[OSM-talk] Mapping with no GPS data

[David Earl]

Thom'tas said:
> It's sad that osmabrowser didn't display anything for such an area. If
> those segments where displayed then everybody could see that part of the
> job is done here but not finished.

I think there's more needed than this to indicate the coverage. I'd like to
indicate that a road leads off into the distance but isn't mapped at all yet
(in contrast to a dead end), and that I've surveyed an area but there is a
patch missing, or that I've surveyed an area but only to the level of
streets, not footpaths, and that this is the edge of my known universe. I've
put a few proposals to this effect on the map features proposals page last
week.

> It makes much more sense to display them as "work in progress" (with a
> special color and line style).

Perhaps, but don't you even know if it's a road, river or railway?
highway='unknown' might be useful, but nothing at all  isn't that helpful.
You see them in JOSM to work on, and you can do the same in osmarender by
changing one line, but someone wantng a finished map shouldn't be relying on
work in progress.

We don't need a map that is complete in every detail, but to be useful to an
end user, they need to have something that will give them confidence in the
map, even if that is an indication of completeness or otherwise in an area.

I think this is the singlemost barrier tomaking a useful end product at the
moment - would you trust it?

David