[Talk-us] Chattanooga OSM Meeting on 7/21/2011

Randal Hale rjhale at northrivergeographic.com
Fri Jul 22 15:23:01 BST 2011


I suggested last night that if they wanted to do something really easy - 
start with their neighborhood and use mine as an example. Fix the roads 
and just explore the map. I think out of the 6 of us, 4 will continue 
mapping. One of them being the employee from Outdoor Chattanooga. If I 
can keep her going it will spread to other groups. The other experienced 
mapper is working on the county to open up some of their data layers - 
especially the new imagery that was acquired last year. I've tried but 
it needs to come from a different voice.

Overall - I think good things will happen - I am excited about the 
mapping event. They have a good facility - place for presentations - and 
a place to set up some laptops to help with editing (I teach ArcGIS 
classes so I have a laptop lab that can be set up pretty quickly).

Now that I have the first one down and I know there are at least two of 
us committed I can bring in some high school teachers and some local 
university professors and expand. I had 6 participants at this one - 
I'll try to get 8 to 10 at the next one. I've had good luck with a local 
high school. It just needs to be a bit more controlled than the teacher 
wishes - that's a long story for another time.

Randal Hale, GISP
North River Geographic Systems, Inc.
ESRI Business Partner and Certified Trainer
http://www.northrivergeographic.com
423.653.3611 rjhale at northrivergeographic.com


On 7/22/2011 9:31 AM, Richard Weait wrote:
> On Fri, Jul 22, 2011 at 8:22 AM, Randal Hale
> <rjhale at northrivergeographic.com>  wrote:
>> Update on the meeting.
>> We had 6 people attend. I was really only expecting about 3. Out of the 6,
>> two of us were very familiar with OSM. The other four had no experience.
> Fantastic!  Four potential new mappers is a huge success.
>
>> [ ... ] Unfortunately Internet went
>> down as the meeting began and was sketchy the rest of the night.....
> Arrrgh!  The bane of our events; flaky connectivity!
>
> When the experienced : new numbers are close, I've found that newbies
> like to 'lead' the coaching, rather than having a 'formal' lecturer /
> listener presentation style.  They often have to be tricked into
> leading it though.  If you can lead them to doing something in OSM
> that is immediately interesting to them, the whole OSM thing seems to
> 'stick' better.
>
> The alternative to this is the presentation style, in which i talk
> about OSM origins and history, goals and milestones.  I might go on
> for 20 minutes and then mention, "OpenCycleMap".  If the new mapper is
> leading the conversation, we can get to that part that interests them
> sooner.
>
> Me: So glad you could join us. What is it about OSM that brought you here?
> New Mapper: Well the new bike trail in my neighbourhood isn't on the map...
> Me: [sliding computer over to new mapper] show me on this map where
> the bike trail should appear.
>
> Five minutes later
>
> New Mapper: Wow! I added the bike trail and it is already showing on
> the map. OSM is great!
> Me: We know.
>
> There is plenty of time, between mouse clicks for history and project
> goals, but the mapper who has already accomplished something they care
> about is already one of us.
>
> With a few more new mappers, you want to try to be in more places at
> once.  If they all have their laptops with them, you are in great
> shape.  Show a few slides for 1) register for OSM account. 2) zoom in
> to your neighbourhood or another place you know well. 3) find
> something that is wrong or missing 4) fix it.
>
>> [ ... ] They appear interested in - and
>> here's where I get lost - building an "Outdoor Chattanooga" map. They don't
>> have one. So from my limited experience in all this it would involve some
>> sort of custom "mapnik" or something similar to OpenCycleMap.
> Sure, that's one approach.  You might find a dozen or so ways to do
> this depending on what they want, and what they want to spend.
>
> A full mapnik layer might be more than they want to gnaw on initially,
> but it is a fantastic option to show them what a "Full OSM"
> implementation might look like.  Freemap Slovakia uses this approach,
> with a custom rendering of their area of interest, and "default
> rendering" for the rest of the world.
>
> http://www.freemap.sk/#p=48.935|19.67528|7|A
>
> Or they might want an "Event Calendar Map" that shows clickable
> information boxes on their locations.  The OSM user group map shows
> this approach. http://usergroups.openstreetmap.de/?zoom=5&lat=39.23225&lon=-98.83301&layers=B0T
>
> And many variations on these themes.  The first step though, in my
> mind, is get them to put data into OSM.
>
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