Foundation/AGM2024/Election to Board/Answers and manifestos/Q11 Technology and Innovation
Technology and Innovation
OpenStreetMap relies heavily on technology. How satisfied are you with the current state of the technology that powers OSM? How would you support or encourage technological advancements and innovation within the OSM ecosystem? What technology changes are the most pressing?
Craig Allan - Q11 Technology and Innovation
The Technology we have works very well. The Engineering and Ops teams do great work in keeping our systems running reliably and safely. Could IT systems be improved? Yes, they could. Would I support improvements and how would I do it? It’s complicated and it is cultural. As a voluntary organisation our members’ time is scarce and valuable. There is not a deep resource of systems administrators or software developers. Changing anything new means much more work for already stretched volunteers during the installation and testing phase and a small increment of work once the new features are settled in.
Adding features will depend on the new features use profile. We’d probably most welcome new or changed code that increases reliability, security and reduces management and maintenance. One example is the vector tiles project. It offers so many advantages over bitmap tiles that the Foundation has backed development and implementation. The most pressing technology changes are, in my humble opinion, containerisation of software, total replacement of spinning disks with solid state drives and implementing automatic fail-over between data centres.
We have a problem with Distributed Denial of Service (DDOS) attacks, so whatever DWG and Ops WG want to do to eliminate the impact of those will get my support. Prevention and repair of massive vandalism is another problem - see the next question for my approach.
Brazil Singh - Q11 Technology and Innovation
I believe that technology is fundamental to the success and growth of OpenStreetMap (OSM). While the current technology powering OSM is robust and effective, there are always areas for improvement and innovation. Overall, the technology behind OSM, including its mapping tools, data management systems, and infrastructure, is impressive and has supported the platform well. However, there are always opportunities to enhance these technologies to better serve the needs of the community and adapt to new challenges. We should partnerships with technology companies and research institutions to leverage their expertise and resources for advancing OSM technology. Also we should advocate for and assist in securing funding for technological projects and innovations. This could involve applying for grants, seeking sponsorships, or organizing fundraising campaigns focused on technology development. To improve Data Quality and Management we have to develop and integrate more advanced data validation and quality control tools to improve the accuracy and reliability of OSM data. On more important thing is that we ave to focus on enhancing mobile tools and applications to support users in the field with better offline functionality and real-time data syncing.
Courtney Cook Williamson - Q11 Technology and Innovation
I am not qualified to comment on the technology. I will say one thing that I can infer, based on working with engineers and product managers for six years: OSM needs to keep up. Things are changing fast. We will need funding, and we will need to be open to new ideas if we want to protect the quality and integrity of OSM.org.
Maurizio Napolitano - Q11 Technology and Innovation
OpenStreetMap is, in itself, a major driver of innovation. Just browsing the OSM wiki pages is enough to see the wealth of content and the many innovative tools and concepts it has spawned around its data. While some core technological components must be maintained due to their complexity, their performance needs to be improved to meet modern demands. Many third-party tools developed around OSM are highly innovative, and OSMF could benefit from supporting, integrating, or adopting them, while keeping the data at its core. Priorities should include data collection infrastructure, data quality verification tools, and data conversion and dissemination. Finally, it is crucial to maintain OSM’s pioneering spirit by continually improving data quality and fostering innovation in the ecosystem. A dedicated task force to explore and integrate new innovations around OSM could meet this need and help the project grow.
Can Ünen - Q11 Technology and Innovation
I am really happy with the state of vibrancy in technological developments and the innovative ideas within the ecosystem. More and more tools avail OSM data to newer users, and there are both innovative and practical efforts that would support the data contributors. What I see the most pressing of changes for some time is the increasing presence of AI-generated data, and the AI-assisted mapping tools. With the availability of high resolution imagery (will come to that bit in a minute too) feature recognition and geometric accuracy will get better and better to a point that nobody will be able to deny its merits. But beyond geometric feature recognition, there is another aspect where AI will not excel as good as a person on the ground soon: attribute information. So, along with AI generated geometry, the need for mobile editors and data collectors would be of great importance. The other pressing matter would be availability of and accessibility to imagery. After Maxar revoked access to their imagery services, we have seen that access to imagery is a very serious dependency for us. So another pressing technological change in my opinion should be the availability of open imagery services where contributors acquire and share their visual records. And the maintenance, improvement, and sustainability of the existing imagery tools for that matter.
Michael Montani - Q11 Technology and Innovation
I am satisfied with the technology running OpenStreetMap until now and enthusiastic about the adoption of new technological advancements like vector tiles.
I think technology advancement on OSM should mainly aim at increasing the distribution and accessibility of OSM data in an attempt to relief operational costs of the infrastructure. Secondly, I would focus on applications helping data validation to be performed more efficiently by expert users (more on Q12). Eventually, I am interested on applications involved in highlighting social aspects of the OSM data (changeset comments, usage of OSM messages, history of contributions and user classification). I do not see technological advancement as a need per se, if it does not provide support to operational needs.
I have always been involved a lot on composing software to process OSM data and have perfect knowledge of its data model, but I am not following much the latest developments on the infrastructure and other technologies in general. I am open in exploring more and get to know from more knowledgeable members of the community.
Andrés Gómez Casanova - Q11 Technology and Innovation
The Board should consult the Engineering Working Group and ask for its opinion. The Board should avoid issues related to the OSM project, but whatever decision is taken, the OSMF should support it. For this reason, spaces should be opened for the voices of experts to be heard, and based on this, the EWG should forge opinions, which the Board will decide.
Laura Mugeha - Q11 Technology and Innovation
OSM's current technology infrastructure is robust and has proven to be scalable by enabling millions of contributors to collaborate using various editors. However, we face technical challenges as most tools that help us avoid real-time editing conflicts and maintain data quality are third-party tools developed by the community rather than integrated core features.
While we have an incredible amount of mapping contribution, I think we need to also invest our resources in building a stronger developer community around the OSM ecosystem. In addition to mapathons, we can start hosting hackathons and participating in open-source development initiatives like Hacktoberfest, 100 Days of OSS, etc.
We should continue allowing for and scaling the integration of new technologies like AI/ML integration through RapiD and using street-level imagery + detection features. I think we could do so much more when it comes to imagery; we need to explore partnerships to standardize sources and improve the availability of better imagery.
Héctor Ochoa Ortiz - Q11 Technology and Innovation
In my own experience, the popularization of easy-to-use mobile editing apps (Street Complete, Every Door…) in recent times has revolutionized the surveying experience, and lowered the barriers for new mappers. Years ago, when organizing mapping parties, I had the experience of people coming and enjoying the mapping process (we were using Field Papers back then), but then leaving when it was time to upload the data using a computer. Now, easy-to-use apps can be taught in a very short period of time, and people can directly go out and map. Moreover, once they start understanding how to map, they become interested in learning more difficult editors, and map further. I think further development of easy-to-use domain-specific editors, both for phone and desktop, is the way to go.
One domain I would want to see more focus on is small companies maintaining their business locations in an easy-to-use app for non-technical people. The development of domain-specific editors would still be paired with more difficult and complete generalist editors, for more advanced and diverse users.
Regarding the technology to use OSM data, question 14 on Overture Maps explains most of the challenges.
Español
Bajo mi propia experiencia, la popularización de aplicaciones de edición móvil fáciles de usar (Street Complete, Every Door…) en tiempos recientes ha revolucionado la experiencia de recogida de datos, y ha reducido las barreras para nuevos mapeadores. Hace años, cuando organizaba fiestas de mapeo, tuve la experiencia de personas que venían y disfrutaban del proceso de mapeo (usábamos Field Papers en ese entonces), pero luego se iban cuando era el momento de subir los datos en el ordenador. Ahora, las aplicaciones móviles se pueden enseñar en un período de tiempo muy corto, y las personas pueden salir directamente a mapear. Además, una vez que comienzan a entender cómo mapear, se interesan en aprender editores más difíciles, y mapear más. Creo que el desarrollo adicional de editores específicos de dominio fáciles de usar, tanto para móvil como para escritorio, es el camino a seguir.
Un dominio en el que me gustaría ver más enfoque es en las pequeñas empresas manteniendo las ubicaciones de sus negocios en una aplicación fácil de usar para personas no técnicas. El desarrollo de editores específicos para ciertos dominios aún estaría emparejado con editores generalistas más difíciles y completos, para usuarios más avanzados y diversos.
En cuanto a la tecnología para usar datos de OSM, la pregunta 14 sobre Overture Maps explica la mayoría de los retos.
Arun Ganesh - Q11 Technology and Innovation
The technology running OSM is not shiny but robust. I would align with the strategic plan that the primary focus on the tech stack is maintaining core operations and uptime of the system. This focus is what has given rise to a diverse and thriving tech ecosystem around the primary OSM tech stack.
Outside of this focus, the main technology change that would be most essential is having OSMF-supported vector tiles. In today's age of web maps, vector tiles have become the standard offering several advantages. A vector map on the homepage should have been the default by now.
OSM Foundation's board election 2024: official questions
Q01 Motivation and Objectives
| Q02 Conflict of Interest Management
| Q03 Transparency and Accountability
| Q04 Strategic Vision and Sustainability
| Q05 Decision-Making and Collaboration
| Q06 Fundraising and Resource Development
| Q07 Handling Legal and Political Challenges
| Q08 State of the Map
| Q09 Your Community Contributions
| Q10 Promoting Community and Attracting Volunteers
| Q11 Technology and Innovation
| Q12 Data Quality and Protection
| Q13 Perspective on Open Source
| Q14 Perspective on Overture Maps
All board candidates' manifestos
2024 OpenStreetMap Foundation's: Board election - Voting information and instructions - Annual General Meeting
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