I’m also taking this course. I’ve done a lot of OSM, but took the course because I don’t know much about the basics behind the map. I think the course won’t help with editing OSM much. Knowing how to edit and map are much different than understanding the abstractions the course talks about. They did talk about the Haiti map, but without attribution.

And you can do it even better. Best wishes!

Nice work, and welcome. If you are restless, you can always map most anywhere in the world that has aerial imagery. Straighten a road here, add a lake there or a building. Add a rail. Again, welcome, and thanks for your work.

(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speed_of_light)

At this point in the US map, the tag is less important than the road/feature being correctly placed on the map. While the map does look deceptively good only from a high zoom, the TIGER data is a net improvement. It would take many years for users to drive or bike every road to name streets, as already done by TIGER. And I grudgingly admit that most of the data regarding naming is good, and is now available to be fixed from a user anywhere.

The default editor is easier to use than JOSM. Save often, so you can bail out if you’re not so sure of your last edits. I think this won’t be a problem for you. Don’t forget the UNDO key, “Z” does the same. “Map Features” is priceless http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Map_Features.

Welcome and all the best to you!

Thank you all, I will try to pull something together. I do think it’s important.

Kindest regards!

Preaching to the choir! We need this in Bangkok and Peoria.

Finally, some discussion of this. I have been aligning and editing TIGER data for some months now. The sole value of this data base is the names of roads. Everything else is useless. If I draw a bridge based on Bing, I delete everything below 'tiger reviewed', because it is not based on tiger. When I redraw and city, it is largely based on Bing, not tiger. I haven't been deleting tiger tags, but am always tempted....

The chance that there will be another tiger upload is slim. Our data is now better than anything the gov can make, given their financial condition. It is more likely that they will use our data. They would be stupid not to. Portland, OR uses OSM now, because the mapping company they had been using wanted $100k per year. Other cities will follow, if the data is worth a damn. In many areas it isn't.

But it is not so hard to correct. Pick a city, trust the aerial (if there is a problem I haven't found it yet, and the tiger map is much worse in every case}, and realign the roads. Move the POI to somewhere near where they should be, and this map will be something!

You could also contact them and offer to help them get started.

As above, but press 'space bar' first.

Someone should be able to block this. If so, please do!

OSM is not a political forum.

Thailand needs some work, though it is improving rapidly! Any help, especially from Thais, is greatly appreciated.

Ray,

Feel free to contact me directly with questions. I can help, just as one other user helped me to do this right (I was at first blocked for my mistakes). Since then I've done lots of edits. Things that are obvious to me now were not so clear at my start. Again, I will work with you, just ask.

Best wishes, Sam