[OSM-newbies] Missing "How To" instructions - getting a minimal map

[Richard Owlett]

Thomas Wood wrote:

> 2009/3/13 Akkana Peck <akkana at shallowsky.com>:
> 
>>I sent an offline response to Richard, he responded and we decided
>>it might be better to have some of it on the list, so here goes:
>>
>>Richard Owlett writes:
>>
>>>I'm looking for an *outline* map of North America showing national,
>>>state, and provincial boundaries for U.S. and Canada.
>>>
>>>My particular use is assisting someone else to plot some bird migration
>>>data. I can see the same outline having use for geography lessons from
>>>primary school thru college.
>>>
>>>In the past week I've spent >8 fruitless hours browsing
>>>www.openstreetmap.org and its wiki.
>>
>>The national and US state boundaries are definitely there in
>>the OSM data: they aren't drawn in the default "Mapnik" view
>>on openstreetmap.org, but if you click on the + over at the top
>>right and choose the Osmarender layer you'll see them.
>>
>>The trick is displaying them in a nice clean display with all
>>the rest of the data hidden. And I'm not sure there's any app
>>that can do that. The big three OSM programs, JOSM, Potlatch
>>and Merkaartor, are all aimed at editing, not at letting you
>>turn things off and on to make a nice clean display.
>>
>>Maybe your best bet is to set up a web-based view using the OSM
>>databases, and then you can make stylesheets to show only what you
>>want. But that's a lot of work.
> 
> 
> The default lowzoom cloudmade render is quite nice
> http://maps.cloudmade.com/?lat=38.959409&lng=-96.064453&zoom=4&styleId=1
> 

That proves the information I'm looking for exists.
Now to find out how to conviently:
   1. get ONLY what what I want.
   2. render it for *OFFLINE* use.