Things that we(startup/SME) can do

Hi guys,

Was referred here by AkuAnakTimur. I am Afeez and I am doing marketplace/logistics business. Check it out:https://motion.com.my. I am using OSM extensively so I would like to contribute back to OSM. Of course, these contributions are not purely altruistic as we do get financial benefits in return as better OSM data would allow us to be more efficient.

I am going to list things what I have been thinking:

  1. We can add some data but there is no ‘method’ per se. How can I train my staffs, dedicated just to make the data more molek?

  2. For toll data, what is the best way to add this info as it would be great to combine routing + toll cost?

  3. On the road condition, surface area, climb/altitude: How can we add these data, we have lots of GPS tracks data but honestly we do not have proper way to upload it back. Our data covers the whole peninsular Malaysia, not just in the cities but also in the rural areas where there is no cellular connection!

  4. What other qualitatives data/parameters that you guys would like to see? Not only that we have GPS tracks but we have LIDAR & camera enabled fleet to supplement our GPS data. For now, we are using it for HD mapping but we would love to give back to OSM in any way.

Appreciate it if the rest of team can assist us!

Afeez Aziz @ Motion

Hello Afeez,
welcome to OSM!

Adding or changing data can be complicated. There are some editors like iD, Potlach, Josm, … I guess AkuAnakTimur can give you better advice tailored towards your needs.

For toll data, see https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Key:toll
I do not know how to add the amount to be paid - there seems not to exist a typical tagging scheme. Which makes routing information with toll costs hard to establish.

The road condition can be shown in a number of tags:
“surface”: asphalt, concrete, ground, mud, or simpler paved/unpaved, see https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Key:surface
“smoothness”: excellent, good, …, see https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Key:smoothness. But in my experience, smoothness can change within short time, so I hardly use it in countries with a small local community.
Also width (in meters), (number of) lanes, legal speed limit (max_speed) are interesting values.
“incline” is sometimes used for steep ascents/descents, see https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Key:incline , but hardly anywhere shown on the map.
Reference numbers (“ref”) and road names, village names etc. are very useful for orientation.

GPS tracks are interesting, especially outside the major highways. Great if the driving speed can be deduced. This will help to complete the map, and align the imagery.
Upload some of them at https://www.openstreetmap.org/user/Motion%20Technologies%20Staff%201/traces
It’s not necessary to upload every file, just newly covered areas, as you find time to do so.
Also when you do not add all those roads to the map, the GPS data are helpful to us.

For geo-tagged images, you can use https://www.mapillary.com/ .

Don’t hurry, get used to some tools, and try to do things step by step. The first steps may feel hard, but the more experience you get, the easier contributing will become.

Have a lot of fun!

Thanks Bernhard,

Can we start to establish a standard for this? Because we have all the data necessary, at least for Malaysia. It would be great if routing to also include toll rates.

Ah, now I have to find out on a tool that can convert my existing database of tracks, can be exported as CSV to a GPX file. Do you have any suggestions?

Yes, I have been uploading images to mapillary for a while. Stopped for a few months but we have videos/images enough to cover the whole peninsular Malaysia.

Hi Afeez,
I see you already asked toll question in osm help.
Toll calculation is a bit complicated as in involves several variables like vehicle type, distance travelled and toll type.
We have open toll like LDP and closed toll like NSE.
Open toll is easier as it only has 1 fare but for closed toll we need to know the entry and exit point to calculate the charges. One idea to simplify this is to use the average of Ringgit per km, but this only gives the estimated toll.
Anyhow, you can start an external toll table with toll booth node id as the primary key to link to the osm map.

You can try freeware, GPSbabel to convert your gps tracks to GPX format and upload them.

Hope you can keep uploading the videos as it contains the most important data source we need
which is the ground level view…from this we can extract many other information like POI,
road name, traffic flow, house number(maybe) etc etc…

Hello Afeez! Took me some time, trying my best to answer these.

To non-Malay language speaker, molek is “better” :smiley:

Importing things is usually done through the JOSM editor. Convert raw data into an XML-like format. But that’s too much, I reckon.

Actually JOSM may read (properly encoded) data in these formats e.g. KML, KMZ, shapefiles, CSV; through the OpenData plugin.

Sometimes, mobile editors maybe find its place: iOS / Android.

If your staff ran into trouble, let us know too. The community could lend a hand, hopefully, somehow.

IMHO this data could be on its own separate database - not uploaded to OSM. Probably run a script (mileage-based), per jackSamad’s reply. Sadly; I’m no programmer, nor a GIS expert. Hopefully the fine folks on Stack Exchange may give a hint.

This is so exciting! Even Strava may not have recorded tracks – especially near places where sport activities are not very likely to take place. Definitely your company’s GPS tracks can really help a lot!

Uploading those GPS tracks to OSM (Bernhard’s reply) is straightforward. As an alternative, consider how Strava displays their users’ collected GPS data - but this definitely requires extra cost.

Altitude data, however, again; has no place in OSM. Quoting an answer from the Q&A forum, “keep a separate database with elevation data, and then reference a route from OSM with matching elevation data from this second source”.

LIDAR is useful too, to determine the height of buildings (mapped in OSM) - see how they are imported into OSM: Texas LIDAR Import

One more. Looking at the current state, apparently, place names are lacking from OSM. That includes addresses, to street names. Hopefully your company’s collected data will help fill in the blanks.

By the way, a mapathon, or a coordinated mapping event in your company’s place; could offer insight with the help from otai (experienced) mappers. :slight_smile:

Welcome to OSM Malaysia community :smiley:

What I would suggest for new members to learn and contribute to OSM are:

  1. Draw / align the roads according to satellite images or GPS tracks.
  2. Add the road’s name eg. Jalan ABC

We still lack of this kind of basic info especially for many rural areas.

Once you’ve familiar with that than you can move on to more advance skill like drawing area of buildings and etc.
Anyway, happy mapping~ :stuck_out_tongue: