[OSM-newbies] JOSM beginner

John McKerrell john at mckerrell.net
Thu Mar 22 07:57:56 GMT 2007


Hi and Welcome,

On 22 Mar 2007, at 00:47, Lars Aronsson wrote:

>
> When I start JOSM, I can open a local GPX or OSM file, and the
> visual area will be zoomed in to cover that part of the map.  But
> if I don't have a local file, and instead I only want to download
> data from the server, how do I specify the right coordinates?
> Am I supposed to know the latitude and longitude by numbers?
> Is there any way to search for a city name from JOSM?  There is a
> zoomable map in the download dialog, but it doesn't show any
> existing ways.  If I try to grab a too big area, the server will
> refuse the download with a HTTP 400 error, and JOSM doesn't try to
> explain the reason or split the download into smaller chunks.
>

You can save bookmarks, so what I'd suggest is that when you've  
loaded your GPX file in and it's zoomed into the correct area, click  
on Connection -> Download from JOSM, then click on Add. The latitudes  
and longitudes will already be pre-populated using the area that is  
visible in josm. If the area in your GPX file is very large you can  
always load it in, then zoom in before saving the favourite/ 
downloading data.

Alternatively you can find an area on the slippy map that you want to  
edit, right click on "View" to get a link to that area, and put that  
into the "URL from www.openstreetmap.org" box, I think that still works.

I know I generally find myself using the "load a GPX file" method  
these days though as my area's got very dense so my old favourites  
download far too much data these days.

> My second question goes beyond JOSM:
>
> After I have edited the map and successfully uploaded the new ways
> to the server, what happens next?  I guess I should get involved
> in Tiles at Home to help updating the Osmarender tiles?  Is there any
> queue where I can watch my changes turn into tiles?  How long does
> it take on average?  Do these renderers first wait for the new
> Planet.osm to be produced (each Wednesday)?  So a week is a normal
> waiting time?  Or far longer than that?
>
Tiles at Home uses data directly from the API so can be very up to date.  
It will generate new tiles when you add/edit/delete nodes in an area.  
It does this by using the RSS feed to detect these updates. Using  
this method though it will only update tiles once every 2 days so you  
might find that the edits you make at the beginning of an editing  
session get rendered, then nothing for two days. To get around this  
you can either go to one of the websites mentioned here: http:// 
wiki.openstreetmap.org/index.php/Tiles%40home/APIs#Requesting_updates

Or alternatively you can get involved with rendering the tiles, which  
means you can render your tiles whenever you want.

> Some background: I'm [[user:LA2]] on the OSM wiki since May 2005,
> but always used the Java applet and have mostly drawn line
> segments without creating ways, which was the state of the art a
> year ago. All this JOSM and Osmarender stuff is new to me.

Well you've been around a lot longer than I have (on OSM!) so I hope  
I haven't told you anything you already knew! Hope this helps.

John





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