[OSM-talk] Helping mappers feel comfortable about their contributions / quality control

Jaakko Helleranta.com jaakko at helleranta.com
Tue Sep 20 14:57:22 BST 2011


Hi,

Some thoughts regarding various discussions about quality control /
mechanisms in OSM:

We (Seb and I) had a brief discussion yesterday with one of the advanced
Haitian mappers about what improvements the locals would like to see in OSM
tools to make their contributing to the project easier / more fluent.

One of the first things that came out was a request to have some sort of
edit review system for anyone who doesn't feel super comfortable about their
edits when sending them (or for those mappers' edits that the group would
like to have reviewed before uploading).

This is pretty much exactly what Ian suggested in the "Barriers of Entry"
thread the other day.

Interestingly I got a personal experience in using such a tool just a moment
ago when I read a system message from Google Map Maker regarding my approved
edit in Map Maker. I've attached the message below for reference.

Now, I obviously don't know how the Google system works (more than what I
can see). But what I saw when making the edit is that there is a part (that
I think all must fill - for all edited/added features, afaik) that asks the
contributor how confident they are about the edit(s): Very much so, pretty
confident, somewhat confident, "I'm just guessing" - or something along
those lines.

I think this makes all the sense in the world.

So, in short:
1) It would be really great if we could cater to the Haitian mappers and all
others who would rather have someone review their edits before they are
uploaded (or at least have a flag system for review requests). I'd love to
use such system for my own edits, too, at times!

2) A "confidence level" indicator either on node/element edit level or
perhaps on changeset level (or something else?) would also be nice --
combined with / linked to above-mentioned (optional) review system.

I think having something like this will become imperative if OSM wants to /
ends up expanding its contributor base significantly.

Cheers from Haiti,
-Jaakko

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: **
Date: Monday, September 12, 2011
Subject: Map Maker review alert
To: Jaakko H.

Dear Jaakko H.

Your change<http://www.google.com/mapmaker?gw=55&editids=8Fvpi8vIqqywJA2G6T&iwloc=0_0&t=h&dtab=overview>has
been Approved
by Google Reviewer Thom, a trusted reviewer but will be looked at by other
reviewers.

*Comments:* *Hi, thanks for the edit. This should also be marked Enclosed
Traffic Area/Parking under segment usage because this is a parking lot. I
can fix this for you. For more info on attributes go here:
http://goo.gl/eXR7q .*
Click here to reply<http://www.google.com/mapmaker?gw=55&editids=8Fvpi8vIqqywJA2G6T&iwloc=0_0&t=h&dtab=moderate>

 [image: Enable display of images to see the map.]
<http://www.google.com/mapmaker?gw=55&editids=8Fvpi8vIqqywJA2G6T&iwloc=0_0&t=h&dtab=overview>
This change has total 1 approvals and 0 denials

*Previous comments:*
 * added parking aisle to USPS office * (by you)
------------------------------
Google Map Maker


-- 
--
jaakko at helleranta.com * Skype: jhelleranta * Mobile: +509-37-269154  *
http://go.hel.cc/MyProfile
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.openstreetmap.org/pipermail/talk/attachments/20110920/a317a0d2/attachment.html>


More information about the talk mailing list