[Talk-ca] water, woods and junkyards, Ontario Canvec test

[Richard Weait]

Hi Talk-ca-ers,

I've been importing some of the Canvec thematic data in Ontario to get
a feel for the data and tools.  I've created a Canvec status page [1]
on the wiki so others can follow along or join in.  I've chosen only
some of the thematic data for my tests, including water / riviers,
streams, marsh / wetlands and woods plus a few others.

Wanna take a peek at what I've done?  These links show three NTS tiles
(rectangular areas) that I have uploaded and one that is in progress.
Depending on when you look, you may see an obvious margin between the
rendered and un-rendered quadrant.  Pan north and south and you'll see
the areas still to be uploaded.

Mapnik shows wooded areas
http://www.openstreetmap.org/?lat=43.258&lon=-81.504&zoom=10&layers=B000FTF
Osmarender shows water
http://www.openstreetmap.org/?lat=43.258&lon=-81.504&zoom=10&layers=0B00FTF

The results of the import / upload are imperfect.  Some material
duplicates the work of individual mappers though not as often as with
roads.  Some data is out of date.  One mapper has already reported
that an imported railway was removed from reality some time ago.  I've
seen an area that reports ponds where I believe there are houses now.

That said, though imperfect, I believe that the import is worthy of
further consideration.  Please have a look and add your comments.
Should you find duplication in an area you know, please remove the
worst data.

As for the conversion and import process, I have a wish list:

Conversion.  I've been working from Ian's and Sam's older materials
and added a few scripts of my own.  These are nice.  I'd like to
update to the latest, clean up my scripts carry on.  Conversion seems
to be working nicely.

Viewing.  I've been viewing the thematic layers (auto wreckers in one
layer, marshes in another) I clean up tagging here and then upload
from josm.  This works well.  Josm will periodically cry about memory.

Reconciliation.  I wish there were a better way to compare my import
layers to existing OSM features.  Ideally I'd like to upload the
marshes layer (or sport fields) and have a list of the 35 sport field
objects.  That much we can do now.  But now I'd like to look at each
individual sportfield, upload the existing OSM area to another layer,
and compare.  Then hit a button to decide Yes, upload this new
feature; No, this feature exists; or Merge these two features by
sharing their tags sensibly.  Then have it automatically progress to
the next feature on the list.  This imaginary workflow would be much
less error prone than the cursory, manual search / zoom / download /
compare that I do now.  I think it might be well suited to the awesome
Quick Check[2] tool created by Mark Gray.

Upload.  Upload from josm is nice since I'm already there.  I do have
to split ways into <2000 nodes periodically, and some thematic layers
are just too big and should be split with an external tool (unless
I've missed the josm way to auto-split).  The upload does take a
while.  Then I can't edit or inspect further while the upload is
blocking josm.  And I can't queue up two large uploads to run
sequentially overnight.  Those are relatively minor irritations.

Rendering. Wow.  The beauty of the work that the server team did last
year to give us instant rendering updates is fantastic.  It makes
these uploads really rewarding when you can se the results right away
(at selected zoom levels.)

So, pitch in.  Thoughts?

Best regards,
Richard

[1] http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/CanVec_Import_Status
[2] http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/QuickCheck