5 ms·

Cool but basemaps are a very tricky thing from a geographers perspective. There are several border conflicts. When it is open source there could be some manipul

Cool but basemaps are a very tricky thing from a geographers perspective. There are several border conflicts. When it is open source there could be some manipulation. Immediatelly getting downvoted. All I'm saying is that official map boundaries these days should be used. Because I can again not post because too fast here my clarification: I mean official not commercial or proprietary

hapulala89 3y ago
This is so true. Otherwise all Mapping authorities would be useless. I could change my house ground area and nobody cares
ulrischa 3y ago
For all who downvotes. Here is the prof that leaving Mapping borders open source is not the way: https://www.calcalistech.com/ctechnews/article/r1hyeammt https://www.calcalistech.com/ctechnews/article/r1hyeammt
Maxion 3y ago
That's quite the edge case, though. This is exceedingly useful for so many use cases. E.g. internal tools that display locations of assets, system statuses, webpages that display store locations, and so forth. Plenty of use cases where the costs for Googles APIs would exceed the dev costs for implementing something like this.
maxerickson 3y ago
A commercial data provider can also be showing a manipulated border, and is at least making some kind of editorial decision about what they are showing (whether they think so or not).
- JimDabell 3y ago
  For instance: Why isn't my time zone highlighted on the world map? > In early 1995, a border war broke out between Peru and Ecuador and the Peruvian government complained to Microsoft that the border was incorrectly placed. Of course, if we complied and moved the border northward, we’d get an equally angry letter from the Ecuadorian government demanding that we move it back. So we removed the feature altogether. > The time zone map met a similar fate. The Indian government threatened to ban all Microsoft software from the country because we assigned a disputed region to Pakistan in the time zone map. (Any map that depicts an unfavorable border must bear a government stamp warning the end-user that the borders are incorrect. You can’t stamp software.) We had to make a special version of Windows 95 for them. — https://devblogs.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/20030822-00/?p=42823 https://devblogs.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/20030822-00/?p=42...
bdon 3y ago
Indeed! The Protomaps project encompasses the generation of basemap PMTiles and the ecosystem for delivering them to clients. It supplies a standard daily build from OpenStreetMap, and since the generation is open source it can be customized to conform with your specific requirements.
carlosjobim 3y ago
There are no "official map boundaries" when it comes to conflicted borders.
YoshiRulz 3y ago
I think the downvotes may be because people take "When it is open source there could be some manipulation" to mean that you think proprietary alternatives are somehow safe from such manipulation—but of course they aren't, least of all Google Maps.
FpUser 3y ago
>"There are several border conflicts. When it is open source there could be some manipulation." Manipulation can and does happen with non open source data. Just ask any politician. You should be thankful to developers who did a great service for free. If something is incorrect because of conflicts - the world will sort it out eventually. It is not developers job. PS - I did not downvoted as I never downvote any posts.
- wolverine876 3y ago
  > PS - I did not downvoted as I never downvote any posts. Sounds like a good policy.
Aeolun 3y ago
> All I'm saying is that official map boundaries these days should be used. Pray tell, which official map boundaries should be used? The whole problem being that officials disagree of course.

hapulala89 3y ago

This is so true. Otherwise all Mapping authorities would be useless. I could change my house ground area and nobody cares

ulrischa 3y ago

For all who downvotes. Here is the prof that leaving Mapping borders open source is not the way: https://www.calcalistech.com/ctechnews/article/r1hyeammt https://www.calcalistech.com/ctechnews/article/r1hyeammt

Maxion 3y ago

That's quite the edge case, though. This is exceedingly useful for so many use cases. E.g. internal tools that display locations of assets, system statuses, webpages that display store locations, and so forth. Plenty of use cases where the costs for Googles APIs would exceed the dev costs for implementing something like this.

maxerickson 3y ago

A commercial data provider can also be showing a manipulated border, and is at least making some kind of editorial decision about what they are showing (whether they think so or not).

JimDabell 3y ago
For instance: Why isn't my time zone highlighted on the world map? > In early 1995, a border war broke out between Peru and Ecuador and the Peruvian government complained to Microsoft that the border was incorrectly placed. Of course, if we complied and moved the border northward, we’d get an equally angry letter from the Ecuadorian government demanding that we move it back. So we removed the feature altogether. > The time zone map met a similar fate. The Indian government threatened to ban all Microsoft software from the country because we assigned a disputed region to Pakistan in the time zone map. (Any map that depicts an unfavorable border must bear a government stamp warning the end-user that the borders are incorrect. You can’t stamp software.) We had to make a special version of Windows 95 for them. — https://devblogs.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/20030822-00/?p=42823 https://devblogs.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/20030822-00/?p=42...

bdon 3y ago

Indeed! The Protomaps project encompasses the generation of basemap PMTiles and the ecosystem for delivering them to clients. It supplies a standard daily build from OpenStreetMap, and since the generation is open source it can be customized to conform with your specific requirements.

carlosjobim 3y ago

There are no "official map boundaries" when it comes to conflicted borders.

YoshiRulz 3y ago

I think the downvotes may be because people take "When it is open source there could be some manipulation" to mean that you think proprietary alternatives are somehow safe from such manipulation—but of course they aren't, least of all Google Maps.

FpUser 3y ago

>"There are several border conflicts. When it is open source there could be some manipulation." Manipulation can and does happen with non open source data. Just ask any politician. You should be thankful to developers who did a great service for free. If something is incorrect because of conflicts - the world will sort it out eventually. It is not developers job. PS - I did not downvoted as I never downvote any posts.

wolverine876 3y ago
> PS - I did not downvoted as I never downvote any posts. Sounds like a good policy.

Aeolun 3y ago

> All I'm saying is that official map boundaries these days should be used. Pray tell, which official map boundaries should be used? The whole problem being that officials disagree of course.