[OSM-talk] Could JOSM be dumbed down?

[stevea]

On Jan 19, 2022, at 11:41 AM, Jo <winfixit at gmail.com> wrote:
> JOSM's buildings_tool plugin makes adding rectangular buildings so convenient, but alas that is considered too hard to install and use, which is not true either. It's totally possible to get beginning mappers started with JOSM.

I've had good luck streamlining truly complex tasks into a bullet-list of straight-to-the-implementation steps.

Yes, I wouldn't PREFER to teach somebody how to fly by putting them into a jumbo-jet and telling them to grab here, step there, push these buttons.  But if all they are doing is "flying a straight line" (and doing it repeatedly), it CAN be done.  I believe that JOSM can be similarly used in this fashion.  The "dumbing down" might include some configuration steps as a one-off (e.g. installing the buildings_tool plugin), then some highly simplified steps (and the admonishment to otherwise "ignore all of those complex buttons and controls") which can be repeated.

This is perfectly do-able, though it must be done with care, for multiple platforms (Linux, Windows, Mac — and JOSM runs on all of these, being Java-based) and with a friendly, pedagogical attitude that is hand-holding, helpful, even "soothing" and with a "you can do this" approach.  I'm certain of it, having written such steps and attending Mapping Parties where total novices who've never mapped were using basic features in JOSM after a half-hour of some craftily-tuned training.  Be optimistic about this, it helps.