Re: [HOT] NB: Organised Editing Guidelines | Re: Final Request: Volunteers Needed for Global Mapathons!

[Vao Matua]

Rory,

You are absolutely right, I'm not suggesting not using those guidelines, we
need them. The Organized Editing Guidelines are fine and I believe most of
the people in the OSM community want to follow the guidelines or at least
follow in spirit. I've worked very hard to create good clear instructions
when creating HOT tasks. If a mapathon host or newbie editor would follow
those directions and the Guidelines we wouldn't have the problems we are
seeing.
The challenge I see is: How do we help the semi-informed follow those
guidelines and the task instructions?

Emmor




On Thu, Mar 28, 2019 at 11:05 AM Rory McCann  wrote:

> On 28.03.19 02:57, Vao Matua wrote:
> > I have observed some characteristics about the OSM mapping through HOT
> > tasks being done by mapathons, primarily ones done by corporate sponsors.
> > It appears that often these efforts are not well led, or at least not
> > led by individuals that have a good level of OSM experience and skills.
> > The results are that very common mistakes and errors are created.
> > ...
> > Perhaps HOT should establish a test or a vetting process for potential
> > mapathon leaders?
>
> Isn't this why we created the Organized Editing Guidelines in the first
> place? One solution is for mapathon hosts to talk about it before hand,
> and for people will more experience to provide feedback?
>
> We spent a year on the organized editing policy. Why fart around
> ignoring the solution we have chosen. Let's move on. Mapathons can be of
> good quality and good for the community by following the policy. The
> rules are there. Follow them. Map. Organize. Have fun.
>
> Rory
>
>
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Re: [HOT] NB: Organised Editing Guidelines | Re: Final Request: Volunteers Needed for Global Mapathons!

[Mikel Maron]

The guidelines are helpful high level guidance but the actual challenge is in 
implementation. Building a proper data operation, whether in OSM or not, is not 
just about talking to people and provide feedback. It definitely is that, but 
needs to be in a system. But working across all aspects of data operations 
systematically. 

It would really benefit the broader community to understand what those systems 
look like from groups that have built them. HOT could learn and the authors of 
the guidelines could learn, if they want to listen. 
Mikel

On Thursday, March 28, 2019, 2:04 PM, Rory McCann  wrote:

On 28.03.19 02:57, Vao Matua wrote:
> I have observed some characteristics about the OSM mapping through HOT 
> tasks being done by mapathons, primarily ones done by corporate sponsors.
> It appears that often these efforts are not well led, or at least not 
> led by individuals that have a good level of OSM experience and skills. 
> The results are that very common mistakes and errors are created.
> ... 
> Perhaps HOT should establish a test or a vetting process for potential 
> mapathon leaders?

Isn't this why we created the Organized Editing Guidelines in the first 
place? One solution is for mapathon hosts to talk about it before hand, 
and for people will more experience to provide feedback?

We spent a year on the organized editing policy. Why fart around 
ignoring the solution we have chosen. Let's move on. Mapathons can be of 
good quality and good for the community by following the policy. The 
rules are there. Follow them. Map. Organize. Have fun.

Rory


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Re: [HOT] NB: Organised Editing Guidelines | Re: Final Request: Volunteers Needed for Global Mapathons!

[Rory McCann]

On 28.03.19 02:57, Vao Matua wrote:
I have observed some characteristics about the OSM mapping through HOT 
tasks being done by mapathons, primarily ones done by corporate sponsors.
It appears that often these efforts are not well led, or at least not 
led by individuals that have a good level of OSM experience and skills. 
The results are that very common mistakes and errors are created.
... 
Perhaps HOT should establish a test or a vetting process for potential 
mapathon leaders?


Isn't this why we created the Organized Editing Guidelines in the first 
place? One solution is for mapathon hosts to talk about it before hand, 
and for people will more experience to provide feedback?


We spent a year on the organized editing policy. Why fart around 
ignoring the solution we have chosen. Let's move on. Mapathons can be of 
good quality and good for the community by following the policy. The 
rules are there. Follow them. Map. Organize. Have fun.


Rory


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Re: [HOT] NB: Organised Editing Guidelines | Re: Final Request: Volunteers Needed for Global Mapathons!

[Mikel Maron]

Actually things are moving on iD, with focus on validation and expanded tools. 
The blocker was never people asking for a building tool.
Improved validation in iD will help a lot. Being able to specify in TM projects 
that iD should load for beginners treating any problems as errors not warnings 
will be big.
It still leaves a whole in responsibility within HOT for data across the 
enterprise.


Mikel

On Thursday, March 28, 2019, 11:14 AM, Blake Girardot  
wrote:

I gave it everything I could to get an iD editor buildings tool
completed and finally gave up after a few years.

This might be a good use of HOT's tech money or another partner who
has experience developing for iD.

How much effort and problems would be alleviated with an iD building tool?

Cheers,
Blake

On Thu, Mar 28, 2019 at 10:40 AM john whelan  wrote:
>
> To draw a rectangular building in line with another takes two clicks in JOSM 
> using the buildings_tool plugin.  Correctly labelled and square.
>
> To correct a building drawn in iD that is untagged and the wrong shape takes 
> considerably more effort and time when validating.
>
> If you catch the mapper early then you end up with fewer buildings to 
> correct.  If they map say five buildings in a mapathon that's not too bad but 
> some map a couple of dozen and come back to map a couple of dozen more and 
> that becomes a problem.
>
> I've taken new mappers in a mapathon and just shown them the buildings_tool 
> they did fine and mapped fifty buildings each easily.  The buildings even 
> passed Pierre's guidelines.
>
> At the back of my mind is the suspicion that for some charities engagement is 
> important and a mapathon might well be seen as engaging with potential donors.
>
> I don't think there are any simple answers.  Many of the points Emmor 
> mentioned are valid but there is to my mind a justification for spending time 
> with students but a problem can be teachers who have little experience with 
> OSM.
>
> Cheerio John
>
>
> On Thu, Mar 28, 2019, 10:19 AM Rebecca Firth,  
> wrote:
>>
>> Hiya,
>>
>> Just to follow up on this, the mapathons will be supporting Missing Maps 
>> projects. Validation activities to support the mapathons are already planned 
>> for the following week, as well as other activities such as training and 
>> this effort to find local experienced mappers who are interested in 
>> supporting the mapathons and providing additional OSM expertise & also 
>> contributing to improving quality.
>>
>> Missing Maps groups are very aware of OEG but are still working on how best 
>> to create documentation to fit best with both OEG suggestions and 
>> practicality. Much of this information is presently available in slightly 
>> different forms (such as the events list on the Missing Maps website), which 
>> need to be linked to/synthesized differently to fit with OEG. For additional 
>> information, HOT-specific work in progress towards the OEG is available at: 
>> https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Organised_Editing/Activities/Humanitarian_OpenStreetMap_Team
>>
>> Thanks,
>>
>> Rebecca
>>
>>
>>
>> On Wed, Mar 27, 2019 at 8:59 PM Vao Matua  wrote:
>>>
>>> Mikel et al,
>>>
>>> I agree that we need to change the way we do mapathons, the credibility of 
>>> HOT and OSM is at risk.
>>> I have observed some characteristics about the OSM mapping through HOT 
>>> tasks being done by mapathons, primarily ones done by corporate sponsors.
>>> It appears that often these efforts are not well led, or at least not led 
>>> by individuals that have a good level of OSM experience and skills. The 
>>> results are that very common mistakes and errors are created.
>>> 1) The instructions are not followed, nor even apparently read.
>>> 2) Individuals assume that a tile must be completely mapped and will add 
>>> features that are not called for in the instructions such as landuse or 
>>> highways.
>>> 3) The tagging of features is not done based on OSM guidance, for example a 
>>> path in Tanzania is often tagged as "motorway", "primary", "secondary" or 
>>> other type of highway.
>>> 4) Additional tags are added without local knowledge such as railroads, 
>>> traffic cameras, and businesses that are not apparent from imagery.
>>> 5) Using iD with the default image (Bing) without changing the background 
>>> image leads people to mark a tile as "bad imagery" when the Digital Globe 
>>> or Esri imagery in that location is fine.
>>> 6) Sometimes mappers will assume that OSM is a game like Sim City or 
>>> Minecraft and create their own imaginary features
>>> 7) One characteristic of many of these mappers is an apparent hurried to 
>>> try to finish a tile. The buildings are over-generalized by either 
>>> combining buildings, creating polygons much larger than the actual 
>>> building, often the shapes are very crude and are not carefully formed with 
>>> right angles, many buildings are skipped or overlooked, many are 
>>> overlapping with other buildings or roads, and in many cases 

Re: [HOT] NB: Organised Editing Guidelines | Re: Final Request: Volunteers Needed for Global Mapathons!

[Pierre Béland via HOT]

Providing tools sophisticated or not to Newbies is not the only problem with 
quality. See my response about quality for the ticket 
https://github.com/hotosm/tasking-manager/issues/1373 
With the advent of the MissingMaps project in 2014, the organizations that 
sponsor that project did not only organize mapathons but regularly advocated 
for groups around the world to organize mapathons. Since Nepal 2015, all the 
major OSM disaster Responses have suffered from massive participation of 
newbies with bad quality edits. The same with the various actions to help for 
humanitarian NGO's vaccination campaigns and other projects.
The TM let's escalate mapping for the Good or the Bad (Quality).  The major 
role presently is to distribute tasks.  What can be done to offer more 
Coordination functions with a more complex Mapping Network with brokers like 
MissingMaps and unknown mapathons organizers ? 

Pierre 



 

Le jeudi 28 mars 2019 11 h 16 min 16 s HAE, Blake Girardot 
 a écrit :  
 
 I gave it everything I could to get an iD editor buildings tool
completed and finally gave up after a few years.

This might be a good use of HOT's tech money or another partner who
has experience developing for iD.

How much effort and problems would be alleviated with an iD building tool?

Cheers,
Blake

On Thu, Mar 28, 2019 at 10:40 AM john whelan  wrote:
>
> To draw a rectangular building in line with another takes two clicks in JOSM 
> using the buildings_tool plugin.  Correctly labelled and square.
>
> To correct a building drawn in iD that is untagged and the wrong shape takes 
> considerably more effort and time when validating.
>
> If you catch the mapper early then you end up with fewer buildings to 
> correct.  If they map say five buildings in a mapathon that's not too bad but 
> some map a couple of dozen and come back to map a couple of dozen more and 
> that becomes a problem.
>
> I've taken new mappers in a mapathon and just shown them the buildings_tool 
> they did fine and mapped fifty buildings each easily.  The buildings even 
> passed Pierre's guidelines.
>
> At the back of my mind is the suspicion that for some charities engagement is 
> important and a mapathon might well be seen as engaging with potential donors.
>
> I don't think there are any simple answers.  Many of the points Emmor 
> mentioned are valid but there is to my mind a justification for spending time 
> with students but a problem can be teachers who have little experience with 
> OSM.
>
> Cheerio John
>
>
> On Thu, Mar 28, 2019, 10:19 AM Rebecca Firth,  
> wrote:
>>
>> Hiya,
>>
>> Just to follow up on this, the mapathons will be supporting Missing Maps 
>> projects. Validation activities to support the mapathons are already planned 
>> for the following week, as well as other activities such as training and 
>> this effort to find local experienced mappers who are interested in 
>> supporting the mapathons and providing additional OSM expertise & also 
>> contributing to improving quality.
>>
>> Missing Maps groups are very aware of OEG but are still working on how best 
>> to create documentation to fit best with both OEG suggestions and 
>> practicality. Much of this information is presently available in slightly 
>> different forms (such as the events list on the Missing Maps website), which 
>> need to be linked to/synthesized differently to fit with OEG. For additional 
>> information, HOT-specific work in progress towards the OEG is available at: 
>> https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Organised_Editing/Activities/Humanitarian_OpenStreetMap_Team
>>
>> Thanks,
>>
>> Rebecca
>>
>>
>>
>> On Wed, Mar 27, 2019 at 8:59 PM Vao Matua  wrote:
>>>
>>> Mikel et al,
>>>
>>> I agree that we need to change the way we do mapathons, the credibility of 
>>> HOT and OSM is at risk.
>>> I have observed some characteristics about the OSM mapping through HOT 
>>> tasks being done by mapathons, primarily ones done by corporate sponsors.
>>> It appears that often these efforts are not well led, or at least not led 
>>> by individuals that have a good level of OSM experience and skills. The 
>>> results are that very common mistakes and errors are created.
>>> 1) The instructions are not followed, nor even apparently read.
>>> 2) Individuals assume that a tile must be completely mapped and will add 
>>> features that are not called for in the instructions such as landuse or 
>>> highways.
>>> 3) The tagging of features is not done based on OSM guidance, for example a 
>>> path in Tanzania is often tagged as "motorway", "primary", "secondary" or 
>>> other type of highway.
>>> 4) Additional tags are added without local knowledge such as railroads, 
>>> traffic cameras, and businesses that are not apparent from imagery.
>>> 5) Using iD with the default image (Bing) without changing the background 
>>> image leads people to mark a tile as "bad imagery" when the Digital Globe 
>>> or Esri imagery in that location is fine.
>>> 6) Sometimes mappers will 

[HOT] DEADLINE for SOTM Scholarship Submission 3/30

[Rachel VanNice]

Hi all,
Only 2 days left to get in your applications for scholarships for the
Global State of the Map conference in Heidelberg Sept. 21-23, 2019! Within
this application, you can indicate your interest in supplemental support to
attend the HOT Summit. More details and application here-
https://blog.openstreetmap.org/2019/02/26/apply-for-scholarship-to-join-us-at-state-of-the-map-2019-in-heidelberg/

Thanks,

-- 
Rachel VanNice
Operations Manager
E-Mail: rachel.vann...@hotosm.org
Skype: rachel.vannice

*Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team*
*Using OpenStreetMap for Humanitarian Response & Economic Development*
web  | twitter  | facebook
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Re: [HOT] NB: Organised Editing Guidelines | Re: Final Request: Volunteers Needed for Global Mapathons!

[Blake Girardot]

I gave it everything I could to get an iD editor buildings tool
completed and finally gave up after a few years.

This might be a good use of HOT's tech money or another partner who
has experience developing for iD.

How much effort and problems would be alleviated with an iD building tool?

Cheers,
Blake

On Thu, Mar 28, 2019 at 10:40 AM john whelan  wrote:
>
> To draw a rectangular building in line with another takes two clicks in JOSM 
> using the buildings_tool plugin.  Correctly labelled and square.
>
> To correct a building drawn in iD that is untagged and the wrong shape takes 
> considerably more effort and time when validating.
>
> If you catch the mapper early then you end up with fewer buildings to 
> correct.  If they map say five buildings in a mapathon that's not too bad but 
> some map a couple of dozen and come back to map a couple of dozen more and 
> that becomes a problem.
>
> I've taken new mappers in a mapathon and just shown them the buildings_tool 
> they did fine and mapped fifty buildings each easily.  The buildings even 
> passed Pierre's guidelines.
>
> At the back of my mind is the suspicion that for some charities engagement is 
> important and a mapathon might well be seen as engaging with potential donors.
>
> I don't think there are any simple answers.  Many of the points Emmor 
> mentioned are valid but there is to my mind a justification for spending time 
> with students but a problem can be teachers who have little experience with 
> OSM.
>
> Cheerio John
>
>
> On Thu, Mar 28, 2019, 10:19 AM Rebecca Firth,  
> wrote:
>>
>> Hiya,
>>
>> Just to follow up on this, the mapathons will be supporting Missing Maps 
>> projects. Validation activities to support the mapathons are already planned 
>> for the following week, as well as other activities such as training and 
>> this effort to find local experienced mappers who are interested in 
>> supporting the mapathons and providing additional OSM expertise & also 
>> contributing to improving quality.
>>
>> Missing Maps groups are very aware of OEG but are still working on how best 
>> to create documentation to fit best with both OEG suggestions and 
>> practicality. Much of this information is presently available in slightly 
>> different forms (such as the events list on the Missing Maps website), which 
>> need to be linked to/synthesized differently to fit with OEG. For additional 
>> information, HOT-specific work in progress towards the OEG is available at: 
>> https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Organised_Editing/Activities/Humanitarian_OpenStreetMap_Team
>>
>> Thanks,
>>
>> Rebecca
>>
>>
>>
>> On Wed, Mar 27, 2019 at 8:59 PM Vao Matua  wrote:
>>>
>>> Mikel et al,
>>>
>>> I agree that we need to change the way we do mapathons, the credibility of 
>>> HOT and OSM is at risk.
>>> I have observed some characteristics about the OSM mapping through HOT 
>>> tasks being done by mapathons, primarily ones done by corporate sponsors.
>>> It appears that often these efforts are not well led, or at least not led 
>>> by individuals that have a good level of OSM experience and skills. The 
>>> results are that very common mistakes and errors are created.
>>> 1) The instructions are not followed, nor even apparently read.
>>> 2) Individuals assume that a tile must be completely mapped and will add 
>>> features that are not called for in the instructions such as landuse or 
>>> highways.
>>> 3) The tagging of features is not done based on OSM guidance, for example a 
>>> path in Tanzania is often tagged as "motorway", "primary", "secondary" or 
>>> other type of highway.
>>> 4) Additional tags are added without local knowledge such as railroads, 
>>> traffic cameras, and businesses that are not apparent from imagery.
>>> 5) Using iD with the default image (Bing) without changing the background 
>>> image leads people to mark a tile as "bad imagery" when the Digital Globe 
>>> or Esri imagery in that location is fine.
>>> 6) Sometimes mappers will assume that OSM is a game like Sim City or 
>>> Minecraft and create their own imaginary features
>>> 7) One characteristic of many of these mappers is an apparent hurried to 
>>> try to finish a tile. The buildings are over-generalized by either 
>>> combining buildings, creating polygons much larger than the actual 
>>> building, often the shapes are very crude and are not carefully formed with 
>>> right angles, many buildings are skipped or overlooked, many are 
>>> overlapping with other buildings or roads, and in many cases create 
>>> self-intersecting polygons
>>> 8) Once a mapper starts with these bad habits the habits are picked up by 
>>> others working at the same time which expands the problems
>>> 9) It appears that after a small number of edit sessions the mappers from 
>>> these efforts do not continue with other HOT tasks, and presumably go a way 
>>> thinking they have done their feel-good-humanitarian-service.
>>>
>>> The net result of these mapathons is that rather than 

Re: [HOT] NB: Organised Editing Guidelines | Re: Final Request: Volunteers Needed for Global Mapathons!

[Mikel Maron]

Felix I agree with that approach. If it needs to be in the wiki, then automated 
ways to create that archive makes sense.
Rebecca, I think those activities are critical. My perspective is that someone 
in HOT needs to be primarily responsible for looking after data, quality and 
adherence and consistency to tagging practices, making sure documentation is in 
order, and that HOT aligns with OSM community practices. I think we’ve had an 
assumption that best practice in OSM pervades everything and everyone, and that 
this all will just happen. But HOT is such a scale of operation and growth, 
data needs to be looked as an enterprise wide asset. In government this role is 
sometimes called a Chief Data Officer. Similar to a CTO / Tech Director who has 
an organization wide vision strategy and operation for the development of the 
tech stack.
Mikel

On Thursday, March 28, 2019, 10:41 AM, Felix Delattre 
 wrote:

 Hola, 
  Yes, I think it was one of the concerns of the creators of the revised 
guidelines to assure that the scattered information on project's websites like 
Missing Maps and  companies' blogs finds a way back to OpenStreetMap's 
infrastructure.
  
  The Tasking Manager is probably the software that is used for most organised 
editing efforts. And a lot of the information required by the Organised Editing 
Guidelines is already present in the projects' descriptions and database of the 
TM. There the idea emerged that the TM could (automatically) report back to 
OpenStreetMap. This would make it much easier to comply with the guidelines. Me 
too, I don't think the wiki is a good place for managing this. Following the 
idea of automated reporting through the TM, and estimating the amount of 
projects created on all instances, I know of, I'm not sure, whether we want the 
wiki to have thousands of entries every year and I actually don't know if 
automated feeding would work. 
  However I understand the value to store reporting on organised editing 
activities on OSMF's side and in one central repository. I just doubt a bit 
about the technology proposed to be used.
  Some conversation around that has started here, and I invite people to 
participate https://github.com/hotosm/tasking-manager/issues/1373 
  Thanks,
 Felix
  
  On 3/28/19 2:16 PM, Rebecca Firth wrote:
  
 
  Hiya, 
  Just to follow up on this, the mapathons will be supporting Missing Maps 
projects. Validation activities to support the mapathons are already planned 
for the following week, as well as other activities such as training and this 
effort to find local experienced mappers who are interested in supporting the 
mapathons and providing additional OSM expertise & also contributing to 
improving quality. 
  Missing Maps groups are very aware of OEG but are still working on how best 
to create documentation to fit best with both OEG suggestions and practicality. 
Much of this information is presently available in slightly different forms 
(such as the events list on the Missing Maps website), which need to be linked 
to/synthesized differently to fit with OEG. For additional information, 
HOT-specific work in progress towards the OEG is available at: 
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Organised_Editing/Activities/Humanitarian_OpenStreetMap_Team
 
  Thanks, 
  Rebecca  
  
   
  On Wed, Mar 27, 2019 at 8:59 PM Vao Matua  wrote:
  
 Mikel et al, 
  I agree that we need to change the way we do mapathons, the credibility of 
HOT and OSM is at risk. I have observed some characteristics about the OSM 
mapping through HOT tasks being done by mapathons, primarily ones done by 
corporate sponsors. It appears that often these efforts are not well led, or at 
least not led by individuals that have a good level of OSM experience and 
skills. The results are that very common mistakes and errors are created. 1) 
The instructions are not followed, nor even apparently read. 2) Individuals 
assume that a tile must be completely mapped and will add features that are not 
called for in the instructions such as landuse or highways. 3) The tagging of 
features is not done based on OSM guidance, for example a path in Tanzania is 
often tagged as "motorway", "primary", "secondary" or other type of highway. 4) 
Additional tags are added without local knowledge such as railroads, traffic 
cameras, and businesses that are not apparent from imagery. 5) Using iD with 
the default image (Bing) without changing the background image leads people to 
mark a tile as "bad imagery" when the Digital Globe or Esri imagery in that 
location is fine.
  6) Sometimes mappers will assume that OSM is a game like Sim City or 
Minecraft and create their own imaginary features 7) One characteristic of many 
of these mappers is an apparent hurried to try to finish a tile. The buildings 
are over-generalized by either combining buildings, creating polygons much 
larger than the actual building, often the shapes are very crude and are not 
carefully formed with right angles, 

Re: [HOT] Welcome Alex!

[Pete Masters via HOT]

Hi Alex, great to have you on board!

Pete

On Thu, Mar 28, 2019 at 1:32 AM Rebecca Firth 
wrote:

> Hi,
>
> Very pleased to introduce Alex Glynn (
> https://www.hotosm.org/people/alex-glynn/) who joined HOT last week,
> managing our Communications activities globally! Excited to have Alex on
> board to help bring HOT work alive through more and better comms - please
> give her a warm welcome, and let her know any ideas you have for HOT Comms
> going forward!
>
> Rebecca
>
> --
> *Rebecca Firth*
> Director, Community & Partnerships
> rebecca.fi...@hotosm.org 
> @RebeccaFirthy
>
> *Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team*
> *Using OpenStreetMap for Humanitarian Response & Economic Development*
> web  | twitter  | facebook
>  | donate 
>
> ___
> HOT mailing list
> HOT@openstreetmap.org
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>
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Re: [HOT] NB: Organised Editing Guidelines | Re: Final Request: Volunteers Needed for Global Mapathons!

[Felix Delattre]

Hola,

Yes, I think it was one of the concerns of the creators of the revised
guidelines to assure that the scattered information on project's
websites like Missing Maps and companies' blogs finds a way back to
OpenStreetMap's infrastructure.

The Tasking Manager is probably the software that is used for most
organised editing efforts. And a lot of the information required by the
Organised Editing Guidelines is already present in the projects'
descriptions and database of the TM. There the idea emerged that the TM
could (automatically) report back to OpenStreetMap. This would make it
much easier to comply with the guidelines. Me too, I don't think the
wiki is a good place for managing this. Following the idea of automated
reporting through the TM, and estimating the amount of projects created
on all instances, I know of, I'm not sure, whether we want the wiki to
have thousands of entries every year and I actually don't know if
automated feeding would work.

However I understand the value to store reporting on organised editing
activities on OSMF's side and in one central repository. I just doubt a
bit about the technology proposed to be used.
Some conversation around that has started here, and I invite people to
participate https://github.com/hotosm/tasking-manager/issues/1373

Thanks,
Felix

On 3/28/19 2:16 PM, Rebecca Firth wrote:
> Hiya,
>
> Just to follow up on this, the mapathons will be supporting Missing
> Maps projects. Validation activities to support the mapathons are
> already planned for the following week, as well as other activities
> such as training and this effort to find local experienced mappers who
> are interested in supporting the mapathons and providing additional
> OSM expertise & also contributing to improving quality.
>
> Missing Maps groups are very aware of OEG but are still working on how
> best to create documentation to fit best with both OEG suggestions and
> practicality. Much of this information is presently available in
> slightly different forms (such as the events list on the Missing Maps
> website), which need to be linked to/synthesized differently to fit
> with OEG. For additional information, HOT-specific work in progress
> towards the OEG is available
> at: 
> https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Organised_Editing/Activities/Humanitarian_OpenStreetMap_Team
>
> Thanks,
>
> Rebecca
>
>
>
> On Wed, Mar 27, 2019 at 8:59 PM Vao Matua  > wrote:
>
> Mikel et al,
>
> I agree that we need to change the way we do mapathons, the
> credibility of HOT and OSM is at risk.
> I have observed some characteristics about the OSM mapping through
> HOT tasks being done by mapathons, primarily ones done by
> corporate sponsors.
> It appears that often these efforts are not well led, or at least
> not led by individuals that have a good level of OSM experience
> and skills. The results are that very common mistakes and errors
> are created.
> 1) The instructions are not followed, nor even apparently read.
> 2) Individuals assume that a tile must be completely mapped and
> will add features that are not called for in the instructions such
> as landuse or highways.
> 3) The tagging of features is not done based on OSM guidance, for
> example a path in Tanzania is often tagged as "motorway",
> "primary", "secondary" or other type of highway.
> 4) Additional tags are added without local knowledge such as
> railroads, traffic cameras, and businesses that are not apparent
> from imagery.
> 5) Using iD with the default image (Bing) without changing the
> background image leads people to mark a tile as "bad imagery" when
> the Digital Globe or Esri imagery in that location is fine.
> 6) Sometimes mappers will assume that OSM is a game like Sim City
> or Minecraft and create their own imaginary features
> 7) One characteristic of many of these mappers is an apparent
> hurried to try to finish a tile. The buildings are
> over-generalized by either combining buildings, creating polygons
> much larger than the actual building, often the shapes are very
> crude and are not carefully formed with right angles, many
> buildings are skipped or overlooked, many are overlapping with
> other buildings or roads, and in many cases create
> self-intersecting polygons
> 8) Once a mapper starts with these bad habits the habits are
> picked up by others working at the same time which expands the
> problems
> 9) It appears that after a small number of edit sessions the
> mappers from these efforts do not continue with other HOT tasks,
> and presumably go a way thinking they have done their
> feel-good-humanitarian-service.
>
> The net result of these mapathons is that rather than contributing
> to the completion of mapping in an area, there is actually more
> work required to clean up the messes than there would have 

Re: [HOT] NB: Organised Editing Guidelines | Re: Final Request: Volunteers Needed for Global Mapathons!

[john whelan]

To draw a rectangular building in line with another takes two clicks in
JOSM using the buildings_tool plugin.  Correctly labelled and square.

To correct a building drawn in iD that is untagged and the wrong shape
takes considerably more effort and time when validating.

If you catch the mapper early then you end up with fewer buildings to
correct.  If they map say five buildings in a mapathon that's not too bad
but some map a couple of dozen and come back to map a couple of dozen more
and that becomes a problem.

I've taken new mappers in a mapathon and just shown them the buildings_tool
they did fine and mapped fifty buildings each easily.  The buildings even
passed Pierre's guidelines.

At the back of my mind is the suspicion that for some charities engagement
is important and a mapathon might well be seen as engaging with potential
donors.

I don't think there are any simple answers.  Many of the points Emmor
mentioned are valid but there is to my mind a justification for spending
time with students but a problem can be teachers who have little experience
with OSM.

Cheerio John


On Thu, Mar 28, 2019, 10:19 AM Rebecca Firth, 
wrote:

> Hiya,
>
> Just to follow up on this, the mapathons will be supporting Missing Maps
> projects. Validation activities to support the mapathons are already
> planned for the following week, as well as other activities such as
> training and this effort to find local experienced mappers who are
> interested in supporting the mapathons and providing additional OSM
> expertise & also contributing to improving quality.
>
> Missing Maps groups are very aware of OEG but are still working on how
> best to create documentation to fit best with both OEG suggestions and
> practicality. Much of this information is presently available in slightly
> different forms (such as the events list on the Missing Maps website),
> which need to be linked to/synthesized differently to fit with OEG. For
> additional information, HOT-specific work in progress towards the OEG is
> available at:
> https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Organised_Editing/Activities/Humanitarian_OpenStreetMap_Team
>
> Thanks,
>
> Rebecca
>
>
>
> On Wed, Mar 27, 2019 at 8:59 PM Vao Matua  wrote:
>
>> Mikel et al,
>>
>> I agree that we need to change the way we do mapathons, the credibility
>> of HOT and OSM is at risk.
>> I have observed some characteristics about the OSM mapping through HOT
>> tasks being done by mapathons, primarily ones done by corporate sponsors.
>> It appears that often these efforts are not well led, or at least not led
>> by individuals that have a good level of OSM experience and skills. The
>> results are that very common mistakes and errors are created.
>> 1) The instructions are not followed, nor even apparently read.
>> 2) Individuals assume that a tile must be completely mapped and will add
>> features that are not called for in the instructions such as landuse or
>> highways.
>> 3) The tagging of features is not done based on OSM guidance, for example
>> a path in Tanzania is often tagged as "motorway", "primary", "secondary" or
>> other type of highway.
>> 4) Additional tags are added without local knowledge such as railroads,
>> traffic cameras, and businesses that are not apparent from imagery.
>> 5) Using iD with the default image (Bing) without changing the background
>> image leads people to mark a tile as "bad imagery" when the Digital Globe
>> or Esri imagery in that location is fine.
>> 6) Sometimes mappers will assume that OSM is a game like Sim City or
>> Minecraft and create their own imaginary features
>> 7) One characteristic of many of these mappers is an apparent hurried to
>> try to finish a tile. The buildings are over-generalized by either
>> combining buildings, creating polygons much larger than the actual
>> building, often the shapes are very crude and are not carefully formed with
>> right angles, many buildings are skipped or overlooked, many are
>> overlapping with other buildings or roads, and in many cases create
>> self-intersecting polygons
>> 8) Once a mapper starts with these bad habits the habits are picked up by
>> others working at the same time which expands the problems
>> 9) It appears that after a small number of edit sessions the mappers from
>> these efforts do not continue with other HOT tasks, and presumably go a way
>> thinking they have done their feel-good-humanitarian-service.
>>
>> The net result of these mapathons is that rather than contributing to the
>> completion of mapping in an area, there is actually more work required to
>> clean up the messes than there would have been to properly trace the
>> features from scratch.
>> I do not believe this is a validation issue, but is an issue with
>> leadership. The individual organizing the event for the corporation or
>> group may have little or no OSM experience, and have been giving the task
>> of setting up the mapathon  and do not have the skills or expertise to help
>> newbie mappers.  I 

Re: [HOT] NB: Organised Editing Guidelines | Re: Final Request: Volunteers Needed for Global Mapathons!

[Rebecca Firth]

Hiya,

Just to follow up on this, the mapathons will be supporting Missing Maps
projects. Validation activities to support the mapathons are already
planned for the following week, as well as other activities such as
training and this effort to find local experienced mappers who are
interested in supporting the mapathons and providing additional OSM
expertise & also contributing to improving quality.

Missing Maps groups are very aware of OEG but are still working on how best
to create documentation to fit best with both OEG suggestions and
practicality. Much of this information is presently available in slightly
different forms (such as the events list on the Missing Maps website),
which need to be linked to/synthesized differently to fit with OEG. For
additional information, HOT-specific work in progress towards the OEG is
available at:
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Organised_Editing/Activities/Humanitarian_OpenStreetMap_Team

Thanks,

Rebecca



On Wed, Mar 27, 2019 at 8:59 PM Vao Matua  wrote:

> Mikel et al,
>
> I agree that we need to change the way we do mapathons, the credibility of
> HOT and OSM is at risk.
> I have observed some characteristics about the OSM mapping through HOT
> tasks being done by mapathons, primarily ones done by corporate sponsors.
> It appears that often these efforts are not well led, or at least not led
> by individuals that have a good level of OSM experience and skills. The
> results are that very common mistakes and errors are created.
> 1) The instructions are not followed, nor even apparently read.
> 2) Individuals assume that a tile must be completely mapped and will add
> features that are not called for in the instructions such as landuse or
> highways.
> 3) The tagging of features is not done based on OSM guidance, for example
> a path in Tanzania is often tagged as "motorway", "primary", "secondary" or
> other type of highway.
> 4) Additional tags are added without local knowledge such as railroads,
> traffic cameras, and businesses that are not apparent from imagery.
> 5) Using iD with the default image (Bing) without changing the background
> image leads people to mark a tile as "bad imagery" when the Digital Globe
> or Esri imagery in that location is fine.
> 6) Sometimes mappers will assume that OSM is a game like Sim City or
> Minecraft and create their own imaginary features
> 7) One characteristic of many of these mappers is an apparent hurried to
> try to finish a tile. The buildings are over-generalized by either
> combining buildings, creating polygons much larger than the actual
> building, often the shapes are very crude and are not carefully formed with
> right angles, many buildings are skipped or overlooked, many are
> overlapping with other buildings or roads, and in many cases create
> self-intersecting polygons
> 8) Once a mapper starts with these bad habits the habits are picked up by
> others working at the same time which expands the problems
> 9) It appears that after a small number of edit sessions the mappers from
> these efforts do not continue with other HOT tasks, and presumably go a way
> thinking they have done their feel-good-humanitarian-service.
>
> The net result of these mapathons is that rather than contributing to the
> completion of mapping in an area, there is actually more work required to
> clean up the messes than there would have been to properly trace the
> features from scratch.
> I do not believe this is a validation issue, but is an issue with
> leadership. The individual organizing the event for the corporation or
> group may have little or no OSM experience, and have been giving the task
> of setting up the mapathon  and do not have the skills or expertise to help
> newbie mappers.  I also have seen people that claim to have OSM experience
> or skills often are very inexperienced and have very slight exposure, There
> is a lot to learn about OSM, and we do ourselves a disservice by saying
> that it's easy and anyone can do it. We should be happy to teach people,
> but I don't believe any of us doesn't have more to learn.
> I have led several corporate mapathons in person and remotely, they are
> hard work. The same can be said for tertiary school effort.
>
> Perhaps HOT should establish a test or a vetting process for potential
> mapathon leaders?
>
> Emmor
>
>
> On Wed, Mar 27, 2019 at 2:06 PM Mikel Maron  wrote:
>
>> Important to note the guidelines are suggestions not enforced
>> requirements of the OSMF. More on that in the blog post
>> https://blog.openstreetmap.org/2019/02/09/organised-editing-guidelines/
>>
>> My opinion is master list of mapathons is a very good idea. I don’t think
>> the wiki is best system suited to be the place for that primary list.
>> Another tool could mirror to the wiki for archiving purposes.
>>
>> I agree with Pierre. Data quality needs to become a primary focus of
>> these and other mapping activities asap. Otherwise it’s not valuable
>> experience for those present or