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Digital platforms increasingly combine maps, data, and responsive web interfaces to help people access information from different devices.

OpenStreetMap is an interesting example of how an open mapping community can collaboratively create and maintain geographic data. Users can contribute mapping information, discuss changes, and document their mapping activities through user diaries.

From a web-development perspective, mapping platforms demonstrate the importance of responsive interfaces, clear navigation, structured information, and community participation.

My interest in this area is focused on understanding how modern web technologies can present large amounts of information in a simple and accessible way.

Community-driven projects also show how technology can bring contributors together to improve publicly available information.

15 hours ago

I’ve now uploaded to the Internet a little web-based program called GPX Reference Point Generator (GPXRPG).

GPXRPG may be of interest to the subset of OSM Contributors who use the OSM iD Editor for “armchair mapping”.

These Contributors add to the OSM database new Area features - particularly urban building footprints - by tracing the outline of each building on an aerial imagery background layer. Before commencing to trace new building outlines, they need to check that the aerial imagery background they have chosen is aligned to OSM’s coordinate system with sub-metre accuracy (and if not, adjust the alignment using the iD Editor’s Imagery Offset dialog).

Two items are required to provide a basis for the alignment check:

1. a “target spot” in the iD Editor’s Aerial Imagery Background Layer that has accurately known latitude-longitude coordinates. A visible Survey Control Mark with published coordinates would meet this requirement perfectly.

2. a “reference point feature” in the iD Editor’s OSM Data Layer located at the same coordinates.

GPXRPG is a simple tool to create the required “reference point feature”.
It generates and downloads a GPX track file modelling an Arrow with its tip placed exactly at the published position of the target spot. This track file can then easily be dragged-and-dropped to the iD Editor’s map window to provide that vital OSM reference point feature.

GPXRPG includes a User Guide button which opens a document including an illustrated walk-through of an “armchair mapping” session using a Survey Control Mark and a GPX track file.

You can checkout this program and user guide at www.davidhaycraft.id.au/GPXRPG. Careful - this URL is case-sensitive!

2 days ago

For tomorrow’s eclipse I built a small free tool that reconstructs the ground-level view anywhere in the visibility zone, with buildings and forests from OSM extruded over real terrain, and the eclipse computed minute by minute. I posted the technical details on the community forum this week. The tool is at 2026eclipse.eu. Feedback on how your area renders is very welcome, especially where height tagging is sparse.

3 days ago

• URL: osmapp.org
• Full changelogs:
  • github.com/zbycz/osmapp/releases/tag/v1.8.0 (Nov 9, 2025)
  • github.com/zbycz/osmapp/releases/tag/v1.9.0 (Aug 7, 2026)

OsmAPP is the one integrated app for OpenStreetMap ecosystem for both web and mobile. It should be as easy to use as Google Maps, but fully open-source using all the great services around. It was first aimed at broad public, but now it becomes apparent, that it works best for the OpenStreetMap contributors, who want better UX or share OSM around.

The November release didn’t recieve its release notes until now, so we announce both version together. Also, mind that OsmAPP is updated continuously with every commit, versioning is used only for summarizing the changes.

Special thanks to all 6 contributors in both releases (BilbozZ, Dlurak, Fan Yaowen, Gabriele Monaco, Roman Deev, homtec). ❤️

v1.9.0 (Aug 7, 2026)

This release is mainly an announcement of the OpenClimbing fork 🎉

Since 2023 the OpenClimbing project has been developed alongside OsmAPP in one codebase. But recently the needs of both projects have started to differ, so we decided to fork it into a separate repository. The maintainership of the new repo was kindly taken by @jvaclavik.

Feel free to visit and add a star! Also, check out a ton of new features:
🌐 ➡️ github.com/jvaclavik/openclimbing  
           openclimbing.org/
           LATEST RELEASE: blogpost – OpenClimbing v2.0

To ensure higher reliability, OsmAPP was moved out of Vercel, and is now powered by a hacky-static-export, currently residing at Github Pages.

general

• next.js hacky-static-export by @zbycz in #1450, #1493
• auto deploy VPS on push by @zbycz in #1469

FeaturePanel

• ⏰ Add coloring for opening times to indicate state by @homtec in #1141
• Instant fetching for ways by @zbycz in #1488

SearchBox

• show z/x/y tile boundaries by @zbycz in #1472
• add more overpass hosts + retry if busy by @jvaclavik in #1460

Locales

• locales: update Chinese translations (Q1, 2026) by @fywmjj in #1456
• locales: Add Russian localization and add missing strings by @deevroman in #1482

v1.8.0 (Nov 9, 2025)

Most notably the app got the new “Hamburger menu” as a side-drawer, which really makes it feel more mature. Also, OsmAPP now features the new official OpenStreetMap vector tiles called Shortbread, which switches dark and light theme according to your app theme setting. Currently it is not clickable - see thread here.

In Feature Panel, we now load the “social image” (og:image) for the first website, which usually shows very relevant image. Overall OsmAPP now displays wide variety of images: Wikimedia/Wikipedia/Wikidata images, the image=* tag, og:image and three streetviews – Mapillary, KartaView and Panoramax.

general

• 🍔 HamburgerMenu: new design by @jvaclavik in #1283
• 📲 ShareDialog: add QR codes + ux by @jvaclavik in #1226
• SearchBox: fix losing focus on pressing Enter by @BilbozZ in #1438

Map and layers

• ⭐️ add shortbread vector tiles+styles by @zbycz in #1133
• add rock landcover to outdoorStyle by @zbycz in #1185
• add arrow for previewMarker outside of map by @zbycz in #1315

FeaturePanel

• 🏞️ Images: Load og-image for features by @Dlurak in #1149
• Images: Show the panoramax license by @Dlurak in #1148
• FeaturePanel: Show intervals always as HH:MM or when needed as HH:MM:SS by @Dlurak in #1151
• FeaturePanel: Optimized featured tags by @Dlurak in #1153
• FeaturePanel: Allow all css colors by @Dlurak in #1155
• FeaturePanel: prefer level:ref if available by @zbycz in #1280
• PublicTransport: Improve reliability of requestLine by @glemco in #1160

EditDialog - small enhancements to the new Relations editor

• show grade system input as autocomplete by @jvaclavik in #1143
• climbing multivalue editor by @jvaclavik in #1229
• add osmChange file download by @zbycz in #1320
• fix convertToRelation deletes peaks by @zbycz in #1338
• add modified badge by @zbycz in #1342
• Add Save & Draw by @jvaclavik in #1340
• node location can be undefined by @zbycz in #1362
• batch add members by @zbycz in #1365
• store expanded sections by @zbycz in #1422

Locales

• locales: add Chinese translations by @fywmjj in #1191, #1313

Thank you for your support!

@zbycz and @jvaclavik

Related projects:

• cartes.app/
• facilmap.org/

3 days ago

Hello guys, It’s me, plato59 and I realized that I am 76th place in Edits of the Philippines for August 10, 2026 according to OSMstats

Source: osmstats.neis-one.org/?item=countries&country=Philippines

3 days ago

纠正了一些先辈们所标注的不准确道路，这些道路或是如今已与从前大不相同，或是先前的标注不规范。删去了箐湖和县政府大楼，本人之前的相关数据太过于粗略。增加了一些建筑，删除了已不复存在的地点。有的地方不够详细，明天打算实地勘探后再修改。那么就这样吧，晚安OSM。

4 days ago

from marathon to speedway

4 days ago

Je fais du vélo, j’aime rentrer en train, et j’ai fini par construire un outil qui repère les boucles réalisables entre deux gares. Pour ça, je croise les véloroutes d’OpenStreetMap avec le référentiel officiel des véloroutes françaises, RVM (Réseau vélo et marche).

J’ai documenté ce retour d’expérience (choix du référentiel, rapprochement des deux sources et reconstruction d’une géométrie exploitable) ici : OpenStreetMap et les véloroutes françaises : retour d’expérience de Tisseur de Voies

Je voulais surtout soumettre ici les deux points sur lesquels votre avis m’aiderait le plus.

1. Où placer l’identité d’un itinéraire dans une hiérarchie superroute / route ?

Les grandes véloroutes sont souvent modélisées avec plusieurs niveaux de relations.

La Route des Grandes Alpes, par exemple, a une racine type=superroute portant ref=VRGA, puis un « tracé principal » et des « variantes », puis les étapes. La structure est très utile, mais un consommateur qui ne traite que les relations feuilles type=route perd alors l’identité portée par la racine.

Sur la quarantaine de superroutes vélo que j’ai analysées en France, j’observe plusieurs situations : ref uniquement sur la racine, présent également sur certaines relations filles, ou parfois absent à certains niveaux.

J’ai trouvé différentes documentations et propositions sur les hiérarchies de routes, mais je n’ai pas identifié de convention suffisamment claire pour un consommateur de données :

dans une hiérarchie superroute / route, quelle duplication de ref, network et éventuellement name est aujourd’hui considérée comme souhaitable ?

L’objectif côté consommateur serait de pouvoir conserver à la fois l’identité de l’itinéraire et sa structure hiérarchique, sans déduire l’une à partir de l’autre.

Détail et exemple de la Route des Grandes Alpes

2. ref:FR:RVM : une clé de jointure OSM ↔ RVM ?

Le rapprochement entre OSM et RVM n’est pas simple par ref : dans mon jeu de données, le numero RVM et le ref OSM ne coïncident que dans environ un cas sur quatre.

J’ai en revanche rencontré le tag ref:FR:RVM, dont la valeur correspond à l’id_iti du Réseau vélo et marche / RVM.

Dans les cas que j’ai vérifiés, cela fournit une clé de rapprochement directe et non ambiguë entre l’itinéraire OSM et son entrée dans RVM. Mais le tag reste très rare : je le trouve sur moins de 1 % des véloroutes analysées.

Est-ce un tag déjà utilisé ou discuté par d’autres contributeurs ? Et serait-il pertinent de le documenter ou d’en encourager l’usage lorsqu’une correspondance RVM est certaine ?

Question liée à la précédente : si oui, sur quel niveau d’une hiérarchie superroute / route faudrait-il idéalement porter cet identifiant ?

Détail sur le rapprochement OSM ↔ RVM

Le reste du retour d’expérience porte notamment sur le dédoublonnage OSM / RVM, les tronçons partagés par plusieurs itinéraires, les hiérarchies de relations, les bacs et la reconstruction d’une continuité exploitable par un algorithme.

Sur ce dernier point, je considère bien l’ordre des membres d’une relation route comme une information significative ; simplement, côté consommateur, je ne peux pas supposer qu’il suffise à résoudre tous les cas de hiérarchies, variantes ou embranchements que je rencontre.

Je prends volontiers les contre-exemples, corrections ou pointeurs vers une convention que j’aurais manquée, y compris si certaines de mes hypothèses côté consommateur sont à revoir.

Nicolas

4 days ago

30/07/2026-05/08/2026

♦

[1] ‘Cool’ bicycle routing mode – estimated street-level thermal conditions at a resolution of roughly 25 metres | Victor Rotariu | map data © by OpenStreetMap Contributors.

Mapping campaigns

• Uber has proposed, on the OSM Community forum, an organised editing activity to improve pedestrian mapping in 21 countries. Various mappers criticise it due to a lack of details and because Uber has a poor track record in the UK.

Community

• Rphyrin made an Overpass Ultra script for viewing image=* tags in OpenStreetMap.
• MideaFind has used OpenStreetMap data to collect the locations of stores that might sell portable air conditioners.
• Andrea Grandi explained why Book Corners won’t sync contributions back to OpenStreetMap. Pieter Vander Vennet responded in his blog.

Imports

• Oscar Car Rental announced ♦►♦ that they are planning an organised editing activity to add their 93 missing car rental locations in Germany, along with performing some data maintenance.

OSM research

• Marni Davis documented Atlanta’s immigrant population in the late 19th century, visualising their neighbourhoods on an OpenHistoricalMap basemap.

Maps

• [1] Victor Rotariu and his team are developing a live urban heat map that estimates street-level thermal conditions at a resolution of roughly 25 metres. This data will power a new ‘Cool’ routing mode. Rather than selecting only the fastest or shortest cycling route, Cool mode will identify the route with the lowest estimated heat exposure. The goal is simple: help cyclists avoid the hottest streets, enjoy a more comfortable ride, and arrive at their destination with less sweat on hot summer days.

OSM in action

• A 23-year-old student developer from South Korea has created a navigation app for finding shade covered areas, which has shot to the top of the App Store’s navigation apps. The app uses OpenStreetMap data to plot routes.

Software

• HeiGIT presented their latest update on the roadmap toward the new ohsome API 2.0, outlining the next steps in the evolution of the ohsome platform for analysing OpenStreetMap data. The update introduced planned developments, improvements, and future directions aimed at creating a more flexible, efficient, and sustainable API for OSM history data analytics.

Releases

• The CoMaps team published release 2026.07.16, which is now available via Codeberg, F-Droid, Google Play, and the iOS AppStore. This version adds a preview of turn-by-turn directions when creating a route, adds lane guidance and improved next turn descriptions for iOS/CarPlay, per-transport-mode routing options, support for more OSM tags, and many further bug fixes and improvements.
• Organic Maps July 2026 has been released, bringing a collection of bug fixes and general improvements.
• A note for mappers resolving notes: Organic Maps version 2026.07.15 has fixed a long-standing issue, where notes left inside large forest polygons and road lines would always move to the centre of the object. Notes are now added at the user’s click location.
• Tina announced that OsmAnd Astronomy, currently available in the OsmAnd Android 5.4 beta (on paid plans Maps+ and OsmAnd Pro), now includes tools for exploring solar and lunar events. Users can move through a timeline to preview upcoming astronomical events, check eclipse visibility from any location on Earth, and watch exactly how each solar or lunar eclipse will unfold before it actually occurs.
• HeiGIT reported the release of Ohsome-Planet version of 1.3.1, codename ‘Baarle-Hertog‘. This tool is designed to facilitate the transformation of raw OpenStreetMap history data into the geoParquet format, making it more accessible for spatial data analysis.

Did you know that …

• … the OSM Apps Catalog allows you to browse a list of thousands of various map apps?

OSM in the media

• BRUZZ, a local newspaper in Brussels, commented ♦►♦ on the rise in recent years of private swimming pools in residential neighbourhoods. They praised OSM volunteers for having mapped them and showed maps with their locations.
• Heise’s c’t Open Source Spotlight newsletter reported ♦►♦ on CoMaps and interviewed OSM community member Bastian Greshake Tzovaras about CoMaps, OSM and free software in general.

Other “geo” things

• Google had integrated its AI image generator ‘Nano Banana 2’ into Google Earth. They removed it two days later after people started abusing it, as the BBC reported.
• The Times of India explained how Polynesian navigators crossed the Pacific Ocean by reading the stars, ocean swells, winds, birds, and clouds to find their way.
• In response to the recent news about Moroccan migrants crossing into the Spanish enclave of Ceuta, OpenCage reshared their previously published geo-trivia posts about Spain and Morocco.

Upcoming Events Country Where Venue What When ♦ Online Racha Mapping Party ♦ 2026-07-27 – 2026-08-09 ♦ नई दिल्ली Jitsi Meet (online) OSM’s 22nd Birthday × OSM India Monthly Online Mapathon ♦ 2026-08-08 – 2026-08-09 ♦ 臺北市 國立臺灣科技大學研揚大樓412-1教室 COSCUP 2026 State of the Map Taiwan 2026 / Wikidata Community Summit 2026 ♦ 2026-08-09 ♦ New Delhi Indian Coffee House, Connaught Place OSM’s 22nd Birthday × OSM Delhi Mapping Party No.30 ♦ 2026-08-09 ♦ 大阪市 11F, Urban Net Midosuji Building, 4-2-13 Awajicho OpenStreetMap関西カンファレンス2026 / OSM Kansai Conference 2026 ♦ 2026-08-09 ♦ København Cafe Bevar’s OSMmapperCPH ♦ 2026-08-09 ♦ 臺北市 MozSpace Taipei OpenStreetMap x Wikidata Taipei #91 ♦ 2026-08-10 ♦ Zürich Bitwäscherei Zürich 190. OSM-Stammtisch Zürich ♦ 2026-08-11 ♦ Hamburg Voraussichtlich: “Variable”, Karolinenstraße 23 Hamburger Mappertreffen ♦ 2026-08-11 ♦ temporärhaus OSM-Stammtisch Ulm/Neu-Ulm ♦ 2026-08-11 Missing Maps Online Mapathon von Ärzte ohne Grenzen ♦ 2026-08-12 ♦ München Echardinger Einkehr Münchner OSM-Treffen ♦ 2026-08-12 UN Mappers Mappy Hour ♦ 2026-08-13 ♦ Hochschule Rhein-Sieg OSM auf der FrOSCon 2026 in Sankt Augustin ♦ 2026-08-15 – 2026-08-16 ♦ Hannover Hannover Congress Centrum OSM auf der Maker Faire Hannover 2026 ♦ 2026-08-15 – 2026-08-16 ♦ Stadt- und Waagenmuseum Oschatz Kartenwerkstatt Oschatz ♦ 2026-08-16 ♦ Magdeburg Netz39 e.V. , Leibnizstraße 32, 39104 Magdeburg 3. OSM Stammtisch Magdeburg ♦ 2026-08-18 Missing Maps London Mid-Month for Advanced Mappers (no training provided) (Online) [eng] ♦ 2026-08-18 ♦ Chemnitz Kaffeesatz, Chemnitz OSM-Stammtisch Chemnitz ♦ 2026-08-18 ♦ Bonn Dotty’s 203. OSM-Stammtisch Bonn ♦ 2026-08-18 ♦ Derby The Brunswick, Railway Terrace, Derby East Midlands pub meet-up ♦ 2026-08-18 ♦ Online Lüneburger Mappertreffen (online) ♦ 2026-08-18 ♦ Karlsruhe Vogelbräu Karlsruhe Stammtisch Karlsruhe ♦ 2026-08-19 ♦ Amsterdam TomTom HQ Maptime Amsterdam: 2026 Summertime Maptime ♦ 2026-08-20 ♦ Potsdam MachBar Potsdamer Mappertreffen ♦ 2026-08-21 ♦ Stadtgebiet Bremen Online und im Hackerspace Bremen Bremer Mappertreffen ♦ 2026-08-24

Note:
If you like to see your event here, please put it into the OSM calendar. Only data which is there, will appear in weeklyOSM.

This weeklyOSM was produced by HeiGIT, MatthiasMatthias, Nakaner, Raquel Dezidério Souto, Strubbl, Andrew Davidson, TrickyFoxy, barefootstache, derFred.
We welcome link suggestions for the next issue via this form and look forward to your contributions.

5 days ago

Looking 4 surrounding Flock action

6 days ago

Is You Now We Started Adding A Lot Of New Stuff And Changes To R 8 Side And R 16 Side. R 8 Side Will Be Done At Aug 29th And R 16 Side Will Be Done On Last Day Of Sep.

6 days ago

··· I didn’t start contributing to OSM because of any grand philosophy or ideology. I simply began editing because I needed to. But as I became more involved, I learned more about what I believed OSM stood for—openness, decentralization, freedom to collaborate, and a community built around shared stewardship rather than commercial ownership. At least, that was how I came to understand OSM.

That understanding was what motivated me to continue contributing. I chose to spend my time improving OSM instead of Google Maps or the dominant commercial map used in my country. I even spent time studying OSM’s principles and community practices because I wanted to contribute in a way that respected those values.

If utility had been my only motivation, I probably wouldn’t have contributed to OSM at all. In the region where I live, almost nobody actually uses OSM. From a purely practical perspective, my efforts have very little visible impact. Yet I kept contributing because I believed OSM represented something fundamentally different from commercial mapping platforms. That belief—not efficiency or popularity—was what made my contributions meaningful.

For that reason, I don’t believe corporate participation is inherently a problem. OSM is open to everyone, and companies should absolutely be free to use the data and contribute to improving it.

My concern is not that companies participate. My concern is whether, over time, the priorities of the project could gradually shift toward the interests of organizations that naturally have business objectives and far greater resources than individual volunteers. Simply saying that “companies are part of the community” doesn’t fully address that concern. To me, the more important question is not whether companies belong here, but how the community ensures that the values and priorities shaped by volunteers remain just as influential as corporate interests.

Perhaps this is the source of my confusion.

If embracing greater corporate participation is a natural direction for OSM, then what is the unique value that continues to distinguish OSM? I don’t believe OSM’s identity has ever been about being anti-business or anti-capitalist. Rather, I believed it was about remaining independent of any single commercial interest, and about building a project where individuals could participate on equal footing in a genuinely open community.

So I would genuinely like to ask those who have been part of this community much longer than I have:

As corporate participation continues to grow, what do you believe will continue to make OSM fundamentally different from commercial mapping platforms? And what principles or safeguards do you think are important to ensure that corporate participation strengthens the project without gradually redefining its priorities?

*** This comment was written in response to the article, “Who Really Owns OpenStreetMap? A Personal Concern About Big Tech in OSM”. If contributing to OSM is ultimately no different from contributing to a commercial map service, then I see little motivation to invest my time and effort in contributing to OSM, given that it provides so little practical benefit to me or to the people around me.

9 days ago

On August 12th, 2025, I made my first edit to OpenStreetMap. It has now been exactly one year since I began editing. Here are some of the coolest things I’ve done in my relatively small amount of time spent on this hobby:

• 3,095 changesets

• 226486 contributions

• Added a “surface=” tag to every primary road, trunk road, and motorway in Virginia

• Made changes in 64 countries

• Procrastinated mountains of homework

It felt like this year went by so fast. I still remember the moment I discovered OpenStreetMap and how I got instantly addicted.

I hope to be an active contributor for years to come and meet tons of mappy people like me!

2 days ago

с Анапы доехать до адлера за 3 т р на бензин

2 days ago

♦

If you’re that afraid of AI, stop trying to beat AI at its own game.

Get out there and develop the originality that only humans can bring!!!

3 days ago

Imagine opening a map and finding almost everything you need for climbing in one place: areas, crags and routes, grades in your preferred system, topo photos, rock type, sun and shade – together with your own ascents and projects.

That is what we are building with OpenClimbing.

OpenClimbing is an open-source climbing guide built on top of OpenStreetMap and other open data. Instead of creating another closed climbing database, we want the data to stay open, reusable and editable by the whole community.

Today, OpenClimbing already contains almost 40,000 climbing routes, with more than 6,000 routes drawn directly on photos, across over 1,000 climbing areas in 31 countries – and the numbers keep growing as people add and improve data in OpenStreetMap.

♦

Anyone can improve a crag, add a missing route or create a topo – and those improvements become part of an open dataset that can also be used by other applications.

Over the last months the project has grown a lot. What started mainly as a way to explore climbing data from OpenStreetMap is becoming a much more complete climbing companion: a map, guidebook, topo viewer, logbook, trip-planning tool and editor in one place.

♦

OpenClimbing 2.0 is a big step in that direction.

Climbing log

The original tick system has grown into a proper climbing logbook.

You can mark routes as climbed, select ascent style, add co-climbers, edit previous ascents, see statistics and charts, and share climbing sessions.

Ticks are stored in our database and connected to your OpenStreetMap login.

♦

Offline PDF climbing guides

Areas and crags can now be exported into printable PDF guidebooks for offline use.

The PDF can include the map, routes, grades and climbing lines drawn directly onto photos.

This means you can prepare a guide before a trip and keep all the important information available even when there is no mobile signal at the crag.

♦

Upload climbing photos directly from OpenClimbing

Climbing photos can now be uploaded to Wikimedia Commons directly from OpenClimbing.

That makes creating and improving photo topos much easier, while keeping the photos openly licensed and reusable.

Routes drawn on photos are interactive, and OpenClimbing can also display images from Wikimedia Commons, OpenStreetMap, websites, Mapillary, KartaView and Panoramax.

We even added an experimental in-browser bolt detector to help when creating climbing topos.

♦

Filter and sort climbing areas

Large climbing areas are now much easier to explore.

Crags inside an area can be filtered and sorted, so instead of browsing through everything you can quickly narrow the list to what you are actually looking for.

♦

OpenClimbing can show information such as:

• climbing type
• difficulty
• rock material
• family-friendly suitability
• number of routes

Similar filtering is also available directly on the climbing map.

The goal is to make questions like “Where can we climb easy sport routes with kids today?” much easier to answer.

A much better climbing map

The climbing map received many improvements.

Routes can now be colored by difficulty, while grades are displayed in your preferred grading system.

Climbing areas can show their outlines directly on the map, including large areas containing smaller areas and crags.

We also added natural rock formations, a tourist map style, weather radar for Czechia and the new OpenStreetMap Shortbread vector tiles with automatic light and dark themes.

♦

And many more improvements

• Custom lists for projects, favourites and trip planning
• Better bouldering support, including Fontainebleau grades and sit starts

♦

• Sun and terrain shadows to estimate whether a crag will be sunny or shaded

♦

♦

• A redesigned editing experience with a map next to the form and better drawing tools
• A broader redesign of the whole application, including a new homepage and navigation
• OpenClimbing is now fully usable on mobile – including browsing, editing, uploading photos and drawing climbing routes directly on your phone at the crag
• We significantly improved performance and loading speed, especially when opening large climbing areas and working with map data

Still completely open

One thing has not changed.

Climbing data is stored in OpenStreetMap, topo photos can be stored in Wikimedia Commons, and OpenClimbing itself is open source.

The goal is still the same: build a useful climbing guide without locking the climbing data inside one application.

You can try everything at openclimbing.org.

We are looking forward to any feedback – and contributions to the climbing data or the project itself are very welcome.

Thank you for your support!

@zbycz and @jvaclavik

3 days ago

I went to miles farm today. 8/10/2026

No new street developments. Mostly just new houses

4 days ago

A while back a message popped up in my inbox inviting me to compete for a GoPro Max2 360-degree sport camera, courtesy of Meta, which of course now owns Mapillary and thus has a vested interest in supporting crowdsourced collection of street-level imagery. I submitted the application assuming it would come to naught and was pleasantly surprised when a GoPro Max2 appeared on my doorstep on July 15th. What follows is a review of that camera for collecting street-level imagery. Amazon sells this camera for $299. To put that in perspective, I paid about $200 for a RealMe model RMX3241 when we got to Italy for SOTM a couple of years ago and discovered that my wife’s iPhone was not unlocked as advertised, so a local Italian SIM card wouldn’t work.

Description:

The GoPro Max2 features back-to-back fixed-focus-to-infinity fisheye lenses. The built-in processor stitches those images together and stores the combined image as a 360-degree view of everything, not just horizontally but vertically as well. A smartphone app, Quik, can be downloaded to control the camera via a wifi connection (and that is vastly easier than trying to control the camera via the tiny LCD screen). The camera can collect both video and still images, 360-degree JPEGs, which can be displayed by VLC Media Player as well as GoPro’s proprietary Player. GoPro Player, a free download, is a desktop imagery editor that allows you to trim video files and also to edit the point of view of video and still photos.

After charging the batteries I did some initial filming by walking around my back yard and viewing the videos on the camera’s LED screen. That led to basic familiarity; after a short time the controls became relatively intuitive. I downloaded the Quik app to my Android phone, connected the camera and phone, and used it to start and stop the camera, select modes, and generally experimented a bit, then deleted those test videos. The Quik app is not hard to figure out.

I researched on the internet options for mounting the camera on top of a car and settled on the Bushman Panoramic Popeye Magnetic Base, which B&H Photo in New York sold me for about $50 including taxes and shipping. I mounted the camera on the provided 10-inch (25 cm) pole, then mounted the pole on the magnetic base and placed it on the roof of the car with one lens facing left and the other facing right. The magnetic base secured the camera firmly yet was easily removed given the leverage the 10” pole provides.

I collected five sets of video imagery at 30fps on July 29 in the general area of Falls Church, Virginia, and still photographs 2 seconds apart on August 4 in the general area of Annandale, Virginia. I was curious to see if clarity of the images would differ between video and still photos taken from a moving automobile.

Pro:

Setup of the camera is relatively easy though the documentation seems to assume that the user is familiar with GoPro equipment. I already had a GoPro Hero so was not completely at sea but could not figure out how to open the battery door and had to consult with a YouTube video (my fear of breaking something made me check that first).

Once installed and functioning, the GoPro Player software was easy to figure out. It is relatively intuitive and after only a couple of false starts I was able to trim from collected videos the first several frames and last several frames that showed me mounting and dismounting the camera after turning it on (I had not yet experimented with starting and stopping the camera remotely, which I now do). I have not yet used Player for any editing other than that. Transferring the 360-degree files to the desktop computer was easy, by simply removing the camera’s SD card, sticking it into a USB adapter, and copying the files to a dedicated folder on my desktop’s 8Tb SSD.

Mapillary’s updated desktop uploader worked perfectly and uploaded all five trimmed videos relatively quickly. Past versions of the uploader have at times been buggy, so having this version of the uploader work so well was pleasant.

The Quik app works well for starting and stopping the camera, changing modes, and so on. This makes control of the camera from inside a car very easy.

After receiving the video Mapillary parses it, extracting selected frames and posting them on the Mapillary website. This process was surprisingly quick, with the photos appearing the next day. This was a real surprise given that in the past still photographs collected with one of my smartphones running the Mapillary app took several days to be processed and posted. The software appears to remove duplicate frames so stopping at stop signs does not result in several extra frames of the same scene (that is not true if you take still photos, however). This has been a problem with some versions of the Mapillary app, which abandoned distance-based interval setting in favor of time-based, and continued to collect imagery when a vehicle stopped at stop signs and stop lights.

Following the video experiments I set the camera to collect still photos and cruised Annandale. At 25 mph (40 kph) the 2-second interval (the briefest interval available) was brief enough to collect imagery that nearly always overlapped enough to capture information of interest to an OSM mapper. I suspect that moving any faster than that would leave out useful information in still-photo mode. I noticed no difference in image quality between video and still photos. Imagery is generally sufficient to identify business occupancies, though making out house numbers is hit or miss, and signs farther than about 30 feet (9 meters) from the camera have to have really large letters to be made out.

Cons:

GoPro and Microsoft Store have conspired to install GoPro Player in a subfolder located in the WindowsApps folder. Access to that folder requires administrator privileges, which means that after you install Player it will not run. You click on the icon, the Critical Stop beep sounds, and the user interface fails to appear. Checking Task Manager reveals that the program is running, sort of, but its functions are not accessible to the user. I emailed GoPro Support, which replied with a series of questions, one of which was whether I had tried launching the program as the administrator. That had not occurred to me so I tried it and Player launched. Obviously, running routine programs as the administrator is a less than optimal solution and should be corrected. GoPro and Microsoft Store should arrange for the installation program to install Player in ..\Program Files\GoPro or someplace similar that does not require administrator privileges to launch (most polite program installers ask the user where the program should be installed–this one does not). GoPro’s help desk simply said it follows Microsoft policy on software downloaded from the Microsoft Store and claimed that the program should launch without administrator privileges.

In reviewing the 360-degree photos in OpenStreetMap using the iD editor, while the photos were there and easily manipulated to pan in any direction, anything farther away than about thirty feet (9 meters) was blurry enough that unless the letters were really big the signs were not legible. I noted when comparing these images with imagery collected with my RealMe model RMX3241 smart phone’s 48 megapixel camera that the RealMe’s images are only a hair clearer and thus only slightly more legible. The tradeoff is of course that a 360-degree view allows you place POIs much more precisely and with zero guesswork. This means the Max2 needs to be driven as closely as possible to storefronts and such if you want to collect as much information as possible.

Editing using Quik on the smartphone is nearly impossible and a waste of time. Also, if you download a 360-degree video to the smartphone it both occupies an inordinate amount of space and cannot be easily found in the file system. Quik is useful for remotely controlling the phone and that’s about all.

Battery life when collecting imagery is about two hours, and the kit came with two batteries, so imagery collection is limited to battery life. There is no separate charger included–you charge the battery by connecting a USB cable to a charging port inside the battery door. A separate battery charger, which comes with two spare batteries, costs $79.99 plus shipping and taxes from GoPro. This means your imagery collection during long trips, as I have done at various times, such as collecting imagery on US Route 50 in West Virginia will be limited to battery life times however many batteries you’ve invested in. By contrast, my dash-mounted RealMe smart phone running the Mapillary app can run indefinitely by plugging into a power socket in the car, though it only collects whatever the single lens can see.

Where to see the imagery:

www.mapillary.com/app/user/apmwa?lat=38.87252489173562&lng=-77.15295395359306&z=17&pKey=1374712051462422&x=0.2523889213771153&y=0.49999999999999983&zoom=0

www.mapillary.com/app/user/apmwa?lat=38.87073799866701&lng=-77.16677960139998&z=17&pKey=2556032581515703&x=0.7973914264299434&y=0.5&zoom=0

www.mapillary.com/app/user/apmwa?lat=38.87095690394227&lng=-77.16453690990403&z=17&pKey=1055544633695914&x=0.18044404021753957&y=0.49999999999999983&zoom=0

www.mapillary.com/app/user/apmwa?lat=38.873351146668114&lng=-77.1461389073852&z=17&pKey=1404069464992751&x=0.15606263554401384&y=0.47321936185741825&zoom=0

www.mapillary.com/app/user/apmwa?lat=38.865436500000015&lng=-77.19527499999998&z=17&pKey=1900402680923668&x=0.36095465234470736&y=0.5000000000000001&zoom=0

www.mapillary.com/app/user/apmwa?lat=38.83504210000001&lng=-77.18747680000001&z=18.327593300918466&pKey=2116999718896607&x=0.3076318708877394&y=0.5263241838228742&zoom=0&focus=photo

Bottom line:

For short (under two to four hours) imagery collection expeditions, the GoPro Max2 is a solid collector of street-level imagery, and it makes consulting Mapillary images in iD much more powerful thanks to the 360-degree view. I’m using it to improve OSM in Northern Virginia. Image quality is acceptable. For long drives I will probably stick to the RealMe on long stretches, but put the Max2 on the roof for collecting POIs in towns where we overnight.

4 days ago

I build bike + train loops in France by crossing OpenStreetMap with the official cycling-route reference (RVM / Réseau vélo et marche). Two points I’d value the community’s view on: at which level the identity (ref) of a multi-level superroute should live, and whether the emerging ref:FR:RVM tag (which carries the RVM id and gives an exact OSM↔RVM join key) is worth spreading. Full write-up (FR): tisseurdevoies.fr/articles/openstreetmap-veloroutes-retour-experience

4 days ago

Today I finished mapping all the homes in the Stonebrae Country Club, a gated community surrounding a golf course at the top of the loop where Fairview Avenue becomes Hayward Avenue. In 2010 I worked as a NARFU Census taker and had to note down which addresses were inhabitable because they hadn’t been built yet. Now all that land with just paved streets are homes. Many of my children’s friends live there as they attended the elementary school across the street from the outer bounds of the neighborhood.

Next step is to start my way down Hayward Avenue and eventually into the heart of the city.

4 days ago

Tourism and Digital Mapping: Research Digital Google Maps Location

Image by Seli Kasela - Google Maps Location

Open in Google Maps

SELI KASELA DIGITAL CREATIVE STUDIO

Jalan Pantai Balangan No.85
Jimbaran, Kec. Kuta Selatan
Kabupaten Badung, Bali 80361
Indonesia

Open SELI KASELA I in Google Maps

Digital Mapping and Tourism

This entry documents my personal work exploring the relationship between tourism, digital mapping, geographic information, and local destination discovery.

The location featured here is OSSY SURF TRIP BALI in the Balangan area of South Kuta, Badung, Bali, Indonesia.

Mapping Perspective

Digital maps are an important part of modern tourism. Travelers use geographic information to discover:

• Surf schools
• Beaches
• Hotels and accommodation
• Restaurants
• Local businesses
• Attractions
• Roads and transportation
• Points of interest

My interest is in documenting how local tourism places are represented within the wider digital mapping ecosystem.

OpenStreetMap and Local Knowledge

OpenStreetMap provides a collaborative environment for geographic information and community mapping.

This diary entry is part of my personal documentation of tourism, digital mapping, geographic information, and destination discovery.

Location Reference

Place: OSSY SURF TRIP BALI
Area: Balangan, South Kuta, Badung, Bali
Country: Indonesia
Topic: Tourism and Digital Mapping
Purpose: Personal work documentation

Open location in Google Maps

MY LOCATION BUILD OWN INDEPENDENT

6 days ago

I have already forgotten how I first came across StreetComplete, but what I do remember is that I immediately fell in love with the concept of the app.

I like wandering around and exploring. When travelling, the things that attract me the most are actually very “normal”. Maybe there is a neighbourhood, maybe a lovely park, maybe a path along the river… I just follow the direction of the road and take a turn at a junction if I feel like it.

I don’t know. I just really don’t like those crowded and buzzing tourist attractions. On the contrary, it is in the nooks and crannies of everyday life that I can feel the vibe of a neighbourhood, a town, or a city.

This convenience store has some good samosas. This small community park offers the best shade during the scorching summer. This path along the canal has ducks and geese to guide your walk…

From these small and seemingly negligible things, I feel a city comes alive.

And that’s why StreetComplete is my best travel companion. It pulls up a bunch of quests for me to explore. The surface of the pavement, the sound signal at a crossing, the bin at a bus stop, the name of a store… It simply guides me to dive deeper into an area, and I can explore while completing the quests along the way.

Gamification is a good way to encourage contributions to OSM, but for me, StreetComplete is far more than just a game. It lets me immerse myself into a city and teaches me how to look at it from a new perspective.

6 days ago

highway=traffic_signals
crossing=traffic_signals

highway=crossing
crossing=traffic_signals

After i added Wuppertal to my Route QA i found tons of interesting stuff which basically made routing worse than it needed to be.

The common issue is a pure pedestrian crossing tagged as

highway=traffic_signals
crossing=traffic_signals

This is something completely different than:

highway=crossing
crossing=traffic_signals

The first has a repeating and thus statistically significant penalty which is being taken into account. The latter is a traffic_signal which is only requested on button press, so has no repeating penalty.

In tagging all pedestrian crossing with highway=traffic_signals you slow traffic on the specific roads. Now - where are those pedestrian crossings? On the main roads. So you slow down the main roads and push traffic to the living_streets around. I fixed halve a ton but still a lot left.

Another interesting thing was this:

www.openstreetmap.org/node/13104642234

description=Baustellen-Ampel
highway traffic=signals
traffic_signals=signal
traffic_signals:conditional=yes @ (2025 Aug 27-2026 Mar 31)
traffic_signals:direction=forward

It was a construction traffic_lights which somebody tagged and hoped that a conditional would somehow make it go away magically. It didnt. It gave a penalty until today when i deleted it.

You cant expect conditionals to work everywhere because you tag it. Conditionals work only in some rare and very tight use cases as with maxspeed.

9 days ago

Mapping

Over the past year, our OpenStreetMap Pakistan community has been actively working to map high-risk flood zones across the country—both areas historically affected by extreme flooding and regions facing critical vulnerability during upcoming monsoon seasons.

Shifting from Reactive Response to Proactive Preparedness

During last year’s monsoon floods, our mapping response began after the disaster had already struck. While those post-disaster edits were vital for ongoing emergency response, we recognised the need to get ahead of the curve.

This year, we shifted our strategy completely: we initiated pre-disaster mapping well before the monsoon season arrived.

By leveraging flood projections and high-risk zone data from the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) and prominent emergency monitoring sources, we identified priority regions across Pakistan. We began our efforts by focusing heavily on areas categorised as the highest risk of severe flooding, ensuring that digital infrastructure is in place before rising waters cut off communities.

Community Coordination & HOT Tasking Manager

Together with two fellow community members, I took charge of creating, organizing, and managing dedicated projects on the Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team (HOT) Tasking Manager.

To drive contributions and sustain momentum, we have been organising community mapping parties and mapathons. Local mappers and volunteers across Pakistan came together to trace the following:

*Missing road networks and bridge connections

*Remote village footprints and building clusters

*Key natural landmarks and waterways

These precise layers are already empowering ground rescue teams, military logistics, and international aid agencies to plan evacuation routes, calculate population exposure, and navigate flood-affected corridors.

Global Recognition

Our community’s proactive mapping drive was recently highlighted in a feature article by the UK newspaper Oxford Herald:

📰 Read the full feature: [Mapping for Rescue: How Volunteer Maps Are Saving Lives in Pakistan’s Flood Zones] (oxfordherald.co.uk/mapping-for-rescue-how-volunteer-maps-are-saving-lives-in-pakistans-flood-zones)

Looking Ahead: The Work Continues

Because the monsoon season in Pakistan typically extends through the end of August, our work is far from finished. We are currently actively editing, validating, and managing existing tasks while preparing to launch new projects on the Tasking Manager as updated satellite imagery and risk models become available.

A massive thank you to all team members at Kaart & the mappers, validators, and community members who have dedicated their time to this effort!

If you would like to contribute or help validate ongoing tasks, keep an eye on our project listings on the HOT Tasking Manager or reach out directly to the OSM Pakistan community

9 days ago