4 ms·

My biggest problem with maps these days is the data license for commercial use. I dont need very detailed map, usually administrative level 2, but it's hard to

My biggest problem with maps these days is the data license for commercial use. I dont need very detailed map, usually administrative level 2, but it's hard to find accurate sources that dont make you pay thousands of dollars per small userbase. We create our own app and distribute it, therefore cannot exactly estimate our userbase. Does anybody know of a decent source with good, fairly detailed world maps and liberal license ? Doesn't have to be free.

henryboston 13y ago
http://www.openstreetmap.org/#map=5/51.500/-0.100 http://www.openstreetmap.org/#map=5/51.500/-0.100
maxerickson 13y ago
Openstreetmap? Just requires a simple attribution. (there are certainly lots of things to work on in the data)
- polskibus 13y ago
  The freely available dumps to SHP are not up -to-date or have insufficient details and my several efforts to produce an SHP myself have failed. I'd like to be able to produce a shp dump that contains only selected "layer" for given country.
  - sivetic 13y ago
    I think OGR (gdal.org) has an OSM driver that you can install optionally to go from OSM -> SHP. Problem is that SHP and OSM are not 100% compatible formats, so data massaging may be necessary in many cases. Also, Geofabrik.de will export it for you for a fee.
    - polskibus 13y ago
      I tried QGis 2 with built-in OSM support but I was unable to properly download data through it. Perhaps I was doing something wrong, I'd love to read a good tutorial on this. If you happen to find one, let me know!
      - sivetic 13y ago
        It's been a while since I played with OSM data. OGR 1.10.0 supports OSM, and you can grab it from various sources (gdal.org or gisinternals.com/sdk/ if you want latest windows binaries). Converting OSM -> SHP should be relatively similar to other formats, and there are a good number of tutorials out there for using OGR. Here's their page on OSM: http://www.gdal.org/ogr/drv_osm.html http://www.gdal.org/ogr/drv_osm.html
sivetic 13y ago
What kind of data are you looking for? Many governments provide data for their own country, with differing licenses (the Canadian ones I've used are commercial-friendly). There are a good number of open GIS data initiatives around the world, that you should be able to find exactly what you're looking for. You can also check the data that ESRI provides, as some is free, and other is paid.
Thrymr 13y ago
Natural Earth data [0] is public domain. Their terms of use state "No permission is needed to use Natural Earth. Crediting the authors is unnecessary." But I think they only have down to admin level 1. [0]: http://www.naturalearthdata.com/downloads http://www.naturalearthdata.com/downloads

henryboston 13y ago

http://www.openstreetmap.org/#map=5/51.500/-0.100 http://www.openstreetmap.org/#map=5/51.500/-0.100

maxerickson 13y ago

Openstreetmap? Just requires a simple attribution. (there are certainly lots of things to work on in the data)

polskibus 13y ago
The freely available dumps to SHP are not up -to-date or have insufficient details and my several efforts to produce an SHP myself have failed. I'd like to be able to produce a shp dump that contains only selected "layer" for given country.
- sivetic 13y ago
  I think OGR (gdal.org) has an OSM driver that you can install optionally to go from OSM -> SHP. Problem is that SHP and OSM are not 100% compatible formats, so data massaging may be necessary in many cases. Also, Geofabrik.de will export it for you for a fee.
  - polskibus 13y ago
    I tried QGis 2 with built-in OSM support but I was unable to properly download data through it. Perhaps I was doing something wrong, I'd love to read a good tutorial on this. If you happen to find one, let me know!
    - sivetic 13y ago
      It's been a while since I played with OSM data. OGR 1.10.0 supports OSM, and you can grab it from various sources (gdal.org or gisinternals.com/sdk/ if you want latest windows binaries). Converting OSM -> SHP should be relatively similar to other formats, and there are a good number of tutorials out there for using OGR. Here's their page on OSM: http://www.gdal.org/ogr/drv_osm.html http://www.gdal.org/ogr/drv_osm.html

sivetic 13y ago

What kind of data are you looking for? Many governments provide data for their own country, with differing licenses (the Canadian ones I've used are commercial-friendly). There are a good number of open GIS data initiatives around the world, that you should be able to find exactly what you're looking for. You can also check the data that ESRI provides, as some is free, and other is paid.

Thrymr 13y ago

Natural Earth data [0] is public domain. Their terms of use state "No permission is needed to use Natural Earth. Crediting the authors is unnecessary." But I think they only have down to admin level 1. [0]: http://www.naturalearthdata.com/downloads http://www.naturalearthdata.com/downloads