Developer Watch - CloudMade Maps in your API
There are a lot of mapping APIs out there giving developers a lot of choice. Some are simple and lightweight, like our Web Maps Lite and some are incredibly fully featured, like the awesome OpenLayers. The image below is a screenshot from John McKerrell’s maps page, which uses MultiMap’s Open API to display several different layers, including our standard web, mobile and no-names layers. Click on the image below to take a look for yourself.
Its great to see developers like John mixing and matching layers like this - its exactly what we had in mind when we started to put together our tile server. We want to help OpenStreetMap’s goal of letting people do interesting and unexpected things with map data. So long as you respect the terms of OpenStreetMap’s CC-by-SA license and attribute CloudMade when you use our maps, you can use our tiles in any web, mobile or desktop client.
If you do something cool with CloudMade maps, let us know.
August 5th, 2008 - Posted in api, cloudmade, openstreetmap, tools | | 0 Comments
CloudMade Release Isle of Man Dataset to OpenStreetMap
We’ve been in Limerick, Ireland for The State of The Map, the OpenStreetMap conference where we took the opportunity to announce the release of a complete mapping dataset of the Isle of Man to OpenStreetMap.
The dataset was collected by CloudMade in late 2007 using all of the tools and processes used by OpenStreetMap mappers. The team, made up of CloudMade founders Steve Coast and Nick Black along with long-term OSM contributor, Andy Robinson, drove and cycled every road on the Isle of Man, recording their movements with cheap, consumer grade GPS units whilst taking photos of street signs with digital cameras.
The finished map
Donating the Isle of Man data to OpenStreetMap is the completion of a cycle for us. We set out to prove that it was possible for three guys with bicycles and GPS units using OpenStreetMap’s software, to do what the Ordnance Survey or TeleAtlas do, but at a fraction of the cost. If I wanted to make a map, I would use OpenStreetMap’s software. If I wanted to make a better map, I’d give it to the OpenStreetMap community and let them maintain it. The real test will be to come back in 6 months and see how many footpaths and new housing estates have been added to the map.
Detailed view of Peel, a city on the west coast of the Island which shows the street network as well as a selection of points of interest.
The dataset is significant for a few reasons. The Isle of Man will become the second country to be completely mapped in OSM, following the donation of the complete Netherlands road network to OSM by Dutch map makers AND. Secondly, the Isle of Man has been overlooked in the past by most online map providers, who do not consider the small nation to be a high priority.
The import process is being managed by OSMer Dan Karran and we expect it to be a few weeks until the data is available in OSM. In the mean time, you can get a sneak preview over here.
A full press is available here.
July 15th, 2008 - Posted in cloudmade, geodata, openstreetmap | | 4 Comments
Product Blog - Two New pre-Alpha APIs from CloudMade
Last week we took the covers off our new CloudMade website - if you haven’t had a look already, head over to CloudMade.com and see for yourself.
We also released two new APIs as pre-Alpha services: theWeb Maps API and the Mobile Maps API. Right now these services are targeted at developers who want to get their hands on the very latest things we have to offer. Both APIs are accessed by directly calling our tile server, though the observant amongst you will probably have noticed slippy maps present on lots of our pages. We’ll be releasing documentation for the slippy map API shortly, so watch this space.
We’re particularly excited about the Mobile Maps API, which gives developers access to a set of tiles which we’ve started to optimize for mobile use. By reducing the tile size to 64×64 pixels (rather than the usual 256×256) and simplifying the cartography we’re keeping tile sizes down to around 2-3kB. This is a first pass and we hope to get the sizes down even more to help mobile applications save on costly bandwidth and enhance user experience.
Because both these services are built on top of OpenStreetMap data you can use them in almost any way you like. Most other online map providers don’t let you use their maps in mobile devices or for real time routing or tracking or outside of their own APIs, for example. We want you to use CloudMade maps for the coolest things you can think of.
If you are itching to play with either the Web or Mobile Maps API, you can request an API key here - I can’t promise that you’ll get access straight away, but we will get back to you as soon as the API is ready. We’ve also got a developers mailing list which you can sign up to here.
Both images based on map data created by OpenStreetMap.org contributors and licensed CCBYSA.
June 4th, 2008 - Posted in api, cloudmade, geodata, news, products, tools | | 0 Comments
Update From CloudMade
Its been busy times here at CloudMade. Since I last posted two months ago we’ve been hiring, finding new offices and of course we’ve all found time to go mapping. Here’s a quick update.
New Offices
We’re leaving the leafy Putney suburbs in search of bigger offices. We move into our new offices at the beginning of June - we’ll be having a moving in party at a local pub. Stay posted for details.
We also now have offices in Menlo Park (CA) and in Kyiv.
New to Team
We’ve had a lot of new people join us over the last two months. First to join our London engineering team was Andy Allan, followed by Shaun McDonald, and most recently Matt Amos. Our Kyiv engineering team is bursting from the seams (click through for names):
Engineering is being headed up by Jim Brown. Our Menlo Park office is home to our new Chairman Juha Christensen and our interim VP Products, Christian Petersen, with more to come soon.
CloudMade Mapping Parties
Through our OSM Grants scheme we’ve been sponsoring a few mapping parties. There’s the London Mapping Marathon - a series of mapping events held throughout London over the summer, being run by Shaun with the aim of finishing off the various bits and pieces that still need to be mapped in London. We’ve also been involved with mapping parties in Sutton and San Francisco. There are definitely more mapping parties to come over the summer.
Hiring
Update We’ve filled all of our internship positions for this year. Keep an eye on this blog for more info about future positions.
We’re still looking for more people to join us in London, including full time and intern positions in the Product Management team, intern positions in Engineering and a full time office manager. Take a look at the careers page for more details.
May 27th, 2008 - Posted in Jobs, cloudmade, news, openstreetmap | | 0 Comments
OpenStreetMap Grants
Tired of waiting for Google Summer of Code? Join Cloud Made’s year of mapping.
We want to make OpenStreetMap better and we want you to be involved UPDATE - this is worldwide, you don’t have to be from the UK. From now on anyone can apply to Cloud Made for an OpenStreetMap Grant. You can apply for grants of £100 - £1000+ to support useful, interesting or innovative work around OpenStreetMap. This could be anything from squashing OSM’s 10 most annoying bugs to mapping an entire city to writing a new mapping client - the choice is yours. Here are some ideas:
- Map somewhere - You need some funds to support a mapping expedition to Monmouthshire or even further afield.
- Build your OSM community - Live in a town or country that’s hardly been mapped? You can apply for a grant to help cover the costs of running a mapping party - promoting it, buying GPS units and providing lunch for hungry mappers.
- Pledge to fix some bugs - Pledge to fix 10 big bugs in 10 days and claim a reward.
This should give you some ideas. The grants are available immediately, to everyone. Judging and awarding of grants is solely at the discretion of Cloud Made Limited, however advice may be taken from leading OSMers and those on the OSM mailing lists. To apply, email grants@cloudmade.com.
March 17th, 2008 - Posted in cloudmade, geodata, openstreetmap | | 3 Comments
We’re funded!
We’re super excited to welcome Sunstone Capital as our first round €2.4 million investors in to Cloud Made. Sunstone join Nikolaj Nyholm and Morton Lund as private seed investors:
CloudMade, a key pioneer in the emerging collaborative mapping space, announced today that the company has secured a €2.4 million first round of financing from Copenhagen-based venture fund Sunstone Capital, who joins the founders as well as existing private stakeholders and serial entrepreneurs, open source evangelist Nikolaj Nyholm and early Skype investor Morten Lund. CloudMade is a mapping company created to professionalise and package geo data from OpenStreetMap (www.openstreetmap.org), a global initiative to create a free, editable map of the world from user-generated input. Read the full press release
March 17th, 2008 - Posted in cloudmade, news | | 8 Comments
Why bother with OSM on your iPhone?
Ed’s Parsons amongst others, has picked up on Mikel’s iPhone hacking activities. Mikel has tweaked his iPhone so that it displays OpenStreetMap maps, rather than Google’s. Ed says:
‘Now in my mind this is one of those things that is cool that is can be done but actually nobody would do for real unless maybe they lived on the Isle of Wight, and whats wrong with Google maps anyway’
We can think of a few good reasons why someone would want to do this.
First, you can (without getting sued) - OSM data is provided under a CC-by-SA license, so you can do what you want with it, so long as you attribute OpenStreetMap and you maintain the CC-by-SA license. The whole point of OSM is to allow people to do interesting things with data - like putting it on mobile phones, something which the Google Maps license forbids. Mobile application developers wont get a cease and decist from OSM.
If this is too niche, consider that OSM is current - OSM data is updated by over 15,500 volunteers, distributed across the world, realtime. If you make an edit to OSM data the changes are immediately available to anyone. There is no ‘validation layer’ and tiles served from openstreetmap.org are continuously re-rendered.
OSM data is richer than Google’s. OSM contains all manner of points of interest - pubs, car parks, shops and amenities - it even contains building outlines in some areas. Google’s data is largely limited to roads, some (not all) train lines and train stations.
Google’s maps are one-size-fits-all cartography. Google don’t produce cycling maps, countryside maps or other special interest products. OSM do, and as the richness of the dataset continues to improve and as the number of contributors to the project continues to rise, we are going to see more and more special interest products that fulfill a multitude of niche needs.
A few people will hack their iPhone to show OSM maps this year, probably for fun. But ultimately crowd sourced data like OSM’s is going to provide a richer, more current, global dataset than any closed source alternatives.
October 30th, 2007 - Posted in cloudmade, geodata, openstreetmap | | 1 Comments
How can you trust OpenStreetMap?
The most voiced criticisms about OpenStreetMap are that the data is not complete and that the data is not reliable. ‘Completeness’ and ‘reliability’ are relative measures; my map is more complete than yours for my personal definition of completeness. If your requirements for completeness are all the motorways in the UK, or the footpaths of London, or the rail network of the UK, or the Tube stations in London, then OpenStreetMap’s data will fit your needs.
The reliability argument goes like this; ‘How can I trust OpenStreetMap maps. They are volunteers on bikes with cheap GPS, Navteq have vans with expensive GPS.’ Fair enough?
OpenStreetMap volunteer, Dair Grant does not think so. After completing mapping his local town of Haywards Heath, he set about comparing the quality of OpenStreetMap’s data against that of Google Maps, supplied by TeleAtlas. The findings of his study can found here.
Dair found 89 errors in Google Maps, based on the elements that appear in both OpenStreetMap and Google’s Maps (Google do not include bridleways OSM do, for example). These included incorrect junctions, missing roads, incorrect geometries and roads that simply did not exist. To confirm that the ‘errors’ were not on the part of OpenStreetMap, Dair went back out and resurveyed the areas he had pinpointed as containing errors.
Dair’s work clearly demonstrates what most OpenStreetMap volunteers know already - that for areas where OSM’s data exists, it is usually of a high quality. Why would someone give up their free time to make a map and not do it properly? There are no ‘Friday afternoons’ or ‘lazy Mondays’ for volunteers - if you can’t be bothered, you just go home. Conversely, large companies spend massive amounts of money managing and motivating their staff and then making sure that their work is up to scratch.
Of course, volunteers can make mistakes too, but their motivations for revealing their mistakes are different to employees. There is little point in an OpenStreetMap volunteer covering up a mistake they made. All of OpenStreetMap’s data is open, so if you see a mistake in the map, you can access the raw data and fix it. Furthermore, many volunteers make their edits public, meaning that anyone can see the OSM name of the person who collected the data. You earn bad OSM points if the community catch you out. Compare this to the attitude of an employee of a large company. There is an entire management infrastructure dedicated to making sure the employee does their job properly. But unless that infrastructure is working 100% effectively, mistakes are going to slip through. And what is the point in the individual reporting their misspelling or wrong attribution of a road? Furthermore, what do you, the consumer do when the errors reach your rung on the supply chain? The large mapping companies have realised the potential for crowd sourcing data - but they are applying a thin layer on top of their system. They are allowing bug-reporting - they are not exposing the entirety of their software and hardware systems, mapping methodology and management techniques for the inspection of the world. This is why they are borrowing from the innovations of the open community and why the software and ultimately the data of the open community will be superior to that of proprietary producers.
October 13th, 2007 - Posted in cloudmade, geodata, openstreetmap | | 0 Comments
