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Started using Organic Maps during the pandemic, this is the app that weaned me out of Google Maps. At the moment I only really use Google Maps to check opening

Started using Organic Maps during the pandemic, this is the app that weaned me out of Google Maps. At the moment I only really use Google Maps to check opening times of certain shops. Also way better routing for cyclists than Google maps.

OfSanguineFire 3y ago
You can often find opening times of shops by searching for their own Facebook page instead of using Google Maps. Moreover, you can add business’ opening hours to OpenStreetMap so that other people in future will see the opening hours in Organic Maps and other OSM-based maps. For a programming-savvy crowd like HN, the syntax of OSM’s opening-hours tag is pretty straightforward.
- Vinnl 3y ago
  > you can add business’ opening hours to OpenStreetMap And by far the easiest way to do this, if you have an Android phone, is to use the beautiful StreetComplete app: https://github.com/streetcomplete/StreetComplete/#readme https://github.com/streetcomplete/StreetComplete/#readme
  - raybb 3y ago
    Street complete may be a bit more beginner friendly but if you just need to update hours or want to add details to several stores quickly everydoor is easier to me https://every-door.app/ https://every-door.app/
    - aembleton 3y ago
      Worth taking a look at Street Complete Extended Edition too: https://f-droid.org/packages/de.westnordost.streetcomplete.expert/ https://f-droid.org/packages/de.westnordost.streetcomplete.e...
  - emaro 3y ago
    You can do it directly in Organic Maps as well.
  - habi 3y ago
    On iOS https://every-door.app/ https://every-door.app/ wins for easiest `opening_hours` editor.
- Aachen 3y ago
  > by searching for their own Facebook page At that point I'd rather open up Google and give them the data point that someone is interested in this store at this time (to make these crowdedness plots) than provide Facebook with my data ._. If they have an own website, sure, but a Facebook page? I'm not whitelisting those IP addresses for my browser to be able to visit that. This is why I always add the website as the most important field for a POI btw: easy to click through, always up-to-date opening hours. They're very often out of date on OSM because the shop owners only supply that info to google and call it good.
  - OfSanguineFire 3y ago
    Because a Facebook page is the business’s own advertisement, you can add the opening hours displayed there straight to OpenStreetMap. (Google’s information obviously cannot be copied into OSM, and besides, sometimes its opening hours are guessed from visitor data instead of added by the business itself.) > This is why I always add the website as the most important field for a POI It has been over a decade now since most physical-retail businesses began giving up on maintaining their own websites, using only Facebook pages instead, unless they are part of large chains.
    - teddyh 3y ago
      > It has been over a decade now since most physical-retail businesses began giving up on maintaining their own websites, using only Facebook pages instead, unless they are part of large chains. This was indeed a trend a few years ago, but it is not true anymore, in my personal experience. Even tiny shops, if they are only a bit more technologically knowledgable than average, tend to have their own web page.
- sundarurfriend 3y ago
  > You can often find opening times of shops by searching for their own Facebook page Maybe a US thing? Where I live, less than 10% of the shops have a Facebook page, and I'd expect maybe 10% of those have up to date reliable information.
- gniv 3y ago
  There is no UI for opening hours in Organic Maps afaict. I think that's part of the complaint.
  - NoboruWataya 3y ago
    There is. When you click on a place, there is an "edit place" option which allows you to edit common details including business hours.
    - gniv 3y ago
      Oh, I see it now -- sometimes it's there, but for a lot of places I cannot even lift the drawer, probably because there is no data other than category, like "Cafe". So I cannot edit.
      - andrewshadura 3y ago
        It usually means that you have outdated data. Update the app, update the data, try again.
prometheon1 3y ago
Do you use the search functionality a lot, and is it giving you the results you want? And if so, do you have any tips on how to write search queries? I love Organic Maps, but when I try to search, I think I find what I'm looking for about 1 out of 5 times.
- DoingIsLearning 3y ago
  Usually I will take an address from my email or browser and plug it in, so indeed the search feature is not something I use much.
- orbital-decay 3y ago
  Reliable search is just generally hard to implement for OSM, as it's highly chaotic. There's no single schema forced upon everyone. The same feature can be tagged in multiple ways, which are dependent on the consensus between mappers, country/jurisdiction, culture, particular mapper preference etc. This is especially relevant for addresses and businesses.
  - Aachen 3y ago
    Um, the wiki is the single schema forced upon everyone: https://wiki.openstreetmap.org https://wiki.openstreetmap.org Searching the schema works just fine, it's just hard to find typos and support natural language queries. Google set the standard for searching, we need to remember that we're literally comparing a volunteer project against the world leader in search who also has the money to employ a hundred distributed servers for every query versus the offline on-your-phone search of something like OsmAnd. Borders is one of the few things that need to be different between countries (county, municipality, city group (Kreisstadt), city region (Städteregion), etc.: every country has a different hierarchy of subdivisions which OSM translates to numeric admin_level values). Some countries use the abbreviated street names like St. John St., others have the convention to expand Saint John Street. Different road types have different rules (is a tractor allowed on rural motorways? In Uganda maybe yes). These handful of things which you'll need to set per country are defined on the wiki, but 99% is the same. Particularly for searching where the name and POI tags like shop=x are the most relevant: after normalising the street name abbreviations, you're pretty much good.

OfSanguineFire 3y ago

You can often find opening times of shops by searching for their own Facebook page instead of using Google Maps. Moreover, you can add business’ opening hours to OpenStreetMap so that other people in future will see the opening hours in Organic Maps and other OSM-based maps. For a programming-savvy crowd like HN, the syntax of OSM’s opening-hours tag is pretty straightforward.

Vinnl 3y ago
> you can add business’ opening hours to OpenStreetMap And by far the easiest way to do this, if you have an Android phone, is to use the beautiful StreetComplete app: https://github.com/streetcomplete/StreetComplete/#readme https://github.com/streetcomplete/StreetComplete/#readme
- raybb 3y ago
  Street complete may be a bit more beginner friendly but if you just need to update hours or want to add details to several stores quickly everydoor is easier to me https://every-door.app/ https://every-door.app/
  - aembleton 3y ago
    Worth taking a look at Street Complete Extended Edition too: https://f-droid.org/packages/de.westnordost.streetcomplete.expert/ https://f-droid.org/packages/de.westnordost.streetcomplete.e...
- emaro 3y ago
  You can do it directly in Organic Maps as well.
- habi 3y ago
  On iOS https://every-door.app/ https://every-door.app/ wins for easiest `opening_hours` editor.
Aachen 3y ago
> by searching for their own Facebook page At that point I'd rather open up Google and give them the data point that someone is interested in this store at this time (to make these crowdedness plots) than provide Facebook with my data ._. If they have an own website, sure, but a Facebook page? I'm not whitelisting those IP addresses for my browser to be able to visit that. This is why I always add the website as the most important field for a POI btw: easy to click through, always up-to-date opening hours. They're very often out of date on OSM because the shop owners only supply that info to google and call it good.
- OfSanguineFire 3y ago
  Because a Facebook page is the business’s own advertisement, you can add the opening hours displayed there straight to OpenStreetMap. (Google’s information obviously cannot be copied into OSM, and besides, sometimes its opening hours are guessed from visitor data instead of added by the business itself.) > This is why I always add the website as the most important field for a POI It has been over a decade now since most physical-retail businesses began giving up on maintaining their own websites, using only Facebook pages instead, unless they are part of large chains.
  - teddyh 3y ago
    > It has been over a decade now since most physical-retail businesses began giving up on maintaining their own websites, using only Facebook pages instead, unless they are part of large chains. This was indeed a trend a few years ago, but it is not true anymore, in my personal experience. Even tiny shops, if they are only a bit more technologically knowledgable than average, tend to have their own web page.
sundarurfriend 3y ago
> You can often find opening times of shops by searching for their own Facebook page Maybe a US thing? Where I live, less than 10% of the shops have a Facebook page, and I'd expect maybe 10% of those have up to date reliable information.
gniv 3y ago
There is no UI for opening hours in Organic Maps afaict. I think that's part of the complaint.
- NoboruWataya 3y ago
  There is. When you click on a place, there is an "edit place" option which allows you to edit common details including business hours.
  - gniv 3y ago
    Oh, I see it now -- sometimes it's there, but for a lot of places I cannot even lift the drawer, probably because there is no data other than category, like "Cafe". So I cannot edit.
    - andrewshadura 3y ago
      It usually means that you have outdated data. Update the app, update the data, try again.

prometheon1 3y ago

Do you use the search functionality a lot, and is it giving you the results you want? And if so, do you have any tips on how to write search queries? I love Organic Maps, but when I try to search, I think I find what I'm looking for about 1 out of 5 times.

DoingIsLearning 3y ago
Usually I will take an address from my email or browser and plug it in, so indeed the search feature is not something I use much.
orbital-decay 3y ago
Reliable search is just generally hard to implement for OSM, as it's highly chaotic. There's no single schema forced upon everyone. The same feature can be tagged in multiple ways, which are dependent on the consensus between mappers, country/jurisdiction, culture, particular mapper preference etc. This is especially relevant for addresses and businesses.
- Aachen 3y ago
  Um, the wiki is the single schema forced upon everyone: https://wiki.openstreetmap.org https://wiki.openstreetmap.org Searching the schema works just fine, it's just hard to find typos and support natural language queries. Google set the standard for searching, we need to remember that we're literally comparing a volunteer project against the world leader in search who also has the money to employ a hundred distributed servers for every query versus the offline on-your-phone search of something like OsmAnd. Borders is one of the few things that need to be different between countries (county, municipality, city group (Kreisstadt), city region (Städteregion), etc.: every country has a different hierarchy of subdivisions which OSM translates to numeric admin_level values). Some countries use the abbreviated street names like St. John St., others have the convention to expand Saint John Street. Different road types have different rules (is a tractor allowed on rural motorways? In Uganda maybe yes). These handful of things which you'll need to set per country are defined on the wiki, but 99% is the same. Particularly for searching where the name and POI tags like shop=x are the most relevant: after normalising the street name abbreviations, you're pretty much good.