Slashdot Mirror


Smooth Open Street Maps For the iPhone

detrow writes "A number of projects are working on bringing a smooth Open Street Maps Viewer to the iPhone, where smooth means as smooth as the Google Maps application. Route-Me is one of them (New BSD License, complete Objective-C native code). The GPS Mission blog reports that their application (GPS Mission) uses Route-Me and made it to the App Store as the first application using that OSM component. The map looks real nice and behaves just like Google Maps with all the well known zooming and panning available. What other iPhone applications exist that feel as smooth as Google Maps but use the Open Street Map?"

46 comments

  1. I hope it... by rossdee · · Score: 4, Funny

    knows about closed streets as well as open ones. Driving down a closed street is often not smooth at all.
    (Of course that is during the pther season of the year (road construction) right now we are in the snow removal season.

    1. Re:I hope it... by horatio · · Score: 2, Informative

      This was an idea that I appreciated when I was testing out a TomTom - the ability to submit and fetch community-based feedback about road closures, detours, etc. For a variety of reasons I ended up choosing a Garmin for my nav needs, but I do wish they would implement some of the community based features.

      --
      There is very little future in being right when your boss is wrong.
    2. Re:I hope it... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

      I cannot recall right now which GPS nav allows for feedback, but the one downside I have heard about it is you need enough users in the area to make it work well. Kinda like Sprint / Verizon / T-mobile / ATT / etc all allow free mobile to mobile, provided its on the same network. In smaller communities, it drives people to chose one provider over another because of the free buy-in.

    3. Re:I hope it... by larry+bagina · · Score: 1, Offtopic

      Software and pussy should both be smooth and bug free.

      --
      Do you even lift?

      These aren't the 'roids you're looking for.

    4. Re:I hope it... by DJNephilim · · Score: 2, Informative

      I think you are referring to the Dash GPS. I haven't used one myself, but it at least looks interesting.

      --
      Enemy of the Sun
  2. I don't know about "smooth" by Man+On+Pink+Corner · · Score: 0

    Even Ultima IV on the Apple II had the sense to precache the next set of tiles in the direction of travel.

  3. What about Marble? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I don't know whether it would run on the IPhone, but what about Marble (License LGPL):

    http://edu.kde.org/marble/

    It supports OSM in different projections, free zooming and panning, has got lots of features

    http://edu.kde.org/marble/current.php

    And is available for Mac OS X, Linux and Windows. Apart from the KDE version there's also a Qt-Only version available which should be easily portable to any plattform.

    http://edu.kde.org/marble/download.php

  4. What about Marble? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Informative

    I don't know whether it runs on the IPhone. But Marble is an awesome application that allows smooth zooming and panning. And it's free software (LGPL):

    http://edu.kde.org/marble

    Marble comes with lots of nice features (even with a somewhat hidden GPS support):

    http://edu.kde.org/marble/current.php

    It's available for a lot of different plattforms (Linux, Windows, Mac OS X) and the source code
    just depends on Qt as a single dependency.

    http://edu.kde.org/marble/download.php

  5. Microsoft Virtual Earth also available by maccodemonkey · · Score: 5, Informative

    I worked with the Microsoft Virtual Earth team a few months back to bring their Virtual Earth platform to the iPhone/Mac in native OpenGL and Objective C. I released my work under the BSD license. http://consonancesw.com/developers/virtualearthkit/ The map view is still closed source, as it was done for a client who wanted it to remain closed source for a bit to give his app an advantage, but it should be released soon. The app has been in the app store for a while, it's called NMobile. It's featured an OpenGL map view with full gesture support. The framework I open sourced also does a lot of nifty stuff like geocoding, reverse geocoding, static maps, and I'm adding supporting for finding locations like nearby restaurants and so forth. The route-me folks should keep in mind that their framework looks to implement support for talking to Virtual Earth without authenticating, which is in complete violation of the Virtual Earth terms. Using the Virtual Earth tiles requires sending a SOAP request for a transaction token, and then attaching that transaction token to every request. Their code does not seem to be doing that. Microsoft has warned that people who try to grab their tiles for free will likely be cut off. The route-me folks are welcome to borrow some code from my project (BSD licensed) to bring themselves within spec. At least Microsoft's terms are better than Google's, who doesn't seem to even allow that sort of behavior at all...

    1. Re:Microsoft Virtual Earth also available by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      i could not see any ref to virtual earth? Why would they want to use virtual earth above and beyond osm.

      i assume you do know about about the open street map project

      JUAC

  6. My GWT map by SashaM · · Score: 3, Informative

    My GWT maps are just as smooth as Google Maps, and the library supports the WMS tiling protocol, which I'm guessing is what OpenStreeMap uses. I'll have to investigate and talk to the OpenStreetMap guys to maybe use my client.

  7. iPhone is becoming an 800-pound gorilla platform by NinthAgendaDotCom · · Score: 1, Interesting

    So far it seems to be more of a "standard" than the Android platform, iPhone compatibility being key as an app can be rolled out to millions of people at once. But it's still early in the game.

    --
    -- http://ninthagenda.com/
  8. yeah, openstreetmap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    According to OpenStreetMap, the city I live in is large beige expanse with no streets. So much for that idea.

    1. Re:yeah, openstreetmap by ZorroIII · · Score: 2, Informative

      Then start walking/driving around with a GPS and map your city. OSM is the map that anyone can edit.

    2. Re:yeah, openstreetmap by rtfa-troll · · Score: 1

      city I live in is large beige expanse with no streets

      Open. As in you can edit it. As in; once you've edited it you own the data and it will never be restricted from you and if they start to try to force adverts down your throat, you can just download it and keep it. If it's blank where you live, then go on and fix it.

      Yes, I know that won't really be an answer later open street map is being advertised as a map service. Right now, however, it's a service where you can build mapping data and they aren't hiding that in any way.

      --
      =~ s,(.*),<sarcasm>$1</sarcasm>,g if any_point_you_wish();
    3. Re:yeah, openstreetmap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If I buy a GPS, why do I have to bother with OpenStreetMap??

    4. Re:yeah, openstreetmap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      A GPS tells you exactly where you are, and typically comes with a set of maps to make that information useful. if the streets in your city change (new streets are made, old ones become one way, etc etc) the maps become outdated and then the fuckers gouge you for updated maps. openstreetmaps is about fixing that last part. your gps tells you where you are. openstreetmaps shows you what is around you now, not 2 years ago.

    5. Re:yeah, openstreetmap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Excellent - that's the balloonist / accountant joke related with no irony whatever!

      http://www.accountantjokes.co.uk/all_jokes.htm

    6. Re:yeah, openstreetmap by goldfndr · · Score: 1

      A GPS receiver is less expensive than a GPS navigation system, but could be paired with your phone/PDA/laptop.

      --
      Copyrights, Patents, Trademarks: temporary loans from the Public Domain, not real property ("intellectual" or otherwise)
  9. Re:iPhone is becoming an 800-pound gorilla platfor by timmarhy · · Score: 2, Insightful

    maybe a standard in hype...

    --
    If you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can imagine....
  10. Navit by anonieuweling · · Score: 2, Informative

    http://www.navit-project.org/ and http://wiki.navit-project.org/index.php/Main_Page are the urls to Navit, a car navigation system with routing engine. Of course it also works when on foot, it can use open street maps and runs on various devices (my own being a PC and an HP Ipaq H2210). It is still in development but is usable.

  11. Re:zoomy streetviews -humbug- what about text edit by Twisted64 · · Score: 1

    You crazy bastard, here it is. I've had it for ages, oohed and aaahed at it for a while with the bookmarks and whatnot, and promptly ignored it. I don't do much with text files. Turned the sound off, and it's really quite pleasant. I don't know if it can open a text file at the same place you closed it, but everything else seems fine.

    --
    Consciousness is a myth. Trust me.
  12. Re:zoomy streetviews -humbug- what about text edit by BitZtream · · Score: 1

    Awesome reply dude, you pointed him at a Windows text editor, perhaps you should consider that Windows text editors don't run on the iPhone so Q10 is absolutely useless to him.

    I feel that I should point out also, that there are thousands of text editors for Windows, many of which have the feature he has asked for and that just about anyone who is posting to slashdot, probably has the sense to find at least ONE of them.

    I'm amazed at how people now days have no reading comprehension skills or at least utterly fail to consider the context something is written in. Are schools really that bad now days?

    --
    Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
  13. Great, now can we get something useful? by BitZtream · · Score: 0

    Awesome, smooth scrolly maps. Thats just what I need while trying to drive. How about we do something useful and provide a turn by turn direction app rather than jerking ourselves over the fact that we now have a beta (at best) version of a component that google did at production quality 6 months ago. That 6 months just assumes that they didn't bother with the nice smooth scrolling before GPS functionality was available to them.

    Also, Google Maps does far more than just 'smooth sliding'. Theres all sorts of smoothing built into Maps, such as that it will attempt to stay centered on the route line rather than your actual position on the map, which can be a little confusing if you happen to be on the main highway and it thinks your on the side road or vice versus.

    Anyway, I was unaware of the quality of OSM at this point, its come a hell of a long ways since I saw it last. So rather than screwing around with almost worthless eye candy, how about someone gives us some turn by turn directions from OSM data instead? Or damnit, someone send me a damn Mac so I can port one of the existing apps over before my developer cert expires.

    --
    Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
    1. Re:Great, now can we get something useful? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      OSM doesn't provide topology data needed for routing. Plus they're viral share-alike licensed. Yes, virally licensed data. Fear, comprehensively.

    2. Re:Great, now can we get something useful? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      OSM doesn't provide topology data needed for routing.

      Fail. Any number of links. JFGI.

      Plus they're viral share-alike licensed. Yes, virally licensed data. Fear, comprehensively.

      I'm not following your gist here. Sarcastic perhaps? ~:|

    3. Re:Great, now can we get something useful? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      OSM doesn't provide topology data needed for routing.

      Fail. Any number of links. JFGI.

      Clearly you don't understand what topology is. You need more than just street lines. You need the to know how the network of lines are connected, and what constraints there are on travel between those lines. Things like maximum clearance, one-way streets, freeway vs surface roads. Companies like teleatlas and navteq have the market sewn up because it takes an enormous amount of effort to collect and maintain this kind of data.

      Any kind of routing based on just the line data will be naive to the point of useless. I raise your JFGI a Just Fucking Read A Book.

      Plus they're viral share-alike licensed. Yes, virally licensed data. Fear, comprehensively.

      I'm not following your gist here. Sarcastic perhaps? ~:|

      Perhaps you're not following because you clearly know nothing about GIS. What happens when you geolocate incidents of cancer by combining viral licensed OSM data with your highly confidential hospital patient record data? A big fuckoff dose of failmap, that's what you get.

      Data should not be virally licensed. It's a very stupid thing to do.

    4. Re:Great, now can we get something useful? by grandedgemaster · · Score: 1

      OSM doesn't provide topology data needed for routing.

      This is completely wrong, OSM is inherently topographic, as opposed to some other GIS data sources. http://www.yournavigation.org/ uses OSM data.

    5. Re:Great, now can we get something useful? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Clearly you don't understand what topology is. You need more than just street lines. You need the to know how the network of lines are connected, and what constraints there are on travel between those lines. Things like maximum clearance, one-way streets, freeway vs surface roads.

      And it's pretty obvious you don't have a faintest fucking clue about what OSM is. Because it does all that, and a shitload more.

      Perhaps you're not following because you clearly know nothing about GIS. What happens when you geolocate incidents of cancer by combining viral licensed OSM data with your highly confidential hospital patient record data? A big fuckoff dose of failmap, that's what you get.

      A map you probably shouldn't upload to the internets because it's, you know, highly confidential. You've already epically failed if you expect copyright to keep something highly confidential secret regardless of the fucking license. Which only covers distribution to boot.

    6. Re:Great, now can we get something useful? by Curmudgeonlyoldbloke · · Score: 1

      The answer to the first point (as already noted) is "yes it does". Whether there's ENOUGH information in there to route you from where you are to where you want to go depends on OSM's coverage of where you are, but there are ways to represent the necessary TYPEs of data.

      The pat answer to the second is that you're free to set up your own mapping project with data available under whatever licence you choose. There's a reason why OSM's founders chose to licence it as they do - some people agree with that and some don't. If you don't; don't worry, collect your own data and you can do what you like with it.

      Non-trolls that have read this far might want to have a look at these two pages which attempt to explain the current situation:

      http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Legal_FAQ
      http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Common_licence_interpretations

  14. Re:iPhone is becoming an 800-pound gorilla platfor by BitZtream · · Score: 1, Troll

    Jealous much?

    --
    Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
  15. Re:zoomy streetviews -humbug- what about text edit by Twisted64 · · Score: 1

    Sorry, I knew the context, but assumed nobody would bother with editing BOOKS on a PHONE. He mentioned that this was OT, and also Macwrite 1.0 which has nothing to do with iPhones. Now I think about it, I'm not sorry at all, that was a kneejerk reaction... for which I must apologise.

    I make no assumptions about slashdot readers these days. They come from everywhere.

    --
    Consciousness is a myth. Trust me.
  16. More iPhone location awareness and OSM stories by Lord+Satri · · Score: 1

    Shameless (really) plug, many users interested in OpenStreetMap and the iPhone location awareness applications will be interested by the site in my sig. Happy Christmas!

  17. seadragon by stiller · · Score: 1

    Can't you use seadragon for something like this?

  18. byNotes uses OSM by hierro · · Score: 0

    byNotes client for the iPhone uses a custom maps framework based on Open Street Maps and it's been available in the App Store since October 20th. It's not yet opensource, basically because it's just a personal project and cleaning the code for a release takes some time, but I plan to release it on January (yes, I wrote it).

  19. Re:zoomy streetviews -humbug- what about text edit by konohitowa · · Score: 1

    Wow - *that's* a troll? Well, it's quite an impressive troll. It's so stunningly subtle that I actually thought you wanted a good text editor on the iPhone. gj!

  20. AndNav2 for Android by DaveLatham · · Score: 1

    Android has AndNav2 which now also provides audible turn-by-turn directions using OpenStreetMap data. And you can report bugs in the map data too. http://www.andnav.org/

  21. Re:zoomy streetviews -humbug- what about text edit by stokessd · · Score: 1

    Are schools really that bad now days?

    Yes....

    I was sitting in Chipotle having a giant burrito with my wife and sitting at the bar next to us were two high-school aged skate-rat mopes. One asked the other what six times four are. They took a moment to figure it out. So to answer your question; Yes, yes they are that bad... But they always have been. Some people are well served by school and some are not. You can't teach a pig to sing.

    Sheldon

  22. or just use osm by emj · · Score: 1

    Openstreetmap actually lets you use the data that you supply.

  23. Re:zoomy streetviews -humbug- what about text edit by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    That doesn't mean the schools are bad, it may be a sign that they have actually improved.

    It could be that they've finally dropped the multiplication table memorization stupidity, and are now focusing on how multiplication actually happens rather than on rote memorization.

    Sure, it's a little slower, but you don't actually learn anything by memorizing a table.

  24. this is where having an iphone seems uselesss. by DragonTHC · · Score: 1, Insightful

    you really should have bought an android phone. My G1 shines when using the GPS function on google maps. It's quite useful.

    The iphone's "you are somewhere in this giant circle" gps function is just useless.

    jesusphone indeed.

    --
    They're using their grammar skills there.
    1. Re:this is where having an iphone seems uselesss. by WiiVault · · Score: 1

      Um dude, shut up. Have you ever even used an iPhone 3G? Once it locates you it puts a little dot which stays updated just like the G1. I get that you are an Apple hater, but for heavens sake don't just make shit up.

  25. Re:zoomy streetviews -humbug- what about text edit by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    42?

  26. Re:zoomy streetviews -humbug- what about text edit by demonlapin · · Score: 1

    you don't actually learn anything by memorizing a table

    ...except what the answer to six times four is. Knowing how multiplication works takes around five minutes of class time to explain; actually being able to do it takes months of practice. Knowing "why" is meaningless if you can't do it.