Hacker News: pietervdvn

Response to "Why Book Corners won't sync contributions back to OpenStreetMap"

pietervdvn — Tue, 04 Aug 2026 20:36:42 +0000

Article URL: https://pietervdvn.me/2026/08/04/response-to-why-book-corners-wont-sync-contributions-back-to-openstreetmap/

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49174734

Points: 7

# Comments: 1

New comment by pietervdvn in "Why Book Corners won't sync contributions back to OpenStreetMap"

pietervdvn — Tue, 04 Aug 2026 18:40:50 +0000

I try to create such a thing with https://mapcomplete.org ; StreetComplete.app is also beginner friendly (but a different approach)

Yes, you'll always need a user account

New comment by pietervdvn in "Why Book Corners won't sync contributions back to OpenStreetMap"

pietervdvn — Tue, 04 Aug 2026 16:42:00 +0000

First of all, I assume you are from the Netherlands (based on the .nl)

The Dutch OSM-community indeed is very conservative, a bit too much IMHO. We Belgians are more relaxed :)

Such a dataset would still be useful, but perhaps in a quality assurance tool, not as map notes that would clog the map. Can you link more information?

New comment by pietervdvn in "Why Book Corners won't sync contributions back to OpenStreetMap"

pietervdvn — Tue, 04 Aug 2026 15:03:38 +0000

Because you need to pay "Little Free Library Corp." to become an official LFL and to get onto that map: https://littlefreelibrary.org/stewards/registration/

Getting an official "charter sign" will cost you 50 bucks.

New comment by pietervdvn in "Why Book Corners won't sync contributions back to OpenStreetMap"

pietervdvn — Tue, 04 Aug 2026 15:01:24 +0000

How would you feel about integrating https://mapcomplete.org/bookcases.html? (which I make) as means of contribution?

This one sends data straight to OSM. I don't have my own database to "moderate", pictures are saved into a Panoramax-instance.

As users authenticate by logging in with OSM, the boring, risky legal stuff is handled by OpenStreetMap. Uploading images has a small print that says that their images will be reshared under CC-BY-SA.

The part where I suck is in creating a nice, polished website with extra pages, SEO, ...

New comment by pietervdvn in "Why Book Corners won't sync contributions back to OpenStreetMap"

pietervdvn — Tue, 04 Aug 2026 14:55:12 +0000

Such as what I make: https://mapcomplete.org/bookcases.html?

New comment by pietervdvn in "Why Book Corners won't sync contributions back to OpenStreetMap"

pietervdvn — Tue, 04 Aug 2026 14:53:26 +0000

OpenStreetMap does not and cannot offer permanent IDs. An entity might be mapped in more detail, resulting in something being split in two parts, or change from node to way, with wildly different IDs.

At the same time, a point might be repurposed as something else entirely.

New comment by pietervdvn in "Why Book Corners won't sync contributions back to OpenStreetMap"

pietervdvn — Tue, 04 Aug 2026 14:49:22 +0000

What makes a stream navigable and what hinders it? Is it water depth? Is it width? Can those be mapped? Are there edge cases that some people might be able to navigate those waters and others not? Or during certain times?

If you work this out, you'll get there

New comment by pietervdvn in "Book Corners: Community map of neighborhood book exchange spots"

pietervdvn — Sat, 25 Jul 2026 22:39:57 +0000

You can also contribute to OpenStreetMap instead - they have bookcases too

New comment by pietervdvn in "Book Corners: Community map of neighborhood book exchange spots"

pietervdvn — Sat, 25 Jul 2026 12:41:19 +0000

I think they have their own database. TBH, we'd better all contribute to OpenStreetMap, it's why I made https://mapcomplete.org/bookcases.html?

New comment by pietervdvn in "Book Corners: Community map of neighborhood book exchange spots"

pietervdvn — Sat, 25 Jul 2026 12:40:09 +0000

And they have a restrictive license. Not gonna happen

New comment by pietervdvn in "Goodbye, and Thanks for All the Bikesheds"

pietervdvn — Sun, 19 Jul 2026 12:30:50 +0000

See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crypt_(C)#MD5-based_scheme

New comment by pietervdvn in "EU Commission: addictive design Instagram and Facebook in breach of the DSA"

pietervdvn — Fri, 10 Jul 2026 11:35:22 +0000

I'd say: the fediverse. Everyone can "broadcast" and discuss freely without having a central power that can censor or subtly manipulate the broader discussion.

New comment by pietervdvn in "StreetComplete: Fixing OpenStreetMap, one tiny quest at a time"

pietervdvn — Tue, 07 Jul 2026 23:19:05 +0000

Hi! <3

New comment by pietervdvn in "CoMaps – FOSS Offline Maps"

pietervdvn — Tue, 07 Jul 2026 13:15:45 +0000

Don't download all the tiles, that is useless.

Look into protomaps instead. One ~100GB archive for the entire world

New comment by pietervdvn in "CoMaps – FOSS Offline Maps"

pietervdvn — Tue, 07 Jul 2026 13:14:57 +0000

This is correct. Tools might however display them slightly different, have different update schedules or make different cartographic choices (e.g. not showing node networks or something)

New comment by pietervdvn in "CoMaps – FOSS Offline Maps"

pietervdvn — Tue, 07 Jul 2026 13:10:53 +0000

This is all OSM-based. OSM is one big pile of data - we don't do layers.

It is also best to add it directly into OSM, importing data afterwards is tricky.

My talk at Why25 should be a good intro (https://media.ccc.de/v/why2025-198-openstreetmap-for-beginne...), but the OSM-wiki also contains some valuable sources: https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Tags , https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Map_features

There are also various libraries to show OSM as background map on a website and allow you to draw features on top. Those support various formats (GPX, GeoJSON, ...) Leaflet and MapLibre are the biggest here, with leaflet being the easiest and MapLibre being very flexible and performant

New comment by pietervdvn in "CoMaps – FOSS Offline Maps"

pietervdvn — Tue, 07 Jul 2026 13:06:43 +0000

The big difference is visibility and scale.

Sure, a 'description' or 'name' tag can contain something inappropriate (like a slur of defamation). If it has high impact, it'll be reverted quickly. If it has little impact, not a big deal. Many tools don't even show the 'description' tag

Pictures are a whole other level. You need to blur faces and license plates. What if someones house is photographed? How to detect inappropriate images? Should one study the laws of all countries? Even the freedom of panorama contains many differences between European countries, let alone privacy rights, ...

New comment by pietervdvn in "CoMaps – FOSS Offline Maps"

pietervdvn — Tue, 07 Jul 2026 12:59:51 +0000

The OSM foundation strictly keeps it with 'map data'. There are however many other, small projects that fill in the gap; for example 'Panoramax' for streetview imagery or lib.reviews for reviews. I've made a webapp that ties those services together (https://mapcomplete.org)

Keep in mind that Google Maps has a >1 billion yearly budget (citation needed, but other global maps have similar budgets)

New comment by pietervdvn in "CoMaps – FOSS Offline Maps"

pietervdvn — Tue, 07 Jul 2026 12:48:52 +0000

Not involved in OM or CoMaps at all; but involved in OpenStreetMap.

> What do you mean, leaked? Isn't this a FOSS project?

The client-app (CoMaps/Organic Maps) indeed is fully FLOSS. It uses OSM data, but that data is packaged into a specific and optimized format. The code _generating_ this optimized data (and serving it to the clients) was kept proprietary.