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Comment by Andrew_nenakhov | Hacker News Reader

OpenStreetMap is the second most-important resource on the Internet, after the Wikipedia.

And if you are on android, there’s a super simple and easy, lightly gamified, app to help improve their data: https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/StreetComplete

This is an excellent app, it works very well. Thanks for linking.

I’ve been using it to update the > 4 years out-of-date streets around my apartment, it really makes it super easy just when walking somewhere.

My kids loved using this on long walks in the neighborhood. Until we'd heavily trodden some paths and the only questions were about road surfaces and streetlamps :)

Street lighting is useful though! My partner wanted to go running but when it gets dark early it would be after dark, and there wasn't a good map of which roads are lit. I since filled in the data and OsmAnd can display it (map settings -> details -> street lighting), but it took a while to get stuff filled in and my partner has since stopped running x). It may help other people plan such trips, or tell people where they can feel more safe while walking after nightfall.

The data is virtually nonexistent in most places, at least until StreetComplete started asking for it, but I imagine that many will find it a useful addition if it starts being rendered or used in route calculations now that it's available here and there. (Which then leads to more people seeing the use and contributing that data, which again makes it more useful.) Finding your way in an unfamiliar place in pitch blackness is a lot harder regardless of safety.

There is also Every Door which i find less annoying. Street complete puts lots of noise on the map. I don't know the answer to my selected questions all the time. Every door lets you fill in whatever you can.

https://every-door.app/

While that is nice, it’s a lot more cluttered. That may be useful when you specifically go out to do mapping, but Street Complete is far easier to do on the side while going somewhere for different reasons.

edit: I will keep both though ;)

If you have a problem with specific quest types, you can disable them in the settings.

If you feel like the question / answer should be improved, check the StreetComplete issue tracker for existing issues / discussions and if there isn't any matching, create a new one.

Thanks for mentioning this! I've installed it and it looks like an interesting app.

Thanks for a great recommendation!

I contribute to OSM, especially when I travel in less populated areas. A reliable map of petrol stations is invaluable in remote areas.

People are sometimes curious about it, and comparing it to Wikipedia is the best way to explain the importance of it.

Good maps are incredibly important. Separating that from financial incentives is necessary.

I gave up trying to edit mistakes on OSM.

I edited something, one month later someone reverted it back without any explanation.

And the UX for discussion is even worse than on Wikipedia, which is saying something. So I have no idea why it was reverted, no idea how to contact the guy and no mood to investigate.

So my street has a wrong name and I am too lazy to change it

Every item on OSM (node, way, relation) is versioned and has a history.

If you can link us to your changes I’m happy to try to help find out why your change was reverted. Usually that’s only the case for blatant errors, copying from proprietary maps (ehm, Google Maps) or vandalism.

We’re trying to be a friendly bunch, and I’d like to get you back as an editor.

I don’t want to ask here (don’t want to mix up my identities), where should I actually ask? In what forum

https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Contact_channels any of these (some may be more or less active). If you're looking for a forum specifically, the answer is https://community.openstreetmap.org

One option you have is to find the changeset that undid your edit and start a discussion with the user in question.

To find the changeset, navigate to the location on openstreetmap.org, right-click, query features, and select the feature in question. The web page should then look like this: https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/93668654/

In the left pane click "View history" to see all the changesets affecting that feature. Find the one you want, then click the link next to "Changeset #". The web page should then look like this: https://www.openstreetmap.org/changeset/104465654

The comment on the changeset might already contain enough information to answer why it undid your edit. If not, the left pane now has a text box for you to add a comment to the discussion. The user in question should receive a notification/email when you comment, and will hopefully engage in the discussion.

If they don't, or are otherwise uncivil, you can contact the local mapper community. Often you can find them on this Discourse forum: https://community.openstreetmap.org/

The local (mostly national) community can often explain why an edit was reverted (if the mapper who did it won't), or mediate with that mapper if they are in the wrong. Just keep in mind that we are all volunteers.

Do as the others said here.

Sometimes one can find specific local communities here, too: https://openstreetmap.community/

I remember quite a few years ago when I once went into OSM and fixed some streets in Las Vegas by "unbraiding" the intersections, in other words converting intersections with ways that joined at one point to ways that joined in a tic-tac-toe pattern. I believe this was considered best practice at the time in OSM. Well, a few days later, I got a very angry private message from some guy complaining that I edited "his" nicely braided roads and demanding that I revert the edit. I was kind of a newbie at the time so I did what he said and stopped editing for a while.

I've since gotten back into editing here and there, but the initial experience likely prevented me from really getting into OSM and becoming some kind of editing master.

Mapping can be very opinionated, but sending angry private messages to people genuinely trying to make the map better is definitely not necessary.

Libgen and scihub are pretty important too.

Not sure of the rank position, but the Internet Archive is quite valuable as well.

I'd say it's even more important than Wikipedia. Static articles on various subjects may require a bit of effort, but dynamic zoomable maps are not something you can get another way (except for commercial offerings).

That's the Web interface, the real value is in its database. Many applications can make use of that data for maps or for geolocation information or to get all of the railway stations in a city.

I'd argue it's #1

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