[OSM-talk] Newbie - queries and usability suggestions

bvh bvh-osm at irule.be
Sat Nov 18 18:06:46 GMT 2006


On Sat, Nov 18, 2006 at 01:53:53PM +0000, Calum Polwart wrote:
> OK I'm new here, but having a few issues - I'm reasonably computer savy so it worries me slightly that you will loose potential volunteers because the userfriendlyness is (a bit) rough around the edges.

Yes, we need more feedback like yours to improve. 

> NONE of the editing tools I've tried are exactly what I'd call user friendly - not sure the best way to feedback on these.  The API is not bad, but of course slow - but also seems to lack adding a node to an existing way - seems a bit poor.  JOSM is faster but seems to freeze a lot (perhaps my track is too large) - unable to do certain tasks like select lines, I also seem unable to get pop-out windows all the time when I click things like add node to give choice of adding a node or adding a node to a segment? It seems intermittent.   Moving the track about is not intuitive - right click and slide?  Where did that come from? Merkator?  Can't get it to actually let me edit!

I can only speak of merkaartor. Could you elaborate a little bit more on
what you tried, expected but didn't work? I am very interested in
(highly) critical feedback.

Adding an new node to an existing way should be easy : 
select the Create->Node menu, move the cursor
close to an existing road, it will highlight in blue and click with
the left mouse button : the node will be added. 

I've been doing a bit of optimizations for the recent version. There is
still a lot of low hanging fruit but I'd like to improve on functionality
first.

> Can I not edit a Way once its created - i.e. add an extra node? (Seems strange to me)

If you want to add a segment to an existing way, just select the way,
click on the Add icon in the toolbar and click on segments you want to
add/remove

> None of the programmes function as I would expect.  I follow that I place nodes and join nodes with segments - and that for whatever reason most software draws the segments straight not curved. I then join segments into Ways - so why when I do that do I not get an automatic popup asking for properties?  I don't know OSM inside out so why when I do manually add properties do I need to work out:
> 
> Highway: Primary
> Name: A691

Very true. This is one of the things I am working on right now. For
example (will commit to svn tonight) my local version of Merkaartor
already has a type combobox where you can select the appropriate
highway-type without needing to mess with tags. Note that for name
and traffic-direction you can already edit them with Merkaartor
withouth needing to know anything about tags.

> Surely when I add a way it should ask what type of way it is - when I choose Highway, it should ask what type of highway. (I have now found auto-properties, but it still doesn't force you through the process) Then it should ask for a name?
> 
> Why would created_by not be automated?

It was in Merkaartor but I removed it on the request of SteveC who wants
to phase out created_by altogether (something I totally agree with!)

> Finally - would it not be logical to be able to do my track conversions over a background which is a rendered version of the map (either dynamically rendered [prefered] or at least at last save/load etc.

What would that bring you? If you are editing, a pre-rendered map would
contain no or incorrect information, that's why you are editing after all no?

But I do agree that during editing we should present more information
visually. For example in merkaartor traffic direction is shown with 
small arrows and areas are filled with a dialog pattern. One more idea
I have is presenting different types of segments/ways differently
(color, width of stroke, etc)

cu bart




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