promise to continue supporting Openmtbmap and Velomap as much as I can - even during bike trips:

 

 

So here the main visible changes over the last 6 weeks - additionally I did quite a lot of bugtracking on mkgmap and my build scripts - so that errors are less likely in case of corrupted data, or other crashes.

New Features / News :

-- After extending the Mac OSx downloads to cover all countries, just like the Windows Installers, I worked a lot on improving the format, and making the installation as easy as possible - also for those countries where it is not practical to put the contourlines into the same download package. So for all Mac OSx users - here is now a description for dummies - showing really every click you need to do: https://openmtbmap.org/tutorials/install-maps-mac-osx/

Velomap: avoid steps only with toll=yes, not with avoid unpaved roads...

Add dav_scale for corrections against sac_scale (not used much yet though...)

add place=isolated_dwelling

remove military from resolution 24 (will be shown in resolution 22 and 21 only - so huge military areas are less of an map obstruction)

Add amenity=clinic, add natural=hill, consider backcountry=yes for campsites, and tent=yes for caravan sites. Better naming of amenity=fuel

Remove cemetary=yes from polygons. Add waterway=canal, waterway=drain and waterway=stream also as polygon. Add back landuse=field - but show it very very decent (mainly visible on PC - too low contrast for GPS by default).

Consider vehicle:forward=no, and bicycle:backward=yes. Also consider bicycle=dismount

add highway abandoned / disused when analysing tags on roads.

water=pond resolution 23 not 22 (add exception).

Footways, better classification if not usable for bikes  and make them less visible.

shop=sports and sports centre less visible (resolution 23/24 instead of 22).

Don't render leisure=* and tourism=* as wildcard anymore for unknown values. Added some more values (all top 20 included).

Add rules for Slovakia and Czech Republic for Kraj and Okres substitution.

Bugfixes:

update tinted background colour in high contrast typfiles (there was a typo that got copied over - only noticeable on newer GPS, older converted to white anyhow).

fix many bugs on the Mac OSx maps - mainly about address search.

fix bug mountain_pass=yes not rendered...

Fix Error that Asia Installation was not possible to send to GPS (mdx/mdr in registry but not actually present).

 

9. November 2012 Map Updates – Mac OSX Maps now Worldwide too

(for german newsletter, please follow the heading and look at it online, für die deutsche Version des Newsletters, bitte die Überschrift anklicken, und auf der Website die Sprache auf Deutsch setzen)

Well three weeks passed since the last map update, and quite a few changes over the last weeks. I'm still progging on both maps for Android as well as an online map (I already rented a nice online root server with 32GB RAM and I7 for rendering the maps), but also still adding or changing stuff on the main openmtbmaps/velomaps.

However as 10 days ago I broke my ankle, and ripped out a ligament, it means progress stopped a bit. Damn stupid thing, just jumping down 1m somewhere backwards, ankle folding over and misery there, no spectacular crash or anything like my "normal" injuries... So instead of making the best of the nice autumn weather mtbiking until the snow arrives, I'm out of order concerning sports for at least another 6 weeks.

 

Mac OSx gmap format maps now available worldwide
But so for changes - today or tomorrow I'll move all Mac OSx downloads to their dedicated download site, this also makes it easier for support as questions regarding mac osx will be found in one place. Main reason however is - that I'm currently finishing up rendering all maps for Mac OSx too. As for the windows maps, I took splitted the contourlines into separate downloads, so for many countries or continents where the contourlines are much bigger than the actual map data, it provides faster updates (you also only need to download the contourlines once, and then update only the maps themselves). To save traffic maybe in general I will in future only update the european country maps weekly, all other maps every two or three weeks? Let's see, it depends a bit on traffic how often I will update.

 

Other changes

I updated the contourlines for North America too now. They are based on viewfinderpanoramas.org 3" data - which isn't as detailed in some places as the 1" SRTM1 - however in general as it is voidfilled it offers a much better general quality - and also smaller download size. Canada contourlines are now also available for full Canada - and not stopping at 60° North. So if you update the North America maps, don't forget to also download the contourlines again.

I also updated the contourlines for some European countries, but the changes are minimal...

 

There have been quite a few changes to mkgmap, so some multipolygon errors in comparison to Mapnik are fixed too now. I too updated a bit the address search processing for Germany and fixe some more rather common access rules tagging mistakes. On the Velomap since 2 weeks, the routing on primaries and secondaries is a little bit degraded again, but the changes are rather small.

 

So that's been it, happy mapping and biking to everyone, I envy you but hope to be back in the outdoors ASAP!