<div class="gmail_quote">Amidst the very serious and sometimes interesting licensing discussions, which I have only been silently following, I just thought of writing this small piece on challenges in mapping. And oh yes, I am voting 'YES' to the ODB License.<br>
<br>Now, this is not an official document, just a slightly exaggerated and 'pun intended' kind of piece but mostly true account of a mapper's adventures. And because OSM does not have a blog, it is here. On another note, I think we should have an OSM blog. Mapping makes for very interesting travelling and there is so much people who want to could share.<br>
<br>This is a little long, so bear with it but it should be worth it. :) Blog posted on this link as well: <a href="http://theconfusedandthewandering.blogspot.com/2009/12/my-experiments-with-mapping.html" target="_blank">http://theconfusedandthewandering.blogspot.com/2009/12/my-experiments-with-mapping.html</a><br>
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<b>My Experiments with Mapping<br><br></b>My apologies go out to Mahatma Gandhi for shamelessly plagiarizing the
title of his autobiography, only in part though. However, if he were to
read this blog post, even he would agree that my Titanic struggle
mapping some parts of India was not too far off his struggle for
getting India freedom. And I have only just started.<br><br>For the
sake of a short background, mapping caught my fancy when I went mad.
Mad as in quit a good well paying job with a large corporation (the
likes of which OSMers seem to hate so much), started travelling and as
happens to all men who go mad, started day dreaming. Day dreams about
getting paid for travelling!! Day dreams about getting paid for
writing!! Ha!! Anyway, I wanted to map some of the treks I went to and
I bought this fancy gadget called a GPS, a Garmin eTrex Vista Hcx,
spending quite a significant portion of my fortune, only to realize
later that this freaking thing tells me my position at any point with a
certain degree of error and it even lies about that. Talk about a bad
start!!<br><br>The adventures or experiments, call them what you like,
started with mapping parts of New Delhi and Gurgaon, a suburb of Delhi,
at times with a friend who introduced me to OSM. On a hot afternoon,
GPS in lap, hands on a steering wheel, I would be passing some
buildings on the way. Now, as most of you would know, a mapper does not
see buildings, parks, hotels, greens. <span style="font-weight: bold;">All he ever sees is 'POIs'</span>.
POIs everywhere, left, right, center, POIs floating around in the air,
each trying to catch his attention. And oh my! None of them on OSM.
What blasphemy! So, each POI was marked on the 'GPS in the lap'. Since
I only have 2 hands, I just remembered the names of the POIs and kept
repeating them till I could park the car and take them down in my
notebook.<br><br>A tough initiation was followed by an even tougher
experience. One fine day, Nishant (the friend and OSM mentor) comes and
says 'I have to go for an interview......with a journalist'. And I was
flummoxed. I mean, fine he is a great computer guy, believes in open
source, I can maybe credit him with some intelligence and so on and so
forth but who would want to interview this unbathed, shabbily dressed,
half obese specimen of human filth? Then he tells me its some French
journalist girl, who wants to interview an OSM mapper in India. Do I
need to tell anyone here that French and girl got me going and I wanted
to be the one interviewed but like we all make compromises, I had to
live with Nishant as part of the interview.<br><br>After we chatted a
bit, she wanted to see how we mapped. Shalabh in the driving seat,
French girl next to him, Nishant relegated to the back seat with the
moronic GPS and we were off. Off to a residential area managed by DLF,
a building company whose tagline says 'Building India'. I will reserve
my comments on the tagline for later but we parked the car after
sometime and started walking along the lanes, the poor studious Nishant
taking down the POIs. We had walked maybe a few hundred metres when a
motorbike approaches us. The rider is wearing a blue jacket with the
words DLF QRT (Quick Response Team) written on the back. And then he
starts mishandling us. Dont worry, I meant verbal mishandling. Asking
all sorts of questions. What are you doing? Mapping. What mapping? We
are making a map. Who asked you to make a map? We are volunteers. Who
asked you to volunteer? What is that in your hand (pointing to the
GPS)? What are you noting down in that pad? Ok, now the questions got a
little too much and I was aware at the back of my mind that this was a
residential area and somewhere there would be some board saying 'No
Trespassing' and we could very well be qualified as trespassers. POIs
notes were torn, handed over to Mr. QRT, a silently angry Nishant was
pulled away and we lost half an hour worth of POIs and tracks.<br><br>Oh! and did I mention the interview was never published and we ended up having to drop the French chic 2 hours away. :(<br><br>Scarred
by this incident, I soon moved to HP, a Himalayan state in India. Small
population, clear skies, lots of conifer jungles and untouched beauty
etc etc. This is the place I was bent on trekking in. I looked at the
OSM map for HP and found....nothing! It was as if someone had forgotten
to draw lines in that part of the world. A couple of days later,
watching TV, I switched to this news channel called India TV (they call
themselves one, I call them a Filth channel). They had a full one hour
show about GPS, telling everyone how a GPS is a threat to national
security, how terrorists can use a GPS to navigate and find any place
(Now, I know why Mr. QRT bothered me, because I was threatening India's
national security). The poor f*cks did not know that a GPS needs maps
and voila, we dont even have digital maps of India. To hell with the
terrorist and his GPS. Yeah, it was another matter if the terrorists
first turned mappers, contributed to OSM, got a full fledged map of
India on OSM and then went about their task. Make life easier for
themselves and serve the community. :)<br><br>So, you see a grim
background is building up. Here is a man, who had a well paying job a
few months ago. He has quit his job, moved back to India. When you ask
him what is he doing nowadays, he does not have a clear answer (because
he is himself not clear). And then he goes around roaming in all
strange places at all strange times, a strange device in hand, which TV
channels say is a threat to national security. He also carries a
notebook in his hand and keeps making notes all the time, looks at all
buildings with great interest and then again notes down something. And
he has also been stopped once by Mr. QRT somewhere. Chequered record, I
must say.<br><br>So, when I came to Himachal and heard this TVchannel
sh*t, I started being more careful. When I went to treks, I was almost
apologetic about the GPS, defending and downplaying it everytime
someone would ask me what it is. Who knows when would someone report me
somewhere, I have even lost the receipts of the GPS purchase. And then
I go on this trek, walking between two vertical faces of huge Himalayan
rock, 25 metres apart. And my GPS says the error is +-53 metres. Where
do you suppose it showed me? Somewhere drilled into the mountain rock?
Perhaps. The error went upto 96 metres and then the altimeter lost 100
metres while I was climbing. I thought, 'Did I face all these
challenges for this piece of crap?' I lost faith in the GPS that day.
It became an instrument of pleasure. Yes, you dirty minds, I know what
you are thinking.<br><br>I have been living in a small town called
Sundernagar for the last 2 months i.e. whenever I am not out trekking.
4 days ago, I decided to make Sundernagar look better on OSM than on
google. There was not much actually to be done. Google had a dot for
Sundernagar in the right place and OSM had it in the wrong place. Zoom
in and you see virgin territory on both maps. As I said, someone forgot
to draw the lines. So, I started these 3 hour walking missions into
Sundernagar. Its an old town, with its fair share of narrow lanes and
streets. And now, you had that strange man with his notebook and
strange device dressed in a heavy jacket walking the dark lanes of
Sundernagar. He would go down a lane right upto the farther end, look
around suspiciously, take out his notebook and a pen and write
something down. He would not stay long writing, the moment he would see
someone, he would make a move. Walk down a little more, past the curve
and then stop to write again. Sundernagar is small place, word gets
around quick and I do look different. Short, thick, with a GPS and
notebook. The strange man walks 9 km on first day. Worth noticing? Yes.<br><br>Second
day, he is spotted coming out again as the sun sets, walking into the
town. This time, he takes slightly different routes, walks some other
lanes but still has that furtive look around him, seems to be avoiding
attention, avoiding looking people in the eye and smiling. He has a pad
today but he is not taking down any notes, its just thrust
unceremoniously into his jacket pocket. He, however seems to be
continously fiddling with an oversize mobile in his hand. Worth
bothering?? No. This day the stranger walked 12 km.<br><br>Third day,
same attire, same man, same strategy, different routes. No attention
attracted. Happy stranger back home, map of Sundernagar looking thicker
on OSM. Stranger walked 10 km today.<br><br>(I thought I had found the
right recipe for avoiding attention. Pretend that the GPS is a mobile
phone and instead of writing on the pad, enter POI details direct using
the clumsy on screen keyboard. Simple, people think this man is
messaging his girlfriend and give you faint smiles.)<br><br>Fourth day,
the strange man does not come out. He, who is looking less strange now,
comes out in a car. The car has a registration number which is from out
of this state and he follows a road to the other end of town. He was
seen there 2 days ago. Now he comes up with a great idea. He drives
into any road, goes on till the road goes out of town and then asks
someone about a locality which is on the other end. So, he pretends
lost whenever he finishes mapping a road. He does this thrice before,
trying to turn back from a narrow lane, he has the front tyre of his
car stuck in a deep drain, hanging in the middle of nowhere. So, he
contemplates asking for help. Oh my, he comes across a man he has asked
directions from twice in the last 2 days, once on foot yesterday and
once today, 15 minutes ago. :)<br><br>Middle aged uncle sees him and
says 'You seem to get lost quite a bit.' Yeah, right!! Scared that a
different state registration number, the strange device, bad record
might land him into unnecessary trouble, the poor guy gets into his
car, puts it in the reverse gear and full throttle backs off.
Thankfully, the car comes out and the stranger disappears into the
mist. He has sort of completed mapping the major lanes of Sundernagar
today and plans to keep doing this. Should you read some news of a baby
faced terrorist having been arrested with a GPS, you would know who he
is and I am sure you will help him out of trouble.<br><br>And one day I hope, they will offer obeisance to my idols for the pioneering work that I am doing. :)<br>--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------<br>
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