[OSM-talk] Land Information New Zealand (LINZ) data import technical steps

Joe Richards joefish75 at yahoo.com
Wed Jun 17 09:13:21 BST 2009


I'm working on the LINZ data import, which will bring New Zealand's maps forward in a huge leap and includes all roads, streets, various features (parks, airports, streams, riverways etc).

LINZ gave OSM permission over a year ago to import the data, provided attribution was passed on with the data.  The attribution can be a mixture of tags (user id, source, attribution link), some attribution pages online, and apparently the ODbL license may help towards this (although I'm unclear as to how, in case anyone wishes to enlighten me).  Although I'm interested in this and involved with it, it's not the focus of my question.

On the actual import, I have been working on the mp2osm script which takes Polish Map .mp format and turns it into OSM data, ready for JOSM.  This is because the data files I can get hold of are in that format, and have been processed heavily by NZ Open GPS.  The downside is that I can't yet get hold of the LINZ data to see whether all this processing (for example of feature types) is accurate and for comparison.  It is also broken up into regions, so many of the features are obviously not joined together at the borders of the regions.

In the meantime I have been pushing on and creating mappings for the various features found, and would like to setup some tests etc so that people can review the results in cycles.  Here are some of the questions/issues/things to do which I would appreciate some help on:
 * getting a test OSM server setup.   I know about api06.dev.openstreetmap.org, but it would be good to have the current NZ data in there to check for overlay/conflict/merge results with existing data.   This server should also generate tiles for everyone to peruse and check, ie for iterative debugging
 * getting hold of the original LINZ files (I believe a DVD full) for comparison with the NZ OpenGPS versions, and to check feature types etc in the LINZ data dictionary
 * leads on the Cadastral/Corax data since the stuff I have seems to be missing property boundaries, street numbers and so on
 * people who were involved in the TIGER or Dutch data import for their experiences and advice (ideally send my your chat/IM handles too)
 * any idea why we can't make NZ a normal mailing list, like the other OSM ones?

Help classifying the data:
 * information on the Garmin types (hex codes)
 * comments on the draft admin_level codes for New Zealand, which I put up here in the table http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Key:boundary
 * help with tagging stuff like mountain ranges, ridges, gully/gorge POIs etc etc

As soon as a test area is setup which generates tiles, I will start uploading chunks for others to view, comment on and help tweak the import scripts...



      




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