Hey all,
Mozilla may be able to help the development of stumbling applications
since Mozilla already has access to map tiles. This mail is a request
for guidance on the re-use of the tiles currently provided as part of
the MozStumbler Android app.
In summary, my questions are:
0) why does MozStumbler not include any copyright notice on its tiles?
1) can the tiles used by the MozStumbler mapping panel be reused?
2) can the tile service used by MozStumbler be reused by third party
stumbler applications?
Stumbling works better with a map, both to stumble one's way forward
productively and to stumble one's way home.
The quickest way to provide a map for the context is using a
tessellation of image 'tiles' showing a map and overlaying positions on
such a background. The 'web' has standardized on a particular set of
tiles (invented by the Google Maps project) so most mapping libraries
can handle such tiles. However, applications wanting a tile map still
need to
1) have the right to show such tiles
2) have the right to distribute such tiles, and
3) have some way to provide such tiles to users.
Solving the issue of providing tiles to stumbling apps is a first step;
eventually, I suspect we will want a general solution to providing map
tiles on the platforms where Mozilla and its community are active, most
notably for me on Firefox OS; this mail is about stumbling apps but the
answers to some of these questions may influence the larger question.
The first of these issues, having the right to show such tiles boils
down to having the right to use some source of geographic data and
having some way to generate tiles from that data. Generally, in the free
software world we use the OpenStreetMap (OSM) data set and some free
software to make the tiles. The use of OSM data carries with it the
requirement to label the map '(c) OpenStreeMap contributors'.
0) why does MozStumbler not include any copyright notice on its tiles?
The MozStumbler app has a mapping panel. The background map is built
from tiles obtained from an online web service, a service which is
apparently under some commercial contract. However, the map does not
show any copyright notice.
Is the lack of a copyright notice because this is not needed according
to the commercial contract because the original producer has full rights
to the underlying data? (Alternatively, this lack of copyright notice
might simply be due to an oversight or to work being in progress on the
MozStumbling app.) I am not clear if the data used for the tiles are at
all derivative of OSM data.
The second two questions are trying to see if the existing tile service
can provide any help in getting tiles to stumblin' users. There are two
approaches to this: a download bundle or a live service. If the tiles
can be reused, I could provide them as a static resource of my web app
for users. If the tile *service* can be used, then users could get the
tiles directly from the network (possibly caching the tiles temporarily
or permanently locally).
1) can the tiles used by the MozStumbler mapping panel be reused?
Given that Mozilla is paying for the provision of map tiles this
aggreement might cover both the right to access and use the tiles and
the service providing the tiles when requested by the MozStumbler
applications; alternatively, Mozilla might only be paying for the
service, with the tiles and underlying data being available for free.
If the tiles were free for reuse, we would be able to reuse them in any
of several ways. For offline access, tiles could be provided a static
files in the app. The size impact is managable for any zone where re-use
will be intensive; storing a set of tiles from a z level of 10 to a z
level of 14 covering 1600 km^2 (40kmx40km) requires only about 6 MB.
2) can the tile service used by MozStumbler be reused by third party
stumbler applications?
This is probably not allowed by the terms of the contract or because
Mozilla is worried about the cost.
However, from Mozilla's point of view, there is little reason to
distinguish the use of tiles by contributors when using one stumbling
app as against any other. Yet I can imagine that this would give Mozilla
enough pause to decide not to allow this.
Thanks for clarification on these issues. If I can reuse the tiles used
by MozStumbler, it will save me much time. If not, at some point I'll
loose a week trying to produce similar tiles from OSM data.
cheers,
~adrian
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