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    <p>John, <br>
      Those links were just to indicate what can be done with task
      setup. I don't think we're close to setting up actual import tasks
      yet, though we do seem to be on the road toward getting things
      sorted out :-)<br>
    </p>
    <div class="moz-signature">
      <p> Nate Wessel<small>, PhD<br>
          Planner, Cartographer, Transport Nerd<br>
          <a href="https://www.natewessel.com"
            style="text-decoration:none;">NateWessel.com</a></small>
      </p>
    </div>
    <div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 2020-01-05 12:20 p.m., john whelan
      wrote:<br>
    </div>
    <blockquote type="cite"
cite="mid:CAJ-Ex1Em_Y26KLu=pAZLtX0raUy4a_O961R6XKT40GvDv7Z2tg@mail.gmail.com">
      <meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8">
      <div dir="auto">I'm getting lost as to who is organising what and
        who is taking responsibility for defining and setting up the
        tasks and where they are being set up.
        <div dir="auto"><br>
        </div>
        <div dir="auto">Are your two examples of what can be done?  Or
          are they to be used by mappers to add buildings?</div>
        <div dir="auto"><br>
        </div>
        <div dir="auto">My understanding was Daniel would identify those
          areas that looked the most interesting then these would be set
          up after the process to see if any local mappers were
          available and what their input would be.</div>
        <div dir="auto"><br>
        </div>
        <div dir="auto">Thanks John</div>
      </div>
      <br>
      <div class="gmail_quote">
        <div dir="ltr" class="gmail_attr">On Sun, Jan 5, 2020, 11:41 AM
          Nate Wessel, <<a href="mailto:bike756@gmail.com"
            moz-do-not-send="true">bike756@gmail.com</a>> wrote:<br>
        </div>
        <blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0
          .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">
          <div>
            <p>The task size, and even shape is totally customizable.
              I've set up a couple that are entirely based on the
              density of the data:<br>
              <a href="http://tasks.osmcanada.ca/project/168"
                target="_blank" rel="noreferrer" moz-do-not-send="true">http://tasks.osmcanada.ca/project/168</a><br>
              <a href="https://tasks.openstreetmap.us/project/107"
                target="_blank" rel="noreferrer" moz-do-not-send="true">https://tasks.openstreetmap.us/project/107</a></p>
            <p>Best,<br>
            </p>
            <div>
              <p> Nate Wessel<small>, PhD<br>
                  Planner, Cartographer, Transport Nerd<br>
                  <a href="https://www.natewessel.com"
                    style="text-decoration:none" target="_blank"
                    rel="noreferrer" moz-do-not-send="true">NateWessel.com</a></small>
              </p>
            </div>
            <div>On 2020-01-04 12:40 p.m., Daniel @jfd553 wrote:<br>
            </div>
            <blockquote type="cite">
              <div>
                <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="color:#1f497d">Bonjour
                    groupe</span></p>
                <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="color:#1f497d"> </span></p>
                <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="color:#1f497d">Looks
                    like we're going in the same direction so far :-)</span></p>
                <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="color:#1f497d">I agree
                    with Nate regarding the implementation of the task
                    manager. In my experience, a size of a few blocks
                    would be better in urban areas, but boring in rural
                    areas. Is it something that can be adjusted?</span></p>
                <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="color:#1f497d"
                    lang="FR-CA"> </span></p>
                <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="color:#1f497d">Daniel</span></p>
                <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="color:#1f497d"> </span></p>
                <div>
                  <div style="border:none;border-top:solid #b5c4df
                    1.0pt;padding:3.0pt 0cm 0cm 0cm">
                    <p class="MsoNormal"><b><span
style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Tahoma","sans-serif""
                          lang="EN-US">From:</span></b><span
style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Tahoma","sans-serif""
                        lang="EN-US"> Nate Wessel [<a
                          href="mailto:bike756@gmail.com"
                          target="_blank" rel="noreferrer"
                          moz-do-not-send="true">mailto:bike756@gmail.com</a>]
                        <br>
                        <b>Sent:</b> Saturday, January 04, 2020 10:09<br>
                        <b>To:</b> <a
                          href="mailto:talk-ca@openstreetmap.org"
                          target="_blank" rel="noreferrer"
                          moz-do-not-send="true">talk-ca@openstreetmap.org</a><br>
                        <b>Subject:</b> Re: [Talk-ca] Importing
                        buildings in Canada</span></p>
                  </div>
                </div>
                <p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
                <p>Hi Daniel, </p>
                <p>Thank you for all the work you've put into this. I'd
                  like to offer a couple suggestions and/or
                  clarifications for your proposed import process,
                  overview though it is. </p>
                <p>First, I think it is very important that a tasking
                  manager is set up on a city/by city basis only, and
                  that only AFTER consensus is achieved that the import
                  should proceed in that area. I would really like to
                  avoid seeing the massive nationwide tasking that was
                  set up the first time around. We should be making it
                  hard for people to go rogue in regions where consensus
                  for an import doesn't (yet) exist. </p>
                <p>Related to this, though important enough to be a
                  second point in it's own right, the tasking squares
                  need to be small enough that a single user can manage
                  them and inspect every single building in a task. The
                  first round of import used task squares that were
                  massive, and which couldn't be divided any further
                  past a certain point. Even in rural areas, it is
                  likely inappropriate to import areas larger than
                  1km^2. In central Toronto it would be (and was)
                  idiotic. An import that doesn't take local scale into
                  account shouldn't proceed. "Too big to load into JOSM"
                  is about 100x too big to import in my opinion and is
                  not a good enough benchmark for import batch sizing. </p>
                <p>That is, each import needs to be local, and not just
                  in a superficial sense. </p>
                <p>I'll also add that the issue of conflation doesn't
                  seem to have been worked out yet except to note that
                  it is an issue. What will we do with the millions of
                  buildings which will substantially overlap/duplicate
                  existing buildings or imports? This needs to be worked
                  out in detail before anything starts up again.  </p>
                <p>And what needs to be done about already existing low
                  quality imports? It's good to acknowledge their
                  existence, but what will be done about them? We've set
                  up a task to clean up some of the mess in Toronto ( <a
                    href="http://tasks.osmcanada.ca/project/168"
                    target="_blank" rel="noreferrer"
                    moz-do-not-send="true">http://tasks.osmcanada.ca/project/168</a>
                  ) but this is only the tip of the iceberg. </p>
                <p>Again, I thank everyone for their time and effort on
                  this - we can get this done if we go slow and do it
                  right :-)</p>
                <p>Best,</p>
                <div>
                  <p>Nate Wessel<span style="font-size:10.0pt">, PhD<br>
                      Planner, Cartographer, Transport Nerd<br>
                      <a href="https://www.natewessel.com"
                        target="_blank" rel="noreferrer"
                        moz-do-not-send="true"><span
                          style="text-decoration:none">NateWessel.com</span></a></span>
                  </p>
                </div>
                <div>
                  <p class="MsoNormal">On 2020-01-03 3:40 p.m., Daniel
                    @jfd553 wrote:</p>
                </div>
                <blockquote style="margin-top:5.0pt;margin-bottom:5.0pt">
                  <p class="MsoNormal"
                    style="margin-bottom:10.0pt;line-height:115%"><span
                      lang="FR-CA">Bonjour groupe, mes excuses pour ce
                      très long courriel !-)</span></p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:115%">I have
                    reviewed everything that has been written on the ODB
                    import (aka Canada Building Import) in Talk-ca and
                    the wiki. I proposed changes to some wiki pages (via
                    talk tabs) to ease the discussions about this import
                    and the following. Now, in order to restart the
                    import, here are some thoughts and a proposal on how
                    to proceed to complete the task.</p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:115%"> </p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:115%"><b><span
                        style="font-size:14.0pt;line-height:115%">1.
                        Issues with the ODB Data Import</span></b></p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"
                    style="margin-bottom:10.0pt;line-height:115%">Many
                    concerns were raised about the import. One major
                    concern was to obtain local communities’ buy-in in
                    the Canadian context. Another concern was to improve
                    the quality of the data prior the import. The
                    following paragraphs intend to clear most of these
                    concerns.</p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:115%"><b>1.1.
                      Which data import project?</b></p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"
                    style="margin-bottom:10.0pt;line-height:115%">According
                    to the import guidelines (steps 3 & 4), a data
                    import explicitly refers to a single data source
                    (ODB in our case). Discussions about the
                    availability and quality of Microsoft or ESRI data,
                    while interesting, are not relevant as they should
                    be dealt with as other import projects.</p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:115%"><b>1.2.
                      What has been imported so far?</b></p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"
                    style="margin-bottom:10.0pt;line-height:115%">According
                    to what I found [1], the ODB import is completed for
                    21 municipalities. These imports seem to have kept
                    OSM content’s history, at least for the samples
                    checked, but many problems were found. In some case,
                    the imports brought swimming pools in OSM because
                    they were included in the dataset (e.g. Moncton). In
                    other cases, importing buildings with accurate
                    locations (XY) over content mapped from less
                    accurate imagery resulted in buildings that now
                    overlap the street network (e.g. Squamish). It means
                    that all these 21 imports need to be carefully
                    re-examined and corrected as required. </p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"
                    style="margin-bottom:10.0pt;line-height:115%">For 12
                    other municipalities, the import is partial, either
                    suspended as requested, or because previous imports
                    had already provided most of the buildings (often
                    from the same municipal provider). That said the
                    import will definitely improve OSM accuracy and
                    completeness if done properly.</p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:115%"><b><span
                        style="font-size:14.0pt;line-height:115%">2. How
                        should ODB Data be imported?</span></b></p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"
                    style="margin-bottom:10.0pt;line-height:115%">I will
                    copy the following paragraphs in the “Canada
                    Building Import” wiki page [3] for a detailed
                    discussion…</p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"
                    style="margin-bottom:10.0pt;line-height:115%">Since
                    the data (ODB, OSM and imagery) differ from one
                    municipality to another, there can be no imports at
                    the national or provincial level. We have to work on
                    a municipal basis and make sure to identify all the
                    problems and the corrective measures to apply when
                    dealing with issues like those I identified [1]. </p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:115%"><b>2.1
                      Importing Locally</b></p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"
                    style="margin-bottom:10.0pt;line-height:115%">According
                    to the import guidelines (step 2), we must not
                    import the data without local buy-in. However, and
                    contrarily to some European country, there is
                    usually no such thing as a local OSM community in
                    each municipality. However, we may find a few local
                    mappers from time to time. Working on a municipal
                    basis should allow identifying these local mappers
                    before doing the import. I often use this tool [2]
                    to identify and contact local mappers. Once
                    identified, I suggest that…</p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal">- We contact them to explain our
                    intents by referring to appropriate wiki pages.</p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal">- We wait a week or two to let
                    them respond nothing, that they have concerns, or
                    wish to help.</p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:6.0pt">-
                    Without negative answers we could proceed to the
                    import.</p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"
                    style="margin-bottom:10.0pt;line-height:115%">I
                    first suggest that when a contributor wishes to
                    import ODB for a given municipality, he first
                    identifies himself as responsible for the import (we
                    need to create an entry for each municipality
                    somewhere in the wiki). He can then contact local
                    mappers, as explain above, and go ahead with the
                    import once everything settled. For those who
                    already made the import, I suggest that they review
                    their work since many issues were detected with some
                    of these imports.</p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"
                    style="margin-bottom:10.0pt;line-height:115%">Since
                    there are only a few local OSM communities in
                    Canada, and because Canada is large, I suggest not
                    limiting the import of a given municipality to the
                    people of the concerned province or region.</p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:115%"><b>2.2
                      Pre-processing</b></p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"
                    style="margin-bottom:10.0pt;line-height:115%">Once
                    local mappers have agreed, some pre-processing can
                    be done if required. </p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"
                    style="margin-bottom:10.0pt;line-height:115%">A few
                    months ago, I developed a tool that could be used to
                    process the data [4]. Concerns were raised because
                    the application was developed using proprietary
                    software. So I documented the whole process and
                    algorithms in order to see courageous coders
                    converting it in open source software. In the
                    meantime, and as long as I have access to an FME
                    licence, I could process the data, when necessary,
                    prior to make it available through the task manager.</p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"
                    style="margin-bottom:10.0pt;line-height:115%">Proposed
                    pre-processing [4] includes: </p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal">- Reading of original ODB data,</p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal">- Removal of near collinear nodes
                    (simplification), </p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal">- Orthogonalization of buildings
                    (for corners having near right angles),</p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal">- Tagging of building footprints,</p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"
                    style="margin-bottom:10.0pt;line-height:115%">-
                    Providing files in OSM format.</p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"
                    style="margin-bottom:10.0pt;line-height:115%"><i>Proposed
                      tagging:</i> In addition to the tags produced by
                    the orthogonalization process [4] and the source tag
                    (<a
                      href="https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Key:source"
                      target="_blank" rel="noreferrer"
                      moz-do-not-send="true"><span
                        style="color:windowtext;text-decoration:none">source</span></a>=Statistics
                    Canada - Open Building Database), the name of the
                    Census Subdivision provided in ODB data [5] is used
                    to add the addr:city tag to each building.</p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"
                    style="margin-bottom:10.0pt;line-height:115%">The
                    pre-processing requires parameters that are specific
                    to the data to process. These parameters were
                    estimated on a municipal basis using actual ODB
                    data. The processing time increases exponentially
                    according to the number of buildings so, it may take
                    a couple of days before the data is available for a
                    given municipality. Currently, the proposed
                    pre-processing does not convert terrace buildings
                    into individual houses nor it tags topological
                    errors.</p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:115%"><b>2.3.
                      Import Process</b></p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"
                    style="margin-bottom:10.0pt;line-height:115%">After
                    the local mappers, if any, agreed to the import, the
                    pre-processing completed when required, we can
                    proceed to the import. </p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"
                    style="margin-bottom:10.0pt;line-height:115%">1- Do
                    not bulk import the data! Always use the task
                    manager (<a href="http://tasks.osmcanada.ca/"
                      target="_blank" rel="noreferrer"
                      moz-do-not-send="true">http://tasks.osmcanada.ca/</a>).
                    Select and open a task square in JOSM. If it’s too
                    big (e.g. too much work or request is too big to
                    load in JOSM), go back to the task manager and split
                    the task into smaller squares.</p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"
                    style="margin-bottom:10.0pt;line-height:115%">2-
                    Load imagery layer (Bing or ESRI World Imagery) and
                    align the imagery with ODB data (i.e. create a new
                    image offset) if necessary because, unless proven
                    otherwise, ODB should be more accurate (XY) than
                    most available images especially in hilly areas.</p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"
                    style="margin-bottom:10.0pt;line-height:115%">3-
                    Align the existing OSM content to the image (i.e.
                    after the new offset is applied) if required.</p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"
                    style="margin-bottom:10.0pt;line-height:115%">4-
                    Currently step 2 and following as described in the
                    wiki [2]. I suggest merging the Conflation section
                    [6] here and reviewing everything to take into
                    account the current proposal.</p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"
                    style="margin-bottom:10.0pt;line-height:115%"><b><span
                        style="font-size:14.0pt;line-height:115%">References</span></b></p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:9.0pt">[1]
                    </span><a
href="https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/The_Open_Database_of_Buildings"
                      target="_blank" rel="noreferrer"
                      moz-do-not-send="true"><span
                        style="font-size:9.0pt">https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/The_Open_Database_of_Buildings</span></a></p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:9.0pt">[2]
                    </span><a
href="https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Canada_Building_Import#Import_process"
                      target="_blank" rel="noreferrer"
                      moz-do-not-send="true"><span
                        style="font-size:9.0pt">https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Canada_Building_Import#Import_process</span></a></p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:9.0pt">[3]
                    </span><a href="http://resultmaps.neis-one.org"
                      target="_blank" rel="noreferrer"
                      moz-do-not-send="true"><span
                        style="font-size:9.0pt">http://resultmaps.neis-one.org</span></a><span
                      style="font-size:9.0pt"> (“Overview of
                      OpenStreetMap Contributors aka who’s around me?”)</span></p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:9.0pt">[4]
                    </span><a
                      href="https://github.com/jfd553/OrthogonalizingBuildingFootprint"
                      target="_blank" rel="noreferrer"
                      moz-do-not-send="true"><span
                        style="font-size:9.0pt">https://github.com/jfd553/OrthogonalizingBuildingFootprint</span></a></p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:9.0pt">[5]
                    </span><span style="font-size:10.0pt"><a
href="https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/92-195-x/2011001/geo/csd-sdr/csd-sdr-eng.htm"
                        target="_blank" rel="noreferrer"
                        moz-do-not-send="true"><span
                          style="font-size:9.0pt">https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/92-195-x/2011001/geo/csd-sdr/csd-sdr-eng.htm</span></a></span></p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:9.0pt">[6]
                      <a
href="https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Canada_Building_Import#Conflation"
                        target="_blank" rel="noreferrer"
                        moz-do-not-send="true">
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Canada_Building_Import#Conflation</a></span></p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:9.0pt"> </span></p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:9.0pt"> </span></p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"
                    style="margin-bottom:10.0pt;line-height:115%"> </p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"
                    style="margin-bottom:10.0pt;line-height:115%">Let’s
                    move ahead!</p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"
                    style="margin-bottom:10.0pt;line-height:115%">Daniel</p>
                  <p class="MsoNormal"><span><br>
                      <br>
                    </span></p>
                  <pre>_______________________________________________</pre>
                  <pre>Talk-ca mailing list</pre>
                  <pre><a href="mailto:Talk-ca@openstreetmap.org" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer" moz-do-not-send="true">Talk-ca@openstreetmap.org</a></pre>
                  <pre><a href="https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-ca" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer" moz-do-not-send="true">https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-ca</a></pre>
                </blockquote>
              </div>
            </blockquote>
          </div>
          _______________________________________________<br>
          Talk-ca mailing list<br>
          <a href="mailto:Talk-ca@openstreetmap.org" target="_blank"
            rel="noreferrer" moz-do-not-send="true">Talk-ca@openstreetmap.org</a><br>
          <a href="https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-ca"
            rel="noreferrer noreferrer" target="_blank"
            moz-do-not-send="true">https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-ca</a><br>
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