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One minor nitpick: measuring the output of a mapper is hard to do on the basis of the number of edits. Local mappers appear to have larger edits where many deta

One minor nitpick: measuring the output of a mapper is hard to do on the basis of the number of edits. Local mappers appear to have larger edits where many details in a neighbourhood or some topical regional updates are performed. I think corporate editors focus on fixing bugs and weirdness reported by linters, which are much smaller in scale in terms of changeset size.

joejoebags 6y ago
Not a nitpick at all--interesting observation. Can you think of a better metric by which to measure contributions? (I'm truly asking out of ignorance)
- Freak_NL 6y ago
  Hmm, tough question. You might get a more representative number by adjusting a bit for changeset size, although I'm not sure if this is easily available in bulk data. It would give a more reliable metric at least. On the whole it's hard to measure the impact someone has on the project though. Some people tirelessly keep the documentation wiki up-to-date, or paint bikesheds on the tagging mailinglist. Some fix bugs in JOSM, Carto, and anywhere that comes along their path. Some manage to get governments to agree to license valuable data sources for use in OSM (this one is potentially huge), and again others write JOSM plugins to unlock such data or to scratch a common itch improving the efficiency of hundreds of mappers.¹ There is one mapper in the Netherlands who welcomes all new mappers starting of in the Netherlands: that's an invaluable service hard to quantify in data! 1: Or in my case, build a plugin that a dozen or so folk seem to use once a month. :P
- rathel 6y ago
  You may have a look at http://hdyc.neis-one.org/?Stereo http://hdyc.neis-one.org/?Stereo to try and find metrics relevant to you (example profile, to retain privacy profiles are hidden behind an OSM account login-wall, unless said user links to that page in their OSM profile site, which this example user did) One great metric is mapping days (distinct calendar days in which the user was active) which sort of abstracts the fact that different people tend to have a different idea how much work warrants a single changeset.
  - stereo 6y ago
    I feel like somebody's watching me :p
- jmkb 6y ago
  The "How did you contribute" dashboard from Pascal Neis [0] is a good place to explore some possible metrics. IMO some good predictors of mapping quality are: - Focus on specific regions - Both creation and deletion of map features, but more creation than deletion - Unique and descriptive changeset comments - Engagement in changeset comment discussions, both of your own and others' changes [0] https://hdyc.neis-one.org/ https://hdyc.neis-one.org/
- matkoniecz 6y ago
  Any metric will have big problems. It is like attempting to measure output of programmer by counting number of commits, added lines, deleted lines, modified lines or time spend in office. I made edits changing one tag that were far more useful and time-consuming than my other edits that added 9 000 objects.
rathel 6y ago
Not always, I guess. If you count raw number of features edited, it's way easier to crank up the number by drawing some buildings, forests, lakes, landuse from satellite/aerial imagery. Whereas things like points of interest (shops, services, tourist-related stuff) won't get you a high number, but arguably are more important. Corporate editors in under-mapped countries certainly can add much more data than average mappers do.

joejoebags 6y ago

Not a nitpick at all--interesting observation. Can you think of a better metric by which to measure contributions? (I'm truly asking out of ignorance)

Freak_NL 6y ago
Hmm, tough question. You might get a more representative number by adjusting a bit for changeset size, although I'm not sure if this is easily available in bulk data. It would give a more reliable metric at least. On the whole it's hard to measure the impact someone has on the project though. Some people tirelessly keep the documentation wiki up-to-date, or paint bikesheds on the tagging mailinglist. Some fix bugs in JOSM, Carto, and anywhere that comes along their path. Some manage to get governments to agree to license valuable data sources for use in OSM (this one is potentially huge), and again others write JOSM plugins to unlock such data or to scratch a common itch improving the efficiency of hundreds of mappers.¹ There is one mapper in the Netherlands who welcomes all new mappers starting of in the Netherlands: that's an invaluable service hard to quantify in data! 1: Or in my case, build a plugin that a dozen or so folk seem to use once a month. :P
rathel 6y ago
You may have a look at http://hdyc.neis-one.org/?Stereo http://hdyc.neis-one.org/?Stereo to try and find metrics relevant to you (example profile, to retain privacy profiles are hidden behind an OSM account login-wall, unless said user links to that page in their OSM profile site, which this example user did) One great metric is mapping days (distinct calendar days in which the user was active) which sort of abstracts the fact that different people tend to have a different idea how much work warrants a single changeset.
- stereo 6y ago
  I feel like somebody's watching me :p
jmkb 6y ago
The "How did you contribute" dashboard from Pascal Neis [0] is a good place to explore some possible metrics. IMO some good predictors of mapping quality are: - Focus on specific regions - Both creation and deletion of map features, but more creation than deletion - Unique and descriptive changeset comments - Engagement in changeset comment discussions, both of your own and others' changes [0] https://hdyc.neis-one.org/ https://hdyc.neis-one.org/
matkoniecz 6y ago
Any metric will have big problems. It is like attempting to measure output of programmer by counting number of commits, added lines, deleted lines, modified lines or time spend in office. I made edits changing one tag that were far more useful and time-consuming than my other edits that added 9 000 objects.

rathel 6y ago

Not always, I guess. If you count raw number of features edited, it's way easier to crank up the number by drawing some buildings, forests, lakes, landuse from satellite/aerial imagery. Whereas things like points of interest (shops, services, tourist-related stuff) won't get you a high number, but arguably are more important. Corporate editors in under-mapped countries certainly can add much more data than average mappers do.