[Talk-ht] Need Help Managing Mapping Requests

[Rafa Gutierrez]

All,

I couldn't agree more and this left us stuck for quite a while before we
could get editing. Here are my thoughts so let me know what you think.

Mikel wrote:
> We lack a single clear place where mappers can come to find what kind of
> tasks are most urgently needed,
> who else is working on these tasks, the status of the task, and who to
> notify if something is completed.

So what it sounds like is that the WIki page needs to serve as a start page
for volunteers WHO ARE NOT in Haiti. There should also be a separate page
for Responders on the ground in Haiti. That way there are two main links
that everyone can distribute quickly. I see these as two separate efforts
for starters.

> Currently, elements of this are spread throughout the Haiti WikiProject
> pages. Mea culpa, I contributed to this
> state of affairs as well.

Mikel, all the information is pretty much here and you've done an incredible
job. It just takes time and patience to search it. I think if you throw a
header on the top of the page with links to the two pages just mentioned,
then the rest can be part of the historical record as well as non-critical
details.

Here's where I see these sections going:

For CrisisCamps:

>
http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/WikiProject_Haiti/Mapping_Coordination#Requests_from_Responders
This should include this blurb but also serve as a jumping off point for why
it is important to map for the intended audience.

>
http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/WikiProject_Haiti/Mapping_Coordination#What_needs_to_be_mapped.3F
>
http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/WikiProject_Haiti/Tasks_and_Ideas#Mapping_Tasks
These two sections are related and should be combined. The headers should be
something like:
* What Needs to be Mapped
* What Has Already Been Mapped
Once you decide on what you are going to map or edit, there should be
tutorials if you are unfamilar with OSM. Nearly all the volunteers with us
last week had little to no experience with OSM so that was a stall. I'd urge
CrisisCamps to have Geospatial folks get familiar with it before coming. The
videos are a great start!

One of the tools I've been using is the Haiti Crisis Map
<http://hypercube.telascience.org/haiti/>from Telascience. If you know what
and where you are looking for, it has most of the valuable layers right
there. I think this should be pushed first for newcomers. Lastly, it would
be good for people to learn about tagging and understand how it can be
useful as metadata.

And one more thing about Tasks - these are Tasks now, not Tasks and Ideas.
We can link to creative ideas in another section for things like Twitter
feeds and KML outputs. Until it's proven and has a clear Task that someone
can follow, it belongs on the sidebar because it clutters things up.

> http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/WikiProject_Haiti/Status
This is the weakest point of this effort and one that needs some
reconciliation. There are two ways to update status that I know of: the OSM
Matrix and OpenStreetBugs<http://openstreetbugs.appspot.com/?lon=-73.02620379327145&lat=19.13440167838874&zoom=8>.
I don't think anyone anticipated this mapping party to get this big and now
we're scratching our head. For now, Status should point to these two tools
but with the caveat that they are not up to date. We made an effort to start
with the OSM Matrix and look for low status sections to edit but were
finding it out of date. I think what needs to happen is make the Status a
separate Task - a sort of QAQC Task. One could quickly turn on UNNAMED ROADS
and see if the status in the OSM Matrix reflects this and start updating the
OSM Matrix. The
OpenStreetBugs<http://openstreetbugs.appspot.com/?lon=-73.02620379327145&lat=19.13440167838874&zoom=8>can
also be a Task in itself but it looks like it usually needs feedback
from someone on the ground in Haiti for OSM Mapping errors.

> http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/WikiProject_Haiti/News
This is a sidebar but knowing when critical imagery becomes available is
good information to have. Still, lower priority.

For Responders:
This should have extensive how-to's for those in the field. I've been out of
touch with this but looks like there are some good resources floating out
there that need to be consolidated on one page. Things like:
* Uploading OSM into Garmins
* Twitter settings for geolocating
* Walking Papers!
* How to report mapping errors

As far as consolidating this into one page, this may break a bunch of links
down the pipe so I'm not sure if doing it this weekend would be good given
the CrisisCamps that will be looking for this material. It could be made in
parallel so nothing gets broken and we can start on this ASAP. Thoughts on
that?

> In this role, if this person became occupied with other work, they'd need
to
> let us know here on talk-ht so someone else could take over.

I'm happy to help if there are others who can check my work unless this is
already being done. Also, it would be good if there was a way to contact all
the authors who have contributed to these Wiki pages so they may redirect
their efforts to the updated site.

> Essentially, this needs to work something like an informal ticketing
system.
> I believe this could be managed in the wiki
> for the time being, and lessons from the crisis applied for better systems
> in future responses.

Again, the OSM Matrix or OpenStreetBugs should provide this. Also, every
Unamed Road is one big checklist but the names are so hard to get at from
the scanned paper maps. It would be great to get more feedback from people
with Walking Papers out there. Ok, I'm rambling now. I've got more feedback
and discussion on Portland's process last week here:
http://wiki.crisiscommons.org/wiki/Portland01232010#If_you_are_a_geo_hacker_or_GIS_geek
:

Feel free to use this for your own CC if you're having one this weekend.
Hope this helps and I'd love to hear folks thoughts on all this.
- rafa

On Thu, Jan 28, 2010 at 9:59 PM, <talk-ht-request at openstreetmap.org> wrote:

>
> "Re: Contents of Talk-ht digest..."
>
>
> Today's Topics:
>
>   1. Re: Need Help Managing Mapping Requests (Margie Roswell)
>   2. Re: Need Help Managing Mapping Requests (Sam Vekemans)
>   3. Re: Need Help Managing Mapping Requests (Mikel Maron)
>
> *snip*


-- 
>
503.705.6592
@rafamoustafah - me
@geografa - geospatial me
http://www.google.com/profiles/rafamoustafah - my profile
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