Hi, I would like to provide images of certain objects, currently shelters in forests and along trekking paths, without lots of overhead work. Preparing for a longer hike, I found it useful to see what a shelter looks like, what state it is in and when that was last documented. Entries in OSM for these shelters are also often incomplete and could be improved based on such pictues. Some suitable images I found on other people’s websites, those one could link, but obviously they might be taken down any time and would have copyrights on them. I also have some own pictures of huts I would like to supply. The info I could find thus far on OSM sources is somewhat confusing and often overkill for the purpose.
It is …
complicated: Wikidata, wikimedia, etc.,
redundant: descriptions needed for the above,
exaggerated to create a wikimedia/wikidata entry for some nameless lean-to in the forest (in my opinion)
lot’s of effort, it seems, to fill in all info requested for each image individually
not clear which version or practice is better for OSM.
There might also be privacy issues (Mapillary @ Meta, KartaView) that I’m not aware of.
There doesn’t seem to be a clear guideline in OSM wiki on how to do it with minimal effort, at least I couldn’t find one.
Has someone done such a project and found a way to optimize the process?
And yes, I did look through some resoures and forum items, but they didn’t really fit the question or didn’t reach a consensus. I did not go back 20 years (or so) of OSM discussions, however, and do not want to do so. If there should be a matching and conclusive thread or pages I’ve overlooked I would appreciate a link.
There’s a Commons app that makes uploading pictures relatively painless. When an OSM object has a wikimedia_commons tag, Organic Maps shows a link to the page. (So it doesn’t work offline.) Not sure what other apps do.
You don’t have to have a photo published for every OSM feature.
Easiest way would be just go on your hike, then record the location of each POI, take a photo for your own information & make a note of what was there, then update OSM later with all that info based on your survey.
It may not help you now, but will help the next person who uses that track!
Thanks @osmuser63783. I checked it and it is indeed less effort. Yet it still creates a wikimedia entry for any “shack in the wilderness” and effectively duplicates data already in OSM (location, context, etc.). The question I have seems related to why some people have started uMaps with shelters, where they do provide pictures and additional information but don’t update the OSM entry, essentially creating a second, third, … map layer but leave the base OSM layer incomplete. See, for example this one or this one. Each of these has a regionally good coverage, but is very incomplete beyond this. These maps are well done and useful, but also show a large investment of time that is not feeding back into OSM. They are also hard to find. I think it would be better to have a tool in the of simplicity StreetComplete to add such information while on the road.
Thanks Mateusz and Alan, very useful. Mapcomplete looks interesting, I’ll check it out. As for wikimedia: the wikicommons app asks for context for each image and complains if I don’t add any. It does get a bit tedious but since it has a camera link it is somewhat useful for this purpose anyway.
I tried to build a MapComplete version for my question, but the MapComplete Studio hangs up frequently and then only shows non-functional buttons with a red frame around them. Only re-starting Firefox helps, reloading the page is not sufficient. I also find it quite difficult to create the query the correct way. Is there a comprehensive how-to somewhere? I couldn’t find one.
