12 ms·

Organicmaps: Android and iOS offline maps app for travelers, tourists, hikers

364 points by yewenjie 5y ago

uniqueuid 5y ago
For anyone wondering, this is a fork of the rather popular app maps.me, which also uses Openstreetmap but started monetizing via increasingly intrusive ads in the past.
- lucasmullens 5y ago
  Just a glance at maps.me makes it clear why a fork is needed. They've launched a cryptocurrency which seems like a pretty massive red flag: https://maps.me/token/ https://maps.me/token/
  - bellyfullofbac 5y ago
    Oh man.. Zawinski's law said "Every program attempts to expand until it can read mail."[1] I guess in 2021 the new law is "Every app expands until it can trade crypto." [1] http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/Z/Zawinskis-Law.html http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/Z/Zawinskis-Law.html
  - ocdtrekkie 5y ago
    For what it's worth, paying contributors with fake money is still way more than Google Maps offers it's data sources.
  - andrewljohnson 5y ago
    Maps.me was acquired by a company for that purpose.
- ch3co2c6h4co2h 5y ago
  I'm unfamiliar with maps.me or organicmaps -- what's the value prop versus just downloading a region from the Google Maps app? Is it opting out of big tech? Or is there some other capability that doesn't exist in Google/Apple's apps?
  - orblivion 5y ago
    Opting out of Big Tech is one. Opting out of tracking is the benefit of organicmaps over Maps.me (as per organicmaps' site). But then there's OpenStreetMap. Are you familiar with that? It's open data, which is sort of related to opting out of big tech. It's "free" like Wikipedia, nobody can forbid access to the data itself. Practical benefits: Among OSM applications, Maps.me and organicmaps are more snappy. OsmAnd is a leading OSM application, and it just has a ton of options which is perhaps good for a power user but it's not streamlined. And then the practical benefit of OSM itself is that while you often don't get as much info as Google Maps, sometimes you get stuff that Google misses. I think a big one is foot trails and stuff. Local enthusiasts like to walk them and fill them in on the map. I added a water reservoir in Berkeley once that was somehow not on Google Maps.
  - blendergeek 5y ago
    There are three main value propositions in my mind. While these could loosely be summed up as opting out of big tech, I think there is much more here than that. 1. Freedom. When using Organic Maps, you have the right to use the app in any way you choose; this includes the right to modify and redistribute the app should the developers ever start violating your principles. In fact this is exactly what Organic Maps is. Before Organic Maps, there was Maps.me; this app was also open source but became increasingly user hostile over time. Organic Maps is what happens when the users have this freedom. 2. Privacy. Even when used offline, Google Maps tracks and reports your location to Google. Organic Maps does not track and report your location to anybody. 3. Giving Back. While it is possible to suggest edits to Google Maps, these edits become part of Google's proprietary map database and can only be used in accordance with Google's ToS. This means that ultimately, Google's profits are what you are contributing to. Organic Maps, on the other hand, uses OpenStreetMap [0] and allows the user to contribute to it. Data contributed to OpenStreetMap can be freely used by anybody, for any purpose, thus benefiting all humankind rather than just one massive, US based, corporate entity that may not have humankind's interests at heart. [0] https://www.openstreetmap.org/ https://www.openstreetmap.org/
  - et-al 5y ago
    1. Maps.me and Organic Maps were initially designed for an offline experience, so they don't even try use data when I have a spotty connection. Unless you explicitly disable data, Google Maps will always try to load new tiles. This can be annoying when your reception is weak and Google renders fuzzy tiles instead of falling back on the already downloaded tiles. 2. You can't download offline maps for South Korea in Google Maps. There may be other areas in the world like this. 3. OSM data is better for hiking trails in my experience.
- hkai 5y ago
  Windy Maps is a pretty good fork too, and from a company with good engineering resources.
  - petre 5y ago
    Yup, it's great, I used it as well. Just used the routing for jeep touring (using the mountain bike profile) and specifically routing through some places. It works great with offline maps. Also one could just download parts of a jurisdiction if it's bigger, like Northern Greece. The maps are bigger but also contain more information than Here which seems dated, lacks some newly built highway segments in Eastern Europe and will route you on national roads instead. I read a story about some people who used Google Maps for routing in the far Eastern part of Russia, got routed through a disused road and froze to death. My in-laws were also using Google Maps when they were routed to a different place than the hotel we were supposed to stay in in Serbia, but the locals were kind enough to guide them.
luke2m 5y ago
I use maps.me, and this looks great. It’s a little unclear I think from the branding, but it works for driving as well.
- 0x0 5y ago
  maps.me was sold and the app went downhill pushing some crypto wallet stuff and a ton of tracking/affiliate/ads stuff. I briefly looked over the github commits earlier when this fork started and there seemed to be dozens if not hundreds of commits just to remove all those nasty integrations. Looks like this fork is in better hands.
orblivion 5y ago
Other F-Droid users here might know that the previously existing fork of Maps.me (called "Maps") apparently stopped providing data files. Perhaps they're unable to continue hosting. (In any case, I appreciate their work.) So, it's exciting that there's another option available again.
- orblivion 5y ago
  So far I'm finding that location search and routing is _faster_ than the last version of Maps was. EDIT: Nevermind it was just the new app feel. It's about the same. (but still good)
flakiness 5y ago
I would love to learn how the routing algorithm works. This is probably one of a few opensource-but-in-production implementation of such kind of algorithms. here seems no doc in the repo unfortunately. Still, it's very exciting to see they started from a "Helicoptor Router" [1] five years ago! The author clearly knew what they were doing. [1] https://github.com/organicmaps/organicmaps/commit/7123f71eeccbc4f92bc72fef6f37e0b97c55f863 https://github.com/organicmaps/organicmaps/commit/7123f71eec...
- erzapp 5y ago
  There are some interesting resources available on the BRouter algorithm: https://brouter.de/brouter/index.html https://brouter.de/brouter/index.html The source code is here: https://github.com/abrensch/brouter https://github.com/abrensch/brouter
- et-al 5y ago
  Valhalla is also open source and in production: https://github.com/valhalla/valhalla https://github.com/valhalla/valhalla
  - flakiness 5y ago
    It's used (or even built) by Mapbox? Very cool! Thanks for the pointer! Leaving a couple of google results for interested folks like me: * https://blog.mapbox.com/mapbox-%EF%B8%8F-valhalla-1fdda95ac4f * https://blog.mapbox.com/valhalla-is-live-on-mapbox-d868e8d41611
    - neolog 5y ago
      Copied links - https://blog.mapbox.com/mapbox-%EF%B8%8F-valhalla-1fdda95ac4f https://blog.mapbox.com/mapbox-%EF%B8%8F-valhalla-1fdda95ac4... - https://blog.mapbox.com/valhalla-is-live-on-mapbox-d868e8d41611 https://blog.mapbox.com/valhalla-is-live-on-mapbox-d868e8d41...
    - andrewljohnson 5y ago
      MapBox hired the Valhalla team after Mapzen went out of business.
erzapp 5y ago
I have used maps.me until a few years ago but was never really happy with the performance of the bike routing algorithm. I've switched to Osmand [1] and BRouter [2] (both available on F-Droid) and nerver looked back. BRouter on Android is a bit tricky to set up (you need to download routing tiles in addition to the map files through a really ugly UI), but once you're done it's the best bike navigator I can think of (and it's really fast). The BRouter profiles are highly customizable, check out Poutnik's repositories [3] for examples. Some of his profiles and many others con be tested on https://brouter.m11n.de/ https://brouter.m11n.de/ (german). [1] https://osmand.net/ https://osmand.net/ [2] https://brouter.de/ https://brouter.de/ [3] https://github.com/poutnikl/Brouter-profiles https://github.com/poutnikl/Brouter-profiles
- austhrow743 5y ago
  In what ways did you find osmands routes better?
  - erzapp 5y ago
    OsmAnd routing works OK for biking, but I specifically meant BRouter. The first thing I noticed was that it's a lot faster - I get the routing results almost immediately, even on a low spec phone (with the drawback that you need additional space for the routing segments). The generated routes are a lot better, too. They make more "sense" from a bikers perspective, because BRouter is elevation-aware. It also gives tracks that are on official cycle routes a higher priority (can be disabled). I tested it with trips I usually cycle and it calculated routes that were very similar if not identical to the ones I chose myself. That's what I expect from a good routing algorithm. Test it yourself: https://brouter.de/brouter-web/ https://brouter.de/brouter-web/
- patrickdavey 5y ago
  I used osmand for navigation while biking around Europe. My trick was using Google maps to plan the route and then exported to a gpx file and loaded that into osmand. Worked pretty well
sneak 5y ago
Thanks for this! The offline maps I was using were still transmitting "usage data" (aka your location) off to third parties. This is great. Note to everyone else that you must still turn off mobile data when using this app, BEFORE turning systemwide Location Services on, otherwise LS will leak your location to Apple in realtime, as LS is not just passive GPS reception, but an Apple network service. For privacy, the only safe way to enable LS is with all network disabled. Otherwise, for your location to remain private, LS needs to be off at a system level. Note that if you have mobile data service on, even with LS off your mobile provider gets approximate location data. This is why I stopped putting SIM cards in my smartphones.
yftsui 5y ago
This is great! I bought Garmin North America from App Store many years ago for $60, and they secretly removed support for it last year and it no longer runs on iOS 14.
perfmode 5y ago
does anyone have any knowledge about the peermaps effort?
tomglynch 5y ago
Does anyone know if there is a map app that allows the user to change route weighting options? For example, as a cyclist who enjoys riding both gravel roads and low traffic sealed roads, I'd like to be able to weight these types of roads above bike paths and main roads. I've been looking for something like this for a while but I'd also be willing to build something out if say mapbox or another mapping platform has the options to allow route weighting. Does anyone know if this is the case?
- maxerickson 5y ago
  You can do this with OSMAnd, last I knew with both the internal routing engine and also with BRouter. You can create a custom routing profile, and also compile maps using your own data transforms (so if the maps that they produce don't include some information from OSM that you value, the software is flexible enough to make different maps just with configuration). The profiles that ship in the app are defined in https://github.com/osmandapp/OsmAnd-resources/blob/master/routing/routing.xml https://github.com/osmandapp/OsmAnd-resources/blob/master/ro...
  - aasasd 5y ago
    > compile maps using your own data transforms (so if the maps that they produce don't include some information from OSM that you value, the software is flexible enough to make different maps just with configuration) Could you please elaborate a bit on that sorcery? I've never heard of this possibility, so don't even know where I would read up on it or what keywords to search for. (Though in retrospect of course it makes sense that someone would figure out how to make maps for open-source software.)
    - maxerickson 5y ago
      They provide the tool to do it: https://docs.osmand.net/en/main@latest/development/map-creation/create-offline-maps-yourself https://docs.osmand.net/en/main@latest/development/map-creat... There's a brief section there on the configuration files. The ones used for the maps they published are at https://github.com/osmandapp/OsmAnd-resources/tree/master/obf_creation https://github.com/osmandapp/OsmAnd-resources/tree/master/ob... (I'm not sure they are the exact files used for the published maps, they are at least close) You'd then have to edit the rendering styles and such to take advantage of the new data.
pomian 5y ago
This looks great. Ever since maps -the Android app quit working. Meanwhile has anyone tried: Mapy.cz It's a great free app too. I'm pretty sure based on the same open source maps. Works great offline too. Any free open source marine chart mapping programs?
- aasasd 5y ago
  > Any free open source marine chart mapping programs? Dunno how far into the seas OSM data goes, but OsmAnd has an entire mode for boat navigation—I gawked at it for an hour upon the discovery, looking at lighthouse locations and boat routes on the river and nearby seawater of my city. The app also has some kind of functionality for horse riders, though either the data is slim in these parts, or I don't know what to look for.
philistine 5y ago
It’s boggling that I cannot tell my phone to keep an offline copy of a 20km radius for 10 Gb for example. That way, I would be sure to always have a local map, and I could download maps of foreign locations to visit.
- tylorr 5y ago
  Google maps on Android lets me do something like this. It will occasionally prompt me to update the map with new data.
- zamadatix 5y ago
  You can save entire state sized regions offline for typically less than a gig on Google Maps.
- habi 5y ago
  With OrganicMaps you can (and are asked) to download an offline copy of the map data, based on OpenStreetMap. I use it whenever I'm out of country (and also a lot when not roaming).
  - habi 5y ago
    A fully offline copy of the map data for Switzerland for example is around 340 MB.
shkkmo 5y ago
A killer feature for me would be the ability to load geo PDFs as a layer so I can overlay MVUM maps with more traditional street maps.
petespeed 5y ago
As much I prefer to you such offline solutions, does anyone know any non-invasive way to overlay live traffic conditions to calculate best route to destination?
- aasasd 5y ago
  Pretty sure the question is, where you would get detailed data on traffic conditions. This is a case where surveillance capitalism of Google/Yandex/etc. wins, as they just have millions of data points from the same people that are using the maps, in addition to whatever data they may buy from cities.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
2Gkashmiri 5y ago
I have a question about hiking maps. Suppose I want to climb a hill, down a valley and back up, I "do not" want a straight line routing as I suppose osmand does it last I tried. Well osmand does show elevation data but "distance" for up a slope is more than "down a slope"
- martyvis 5y ago
  While you can do it that way, for hiking I tend to create routes based off of a map and add useful waypoints. For instance track intersections, River crossings, summits, etc. This is how you would do it with map + compass old school. I load those routes on my Garmin instinct watch, record the actual track, and use downloaded maps on my phone ( Google maps / government issued topographic maps and Open Street map).
  - 2Gkashmiri 5y ago
    do you plan your route beforehand if its a new route for you? edit: i mean do you use maps to investigate a new route? use google earth? whatever?
- Matrixik 5y ago
  Try Mapy.cz it have nice travel route functionality, offline maps and I really like "Trips nearby". It generate trip on the fly based on what distance you want to go that end at the same point you are starting from.
- mackrevinack 5y ago
  would the contour lines plugin help?
  - 2Gkashmiri 5y ago
    i dont know.... i have been using countour lines and hillshade as well as elevation data to plan routes but it is a manual affair
- robotmay 5y ago
pjmlp 5y ago
Best of all, written in a mix of Qt and native views, yet another good example to bookmark.
pmontra 5y ago
Do they have a business model or do they have no need to make money and are only giving back to the community?
- biodranik 5y ago
  Our planned business model is to enable donations :)
hawski 5y ago
I see it's another fork of maps.me, I hope it will gain traction. Are there any relation between maps.me and mapy.cz (they look too similar other than using OSM)? I use the latter for quite some time since the maps.me fork that was on F-Droid stopped updating. I love mapy.cz and I would like to give them money so they would not share the same fate. I also like that mapy.cz is from my southern neighbors. Maps in all of the above are pleasing for the eye and very informative, being offline-capable is an icing on the top, but it is a requirement when hiking. I love to explore areas with them. I start to have an itch to map a few paths in my neighborhood in OSM.
- lggy 5y ago
  AFAIK, mapy.cz and maps.me aren't related and the international version of mapy.cz is called Windy Maps [1]. [1] https://play.google.com/?id=cz.seznam.windymaps&gl=US https://play.google.com/?id=cz.seznam.windymaps&gl=US
  - Tijdreiziger 5y ago
    That link doesn't seem to work for me, I guess you meant this one? https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=cz.seznam.windymaps https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=cz.seznam.wind... It says in the description that it's 'Windy Maps by Seznam.cz' (which appears to be some kind of news site?), but the developer is listed as 'Windyty SE', and the developer website is listed as https://www.windy.com/ https://www.windy.com/, which appears to be a weather map. Doesn't exactly inspire confidence.
    - lggy 5y ago
      Sorry, I guess I must have gotten redirected when logged in or something like that. It is indeed the app you are linking to and the developer of both mapy.cz and windy maps is indeed Seznam.cz, which is the "Czech Google" as much as Yandex is for Russians for example. They are the #1 Czech news/email/search/maps/... provider and have been since the nineties. Windy.com is an interactive weather map company, but also founded and owned by the same owner as Senznam.cz, and I guess they tried to combine the English rebrand of the maps with the ability to show interactive weather, which is indeed a bit odd.
buro9 5y ago
It's good but in the UK open Street maps is insufficient for hiking. The best map app for Android is back country navigator Pro. Why? Because it allows local caching of the Bing tiles for ordnance survey maps. I'm off to the lake District next week and have compared windy maps, organic maps, osmand, back country navigator Pro, Google maps, and several others. Only the os tiles on back country navigator will suffice (level of detail) for the peaks in the lake District. I'd love to see something that uses the country equivalents to ordnance survey in a single global app... For hiking at least
- globular-toast 5y ago
  As an OSM mapper I've been "dogfooding" OSM for years now. I've successfully used it for walks all over Great Britain including the Peak District and Lake District. It hasn't really let me down. If I want to use a right of way that isn't on there, I'll add it myself. I've also been able to find things that aren't on OS maps, like public toilets and car parks. What specifically have you found lacking in OSM compared to OS?
  - Doctor_Fegg 5y ago
    I think the main thing we lack for walking is field boundaries. Certainly here in the Cotswolds the actual path network is not far off parity with Ordnance Survey, plus OSM has more metadata (surface quality, stiles/gates, etc.) and is routable. In less popular areas of the country we still have a way to go with the paths themselves.
    - globular-toast 5y ago
      This might vary from area to area, but I don't generally find field boundaries are necessary. There have occasionally been times where it would have been useful to know which side of the hedgerow the path is on, but I find most of the time my instincts are good enough.
  - buro9 5y ago
    > What specifically have you found lacking in OSM compared to OS? The ability to pick two peaks in the lakes in the more rugged area, and to see enough detail of the land (rather than paths) such that I can see whether it is possible to navigate between them. I.e. how granular does the waterways go? Are crags and cragginess fully shown? Are ancient stone walls shown? Do the contours show sufficient detail to indicate a stream that in a different season may be following but isn't considered a waterway all year round? Open Street maps allow me to read the paths, roads, main waterways. Ordnance survey allow me to read the land.
rcarmo 5y ago
This is very, very snappy and immediately useful, thanks. I quite like having offline mapping options that have zero spammy POIs and foodie ratings...
Arech 5y ago
Nice to see that the original intent of maps.me could be restored. For those who knew what Mail.Ru Group is (the company who bought maps.me at 2014), it was obvious that the app is going to become a junk very-very fast.
- Lex-2008 5y ago
  To be fair to Mail.Ru, I believe maps.me is one product which became better when owned by them: * they dropped paid version in dec 2014 (with all "pro" features, like bookmarks, being merged into free version) * they opensourced it in 2015 * they added some OSM-editing capabilities in 2016 * they added bike navigation I can't say how much of it is thanks to Mail.Ru, and how much - thanks to original developers, but it looks like the app was improving. Note that in November 2020 it was sold to a new owners, - and after that, I believe, jumped down.
  - Arech 5y ago
    That's correct. However Mail.Ru has so much spoiled reputation that, imo, it's kind of a miracle...
  - beagle3 5y ago
    It was at some point last year replaced by something horrible with no shared ancestry, and after a month or two seemed to be back to a maps.me based version (Which it still is, I think, with a few other additions have to do with ads and some kind of wallet).
kavalg 5y ago
Just installed the app on iOS and it looks good so far! Thanks!
thombles 5y ago
Fantastic news. The OSM data is unrivalled for bushwalking tracks. While I am prepared to navigate without technology, I rarely have to because a phone with GPS and offline data gets me back so on track so efficiently.
starsep 5y ago
I'm using it since their beta release in Google Play (in March?). It works very well for me, I like it much more than OSMAnd (which is slow and too complicated). I used MAPS.ME for a while but sponsored POIs, banking ads, tracking etc. was too much for me. Fortunately it's all gone in Organic Maps fork :)
vegardx 5y ago
For hiking nothing really beats paper maps. It's so much faster to navigate by when you're used to it, since you don't end up in this constant loop of checking your phone, quickly losing awareness. I guess most people have experienced this when using their car GPS. Another thing I've seen happen quite frequently is that people under-/overestimate how far away something is because they're changing the map resolution back and forth. I also suggest people look up local alternatives. A good example of excellent digital offline maps for Norway is ut.no or norgeskart.no, with their respective apps.
- dolmen 5y ago
  I love paper maps because: - scale is fixed, so 1 finger = x minutes walk - wide area view Every time I look at a map on my phone centered on my location I'm thinking I'm cheating, spoling the fun of finding where I am.
  - will-bradley 5y ago
    This is a great attitude, but there's a lot of people out there who don't find orienteering fun, they just want to get into and back out of nature safely: the natural surroundings are what's fun to them and they don't want to spend the time double checking the map and compass.
aorth 5y ago
Ah, this is fantastic! OsmAnd is a staple in the open source OpenStreetMap client ecosystem, but its UI is so dated and slow. MAPS.ME was a much better client, with faster and prettier UI until they started monetizing the app in the last year or so (?). Glad to see this new fork of MAPS.ME in the same privacy-first and open-source spirit of earlier clients. Another OSM client that I've recently fallen in love with is StreetComplete. Its UI is fantastic, though it is geared towards gamification of map metadata enrichment. I wish they would do a full OSM client using whatever technology its uses in the future. It's so slick and fast even on my old phone!
- tlocke 5y ago
  I'm glad you mentioned StreetComplete, I'm a great fan of it. For those that don't know it's an Open Source Android app that shows OpenStreetmap with pins in showing where information is needed. For example tapping a pin with a bench icon will ask you, 'is this bench still here?' and you just tap yes or no. Then there are more complicated ones like the opening hours of a shop. It's a fantastic way to contribute to OpenStreetmap, and it's a bit of a 'gateway drug' to more advanced editors such as the one on the OpenStreetmap website. For example, I might be entering house numbers on a local street and find that the buildings on the map don't match what's really there, and then I'll go into the editor the OpenStreetmap website to correct the map. The only shortcoming of StreetComplete is that the map isn't refreshed very often, but despite that I highly recommend it.
oxplot 5y ago
What I noticed is the much faster download speed of the offline maps. It pretty much is as fast as my network allows.
Sporktacular 5y ago
This is an awesome app. Solid, easy interface, can't yet vouch for the accuracy of the maps, but suppose any errors in the data are not their fault anyway.
snickerer 5y ago
I traveled Asia and Europe for 20 months with my off-road camper and Maps.me (OSM data) was one of my two tools for routing and (geographical) trip planning. And I missed only a hill shading feature, nothing else. For the hill shading (orientation in the mountains) I used another app. It is amazing how well it works. Driving tracks in the Gobi (steppe in Mongolia) or in the Lut (desert in Iran)? Well, OSM data is well enough that is just works. Thank you, all the mappers out there, who contribute to the collective knowledge of humankind!
ale42 5y ago
Fantastic, maps.me as it used to be in the past! This requires iOS 12 though. Does anyone know a similar app allowing offline maps that would still work on older version (like iOS 10)? (EDIT: I still have the old maps.me client on a old iPad, but it's impossible to update the maps or download new ones, as they are not any more available on maps.me server, and I couldn't find the source data for that exact version to "inject" it via a web proxy forcing the download from the "right" location)
- minusf 5y ago
  you could try mapy.cz, also uses OSM. pocket earth is also quite good, but the UI needs getting used to.
  - ale42 5y ago
    mapy.cz unfortunately wants iOS 13... ;-)
- will-bradley 5y ago
  Does OsmAnd not work?
  - developer93 5y ago
    I think the and stands for android
lxgr 5y ago
Great to see the original project being continued. But... Where do I donate/pay? This is one of my all-time favorite apps, and while the governance/contribution policy already look promising, I'd hate for it to get derailed by monetization issues again.
nathell 5y ago
I’ve been a very happy user of maps.me since when it was still called MapsWithMe, until they’ve started to push it in the downhill direction. I’m so happy that this fork exists! Switching in an instant – will support the authors if I like it. :)
mrkuji 5y ago
You don't seem to be able to search location by postcode :-(
seltzered_ 5y ago
prior discussion last week: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27543012 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27543012

364 points by yewenjie 5y ago

For anyone wondering, this is a fork of the rather popular app maps.me, which also uses Openstreetmap but started monetizing via increasingly intrusive ads in the past.

lucasmullens 5y ago
Just a glance at maps.me makes it clear why a fork is needed. They've launched a cryptocurrency which seems like a pretty massive red flag: https://maps.me/token/ https://maps.me/token/
- bellyfullofbac 5y ago
  Oh man.. Zawinski's law said "Every program attempts to expand until it can read mail."[1] I guess in 2021 the new law is "Every app expands until it can trade crypto." [1] http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/Z/Zawinskis-Law.html http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/Z/Zawinskis-Law.html
- ocdtrekkie 5y ago
  For what it's worth, paying contributors with fake money is still way more than Google Maps offers it's data sources.
- andrewljohnson 5y ago
  Maps.me was acquired by a company for that purpose.
ch3co2c6h4co2h 5y ago
I'm unfamiliar with maps.me or organicmaps -- what's the value prop versus just downloading a region from the Google Maps app? Is it opting out of big tech? Or is there some other capability that doesn't exist in Google/Apple's apps?
- orblivion 5y ago
  Opting out of Big Tech is one. Opting out of tracking is the benefit of organicmaps over Maps.me (as per organicmaps' site). But then there's OpenStreetMap. Are you familiar with that? It's open data, which is sort of related to opting out of big tech. It's "free" like Wikipedia, nobody can forbid access to the data itself. Practical benefits: Among OSM applications, Maps.me and organicmaps are more snappy. OsmAnd is a leading OSM application, and it just has a ton of options which is perhaps good for a power user but it's not streamlined. And then the practical benefit of OSM itself is that while you often don't get as much info as Google Maps, sometimes you get stuff that Google misses. I think a big one is foot trails and stuff. Local enthusiasts like to walk them and fill them in on the map. I added a water reservoir in Berkeley once that was somehow not on Google Maps.
- blendergeek 5y ago
  There are three main value propositions in my mind. While these could loosely be summed up as opting out of big tech, I think there is much more here than that. 1. Freedom. When using Organic Maps, you have the right to use the app in any way you choose; this includes the right to modify and redistribute the app should the developers ever start violating your principles. In fact this is exactly what Organic Maps is. Before Organic Maps, there was Maps.me; this app was also open source but became increasingly user hostile over time. Organic Maps is what happens when the users have this freedom. 2. Privacy. Even when used offline, Google Maps tracks and reports your location to Google. Organic Maps does not track and report your location to anybody. 3. Giving Back. While it is possible to suggest edits to Google Maps, these edits become part of Google's proprietary map database and can only be used in accordance with Google's ToS. This means that ultimately, Google's profits are what you are contributing to. Organic Maps, on the other hand, uses OpenStreetMap [0] and allows the user to contribute to it. Data contributed to OpenStreetMap can be freely used by anybody, for any purpose, thus benefiting all humankind rather than just one massive, US based, corporate entity that may not have humankind's interests at heart. [0] https://www.openstreetmap.org/ https://www.openstreetmap.org/
- et-al 5y ago
  1. Maps.me and Organic Maps were initially designed for an offline experience, so they don't even try use data when I have a spotty connection. Unless you explicitly disable data, Google Maps will always try to load new tiles. This can be annoying when your reception is weak and Google renders fuzzy tiles instead of falling back on the already downloaded tiles. 2. You can't download offline maps for South Korea in Google Maps. There may be other areas in the world like this. 3. OSM data is better for hiking trails in my experience.
hkai 5y ago
Windy Maps is a pretty good fork too, and from a company with good engineering resources.
- petre 5y ago
  Yup, it's great, I used it as well. Just used the routing for jeep touring (using the mountain bike profile) and specifically routing through some places. It works great with offline maps. Also one could just download parts of a jurisdiction if it's bigger, like Northern Greece. The maps are bigger but also contain more information than Here which seems dated, lacks some newly built highway segments in Eastern Europe and will route you on national roads instead. I read a story about some people who used Google Maps for routing in the far Eastern part of Russia, got routed through a disused road and froze to death. My in-laws were also using Google Maps when they were routed to a different place than the hotel we were supposed to stay in in Serbia, but the locals were kind enough to guide them.

luke2m 5y ago

I use maps.me, and this looks great. It’s a little unclear I think from the branding, but it works for driving as well.

0x0 5y ago
maps.me was sold and the app went downhill pushing some crypto wallet stuff and a ton of tracking/affiliate/ads stuff. I briefly looked over the github commits earlier when this fork started and there seemed to be dozens if not hundreds of commits just to remove all those nasty integrations. Looks like this fork is in better hands.

orblivion 5y ago

Other F-Droid users here might know that the previously existing fork of Maps.me (called "Maps") apparently stopped providing data files. Perhaps they're unable to continue hosting. (In any case, I appreciate their work.) So, it's exciting that there's another option available again.

orblivion 5y ago
So far I'm finding that location search and routing is _faster_ than the last version of Maps was. EDIT: Nevermind it was just the new app feel. It's about the same. (but still good)

flakiness 5y ago

I would love to learn how the routing algorithm works. This is probably one of a few opensource-but-in-production implementation of such kind of algorithms. here seems no doc in the repo unfortunately. Still, it's very exciting to see they started from a "Helicoptor Router" [1] five years ago! The author clearly knew what they were doing. [1] https://github.com/organicmaps/organicmaps/commit/7123f71eeccbc4f92bc72fef6f37e0b97c55f863 https://github.com/organicmaps/organicmaps/commit/7123f71eec...

erzapp 5y ago
There are some interesting resources available on the BRouter algorithm: https://brouter.de/brouter/index.html https://brouter.de/brouter/index.html The source code is here: https://github.com/abrensch/brouter https://github.com/abrensch/brouter
et-al 5y ago
Valhalla is also open source and in production: https://github.com/valhalla/valhalla https://github.com/valhalla/valhalla
- flakiness 5y ago
  It's used (or even built) by Mapbox? Very cool! Thanks for the pointer! Leaving a couple of google results for interested folks like me: * https://blog.mapbox.com/mapbox-%EF%B8%8F-valhalla-1fdda95ac4f * https://blog.mapbox.com/valhalla-is-live-on-mapbox-d868e8d41611
  - neolog 5y ago
    Copied links - https://blog.mapbox.com/mapbox-%EF%B8%8F-valhalla-1fdda95ac4f https://blog.mapbox.com/mapbox-%EF%B8%8F-valhalla-1fdda95ac4... - https://blog.mapbox.com/valhalla-is-live-on-mapbox-d868e8d41611 https://blog.mapbox.com/valhalla-is-live-on-mapbox-d868e8d41...
  - andrewljohnson 5y ago
    MapBox hired the Valhalla team after Mapzen went out of business.

erzapp 5y ago

I have used maps.me until a few years ago but was never really happy with the performance of the bike routing algorithm. I've switched to Osmand [1] and BRouter [2] (both available on F-Droid) and nerver looked back. BRouter on Android is a bit tricky to set up (you need to download routing tiles in addition to the map files through a really ugly UI), but once you're done it's the best bike navigator I can think of (and it's really fast). The BRouter profiles are highly customizable, check out Poutnik's repositories [3] for examples. Some of his profiles and many others con be tested on https://brouter.m11n.de/ https://brouter.m11n.de/ (german). [1] https://osmand.net/ https://osmand.net/ [2] https://brouter.de/ https://brouter.de/ [3] https://github.com/poutnikl/Brouter-profiles https://github.com/poutnikl/Brouter-profiles

austhrow743 5y ago
In what ways did you find osmands routes better?
- erzapp 5y ago
  OsmAnd routing works OK for biking, but I specifically meant BRouter. The first thing I noticed was that it's a lot faster - I get the routing results almost immediately, even on a low spec phone (with the drawback that you need additional space for the routing segments). The generated routes are a lot better, too. They make more "sense" from a bikers perspective, because BRouter is elevation-aware. It also gives tracks that are on official cycle routes a higher priority (can be disabled). I tested it with trips I usually cycle and it calculated routes that were very similar if not identical to the ones I chose myself. That's what I expect from a good routing algorithm. Test it yourself: https://brouter.de/brouter-web/ https://brouter.de/brouter-web/
patrickdavey 5y ago
I used osmand for navigation while biking around Europe. My trick was using Google maps to plan the route and then exported to a gpx file and loaded that into osmand. Worked pretty well

sneak 5y ago

Thanks for this! The offline maps I was using were still transmitting "usage data" (aka your location) off to third parties. This is great. Note to everyone else that you must still turn off mobile data when using this app, BEFORE turning systemwide Location Services on, otherwise LS will leak your location to Apple in realtime, as LS is not just passive GPS reception, but an Apple network service. For privacy, the only safe way to enable LS is with all network disabled. Otherwise, for your location to remain private, LS needs to be off at a system level. Note that if you have mobile data service on, even with LS off your mobile provider gets approximate location data. This is why I stopped putting SIM cards in my smartphones.

yftsui 5y ago

This is great! I bought Garmin North America from App Store many years ago for $60, and they secretly removed support for it last year and it no longer runs on iOS 14.

perfmode 5y ago

does anyone have any knowledge about the peermaps effort?

tomglynch 5y ago

Does anyone know if there is a map app that allows the user to change route weighting options? For example, as a cyclist who enjoys riding both gravel roads and low traffic sealed roads, I'd like to be able to weight these types of roads above bike paths and main roads. I've been looking for something like this for a while but I'd also be willing to build something out if say mapbox or another mapping platform has the options to allow route weighting. Does anyone know if this is the case?

maxerickson 5y ago
You can do this with OSMAnd, last I knew with both the internal routing engine and also with BRouter. You can create a custom routing profile, and also compile maps using your own data transforms (so if the maps that they produce don't include some information from OSM that you value, the software is flexible enough to make different maps just with configuration). The profiles that ship in the app are defined in https://github.com/osmandapp/OsmAnd-resources/blob/master/routing/routing.xml https://github.com/osmandapp/OsmAnd-resources/blob/master/ro...
- aasasd 5y ago
  > compile maps using your own data transforms (so if the maps that they produce don't include some information from OSM that you value, the software is flexible enough to make different maps just with configuration) Could you please elaborate a bit on that sorcery? I've never heard of this possibility, so don't even know where I would read up on it or what keywords to search for. (Though in retrospect of course it makes sense that someone would figure out how to make maps for open-source software.)
  - maxerickson 5y ago
    They provide the tool to do it: https://docs.osmand.net/en/main@latest/development/map-creation/create-offline-maps-yourself https://docs.osmand.net/en/main@latest/development/map-creat... There's a brief section there on the configuration files. The ones used for the maps they published are at https://github.com/osmandapp/OsmAnd-resources/tree/master/obf_creation https://github.com/osmandapp/OsmAnd-resources/tree/master/ob... (I'm not sure they are the exact files used for the published maps, they are at least close) You'd then have to edit the rendering styles and such to take advantage of the new data.

pomian 5y ago

This looks great. Ever since maps -the Android app quit working. Meanwhile has anyone tried: Mapy.cz It's a great free app too. I'm pretty sure based on the same open source maps. Works great offline too. Any free open source marine chart mapping programs?

aasasd 5y ago
> Any free open source marine chart mapping programs? Dunno how far into the seas OSM data goes, but OsmAnd has an entire mode for boat navigation—I gawked at it for an hour upon the discovery, looking at lighthouse locations and boat routes on the river and nearby seawater of my city. The app also has some kind of functionality for horse riders, though either the data is slim in these parts, or I don't know what to look for.

philistine 5y ago

It’s boggling that I cannot tell my phone to keep an offline copy of a 20km radius for 10 Gb for example. That way, I would be sure to always have a local map, and I could download maps of foreign locations to visit.

tylorr 5y ago
Google maps on Android lets me do something like this. It will occasionally prompt me to update the map with new data.
zamadatix 5y ago
You can save entire state sized regions offline for typically less than a gig on Google Maps.
habi 5y ago
With OrganicMaps you can (and are asked) to download an offline copy of the map data, based on OpenStreetMap. I use it whenever I'm out of country (and also a lot when not roaming).
- habi 5y ago
  A fully offline copy of the map data for Switzerland for example is around 340 MB.

shkkmo 5y ago

A killer feature for me would be the ability to load geo PDFs as a layer so I can overlay MVUM maps with more traditional street maps.

petespeed 5y ago

As much I prefer to you such offline solutions, does anyone know any non-invasive way to overlay live traffic conditions to calculate best route to destination?

aasasd 5y ago
Pretty sure the question is, where you would get detailed data on traffic conditions. This is a case where surveillance capitalism of Google/Yandex/etc. wins, as they just have millions of data points from the same people that are using the maps, in addition to whatever data they may buy from cities.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]

2Gkashmiri 5y ago

I have a question about hiking maps. Suppose I want to climb a hill, down a valley and back up, I "do not" want a straight line routing as I suppose osmand does it last I tried. Well osmand does show elevation data but "distance" for up a slope is more than "down a slope"

martyvis 5y ago
While you can do it that way, for hiking I tend to create routes based off of a map and add useful waypoints. For instance track intersections, River crossings, summits, etc. This is how you would do it with map + compass old school. I load those routes on my Garmin instinct watch, record the actual track, and use downloaded maps on my phone ( Google maps / government issued topographic maps and Open Street map).
- 2Gkashmiri 5y ago
  do you plan your route beforehand if its a new route for you? edit: i mean do you use maps to investigate a new route? use google earth? whatever?
Matrixik 5y ago
Try Mapy.cz it have nice travel route functionality, offline maps and I really like "Trips nearby". It generate trip on the fly based on what distance you want to go that end at the same point you are starting from.
mackrevinack 5y ago
would the contour lines plugin help?
- 2Gkashmiri 5y ago
  i dont know.... i have been using countour lines and hillshade as well as elevation data to plan routes but it is a manual affair
robotmay 5y ago

pjmlp 5y ago

Best of all, written in a mix of Qt and native views, yet another good example to bookmark.

pmontra 5y ago

Do they have a business model or do they have no need to make money and are only giving back to the community?

biodranik 5y ago
Our planned business model is to enable donations :)

hawski 5y ago

I see it's another fork of maps.me, I hope it will gain traction. Are there any relation between maps.me and mapy.cz (they look too similar other than using OSM)? I use the latter for quite some time since the maps.me fork that was on F-Droid stopped updating. I love mapy.cz and I would like to give them money so they would not share the same fate. I also like that mapy.cz is from my southern neighbors. Maps in all of the above are pleasing for the eye and very informative, being offline-capable is an icing on the top, but it is a requirement when hiking. I love to explore areas with them. I start to have an itch to map a few paths in my neighborhood in OSM.

lggy 5y ago
AFAIK, mapy.cz and maps.me aren't related and the international version of mapy.cz is called Windy Maps [1]. [1] https://play.google.com/?id=cz.seznam.windymaps&gl=US https://play.google.com/?id=cz.seznam.windymaps&gl=US
- Tijdreiziger 5y ago
  That link doesn't seem to work for me, I guess you meant this one? https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=cz.seznam.windymaps https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=cz.seznam.wind... It says in the description that it's 'Windy Maps by Seznam.cz' (which appears to be some kind of news site?), but the developer is listed as 'Windyty SE', and the developer website is listed as https://www.windy.com/ https://www.windy.com/, which appears to be a weather map. Doesn't exactly inspire confidence.
  - lggy 5y ago
    Sorry, I guess I must have gotten redirected when logged in or something like that. It is indeed the app you are linking to and the developer of both mapy.cz and windy maps is indeed Seznam.cz, which is the "Czech Google" as much as Yandex is for Russians for example. They are the #1 Czech news/email/search/maps/... provider and have been since the nineties. Windy.com is an interactive weather map company, but also founded and owned by the same owner as Senznam.cz, and I guess they tried to combine the English rebrand of the maps with the ability to show interactive weather, which is indeed a bit odd.

buro9 5y ago

It's good but in the UK open Street maps is insufficient for hiking. The best map app for Android is back country navigator Pro. Why? Because it allows local caching of the Bing tiles for ordnance survey maps. I'm off to the lake District next week and have compared windy maps, organic maps, osmand, back country navigator Pro, Google maps, and several others. Only the os tiles on back country navigator will suffice (level of detail) for the peaks in the lake District. I'd love to see something that uses the country equivalents to ordnance survey in a single global app... For hiking at least

globular-toast 5y ago
As an OSM mapper I've been "dogfooding" OSM for years now. I've successfully used it for walks all over Great Britain including the Peak District and Lake District. It hasn't really let me down. If I want to use a right of way that isn't on there, I'll add it myself. I've also been able to find things that aren't on OS maps, like public toilets and car parks. What specifically have you found lacking in OSM compared to OS?
- Doctor_Fegg 5y ago
  I think the main thing we lack for walking is field boundaries. Certainly here in the Cotswolds the actual path network is not far off parity with Ordnance Survey, plus OSM has more metadata (surface quality, stiles/gates, etc.) and is routable. In less popular areas of the country we still have a way to go with the paths themselves.
  - globular-toast 5y ago
    This might vary from area to area, but I don't generally find field boundaries are necessary. There have occasionally been times where it would have been useful to know which side of the hedgerow the path is on, but I find most of the time my instincts are good enough.
- buro9 5y ago
  > What specifically have you found lacking in OSM compared to OS? The ability to pick two peaks in the lakes in the more rugged area, and to see enough detail of the land (rather than paths) such that I can see whether it is possible to navigate between them. I.e. how granular does the waterways go? Are crags and cragginess fully shown? Are ancient stone walls shown? Do the contours show sufficient detail to indicate a stream that in a different season may be following but isn't considered a waterway all year round? Open Street maps allow me to read the paths, roads, main waterways. Ordnance survey allow me to read the land.

rcarmo 5y ago

This is very, very snappy and immediately useful, thanks. I quite like having offline mapping options that have zero spammy POIs and foodie ratings...

Arech 5y ago

Nice to see that the original intent of maps.me could be restored. For those who knew what Mail.Ru Group is (the company who bought maps.me at 2014), it was obvious that the app is going to become a junk very-very fast.

Lex-2008 5y ago
To be fair to Mail.Ru, I believe maps.me is one product which became better when owned by them: * they dropped paid version in dec 2014 (with all "pro" features, like bookmarks, being merged into free version) * they opensourced it in 2015 * they added some OSM-editing capabilities in 2016 * they added bike navigation I can't say how much of it is thanks to Mail.Ru, and how much - thanks to original developers, but it looks like the app was improving. Note that in November 2020 it was sold to a new owners, - and after that, I believe, jumped down.
- Arech 5y ago
  That's correct. However Mail.Ru has so much spoiled reputation that, imo, it's kind of a miracle...
- beagle3 5y ago
  It was at some point last year replaced by something horrible with no shared ancestry, and after a month or two seemed to be back to a maps.me based version (Which it still is, I think, with a few other additions have to do with ads and some kind of wallet).

kavalg 5y ago

Just installed the app on iOS and it looks good so far! Thanks!

thombles 5y ago

Fantastic news. The OSM data is unrivalled for bushwalking tracks. While I am prepared to navigate without technology, I rarely have to because a phone with GPS and offline data gets me back so on track so efficiently.

starsep 5y ago

I'm using it since their beta release in Google Play (in March?). It works very well for me, I like it much more than OSMAnd (which is slow and too complicated). I used MAPS.ME for a while but sponsored POIs, banking ads, tracking etc. was too much for me. Fortunately it's all gone in Organic Maps fork :)

vegardx 5y ago

For hiking nothing really beats paper maps. It's so much faster to navigate by when you're used to it, since you don't end up in this constant loop of checking your phone, quickly losing awareness. I guess most people have experienced this when using their car GPS. Another thing I've seen happen quite frequently is that people under-/overestimate how far away something is because they're changing the map resolution back and forth. I also suggest people look up local alternatives. A good example of excellent digital offline maps for Norway is ut.no or norgeskart.no, with their respective apps.

dolmen 5y ago
I love paper maps because: - scale is fixed, so 1 finger = x minutes walk - wide area view Every time I look at a map on my phone centered on my location I'm thinking I'm cheating, spoling the fun of finding where I am.
- will-bradley 5y ago
  This is a great attitude, but there's a lot of people out there who don't find orienteering fun, they just want to get into and back out of nature safely: the natural surroundings are what's fun to them and they don't want to spend the time double checking the map and compass.

aorth 5y ago

Ah, this is fantastic! OsmAnd is a staple in the open source OpenStreetMap client ecosystem, but its UI is so dated and slow. MAPS.ME was a much better client, with faster and prettier UI until they started monetizing the app in the last year or so (?). Glad to see this new fork of MAPS.ME in the same privacy-first and open-source spirit of earlier clients. Another OSM client that I've recently fallen in love with is StreetComplete. Its UI is fantastic, though it is geared towards gamification of map metadata enrichment. I wish they would do a full OSM client using whatever technology its uses in the future. It's so slick and fast even on my old phone!

tlocke 5y ago
I'm glad you mentioned StreetComplete, I'm a great fan of it. For those that don't know it's an Open Source Android app that shows OpenStreetmap with pins in showing where information is needed. For example tapping a pin with a bench icon will ask you, 'is this bench still here?' and you just tap yes or no. Then there are more complicated ones like the opening hours of a shop. It's a fantastic way to contribute to OpenStreetmap, and it's a bit of a 'gateway drug' to more advanced editors such as the one on the OpenStreetmap website. For example, I might be entering house numbers on a local street and find that the buildings on the map don't match what's really there, and then I'll go into the editor the OpenStreetmap website to correct the map. The only shortcoming of StreetComplete is that the map isn't refreshed very often, but despite that I highly recommend it.

oxplot 5y ago

What I noticed is the much faster download speed of the offline maps. It pretty much is as fast as my network allows.

Sporktacular 5y ago

This is an awesome app. Solid, easy interface, can't yet vouch for the accuracy of the maps, but suppose any errors in the data are not their fault anyway.

snickerer 5y ago

I traveled Asia and Europe for 20 months with my off-road camper and Maps.me (OSM data) was one of my two tools for routing and (geographical) trip planning. And I missed only a hill shading feature, nothing else. For the hill shading (orientation in the mountains) I used another app. It is amazing how well it works. Driving tracks in the Gobi (steppe in Mongolia) or in the Lut (desert in Iran)? Well, OSM data is well enough that is just works. Thank you, all the mappers out there, who contribute to the collective knowledge of humankind!

ale42 5y ago

Fantastic, maps.me as it used to be in the past! This requires iOS 12 though. Does anyone know a similar app allowing offline maps that would still work on older version (like iOS 10)? (EDIT: I still have the old maps.me client on a old iPad, but it's impossible to update the maps or download new ones, as they are not any more available on maps.me server, and I couldn't find the source data for that exact version to "inject" it via a web proxy forcing the download from the "right" location)

minusf 5y ago
you could try mapy.cz, also uses OSM. pocket earth is also quite good, but the UI needs getting used to.
- ale42 5y ago
  mapy.cz unfortunately wants iOS 13... ;-)
will-bradley 5y ago
Does OsmAnd not work?
- developer93 5y ago
  I think the and stands for android

lxgr 5y ago

Great to see the original project being continued. But... Where do I donate/pay? This is one of my all-time favorite apps, and while the governance/contribution policy already look promising, I'd hate for it to get derailed by monetization issues again.

nathell 5y ago

I’ve been a very happy user of maps.me since when it was still called MapsWithMe, until they’ve started to push it in the downhill direction. I’m so happy that this fork exists! Switching in an instant – will support the authors if I like it. :)

mrkuji 5y ago

You don't seem to be able to search location by postcode :-(

seltzered_ 5y ago

prior discussion last week: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27543012 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27543012