TomTom
TomTom is a Dutch multinational developer and creator of location technology and consumer electronics. TomTom has been making data improvements to OpenStreetMap through organised editing since 2021. TomTom announced that its new TomTom Map will use OSM data when it is released, sometime in 2023. TomTom will attribute this map according to the ODbL attribution guidelines.
Contributions
TomTom contributes to OSM in a variety of ways, including releasing two tools (see Community Tools below), sponsoring State of the Map conferences and local OSM communities, map editing leads, and making approved data improvements in the OSM map.
Map Data Improvements
TomTom has made map data improvements in over 200 countries and contributed editing leads via MapRoulette challenges for OSM community editors in several more.
For details about how TomTom contributes map data improvements, see Organised Editing/Activities/TomTom and Automated edits/TTmechanicalupdates.
Community Tools
TomTom has created tools that use GPS data to identify potential problems in the map. These tools are available to the community to use as resources when making edits to OSM.
MapMetrics
MapMetrics helps to identify routing issues in OSM.
Portions of the map can have bad routing for a variety of reasons, including missing roads, inaccurate one-way streets, and poorly drawn connections between roads. MapMetrics uses billions of GPS traces to assess how close drivers are to the route that the OSM engine suggests. When the tool identifies large deviations from the suggested route, it highlights those map areas with a red-to-green color scale, making it easier for map editors to identify and correct errors in the map.
To read more about MapMetrics, see Happy Birthday, OpenStreetMap! and The battle for quality maps on the TomTom blog.
RoadRunner
RoadRunner helps to improve the accuracy of the road network in OSM.
This tool uses vast amounts of GPS trace data to automatically generate a road network. The road centerlines that it generates can be loaded as a custom background in the OSM iD Editor. The centerlines can then be used to identify missing and misaligned roads in the map.
To read more about RoadRunner, see RoadRunner: Instant Maps on the TomTom blog.
Sponsorships
TomTom provides sponsorship support to OSM in the following ways:
- OpenStreetMap Belgium – corporate members
- 2022 State of the Map US – anniversary sponsor
- 2022 State of the Map Firenze – gold sponsor
OSM and TomTom Devices
The Dutch company TomTom manufactures a range of Linux-based satellite navigation hardware, including a car navigation software and several streetmaps. In addition they have ported their software to several PDAs and mobile phones equipped with Bluetooth or built in GPS receivers.
- See also GPS Reviews, Tom Tom Devices.
The navigation units do not normally record tracks. However all recent TomTom units run Linux and allow other software to be installed and run, which extend the functionality of the original firmware. Some useful tools (to record tracks, and others) are listed below:
Using OSM maps with TomToms
Successful attempts were made with Navit software, see TomTom on their wiki.
Though TomTom's mapping format is a closely guarded secret, both for copy protection and because if you knew how they stored the maps, they would be giving away a lot of their navigation secrets. As a result there is no software to allow OSM mapping to be converted to the format the TomTom app uses, and unlikely to be any unless TomTom themselves make it.
- ttMaps enables the display of raster maps (ECW format) for navigation. It can be used with downloaded OSM maps.
- Another method to display OSM maps on TomTom could be porting Gosmore to OpenTom. (mail)
Tracking Tools
- Le Web Bazar offers several add-on applications for TomTom units, including:
- NMEALogger dumps the nmea output from the receiver into a log file on the memory card or internal FLASH memory. New logs can be automatically created when the unit is resumed.
- Tripmaster is a more complex applet, with compass, GPS position and such. It can log directly to GPX or KML files. However, it is using the corrected (copyrighted) position from the TomTom software as default. Therefore it must be switched to "Real" coordinates for collecting tracks for OSM. As a downside of Tripmaster, the TomTom moving map is moving noticeably slower (sometimes even freezes for a few seconds) and the TomTom often crashes when selecting a new routing target. The recommended configuration settings (reachable by pressing the ][ button at the bottom right) are:
- Setup: Coordinates "Real" - to get "uncorrected" GPS coordinates, this is important
- Event Logger can produce GPX tracks. In early versions the produced GPX tracks were corrected by the TomTom's built-in Maps, and hence using them in OSM is not possible. Versions 6.4 and newer can make a GPX of the raw data from the GPS device. Note: The log interval should be something around 1 second and the Event Logger only logs your position every 10 seconds (?), this is enough to map straight streets but you'll not have enough data to map a turn or smaller details. See this page for more Information about installing Event_Logger on TomTom. --Cohort 2 June 2008 (UTC)
- ttMaps enables the display of raster maps (ECW format) for navigation. While ttMaps can handle tiled maps, it's faster when using a single big image for each map set. Among the features which are most interesting for OSM users and mappers:
- Track recording, import and export (GPX)
- NMEA stream recording
- Pedestrian mode to get smoother GPS coordinates (must be enabled for OSM data collection)
- Back and forth switching between several sets of maps, at the touch of a button (installing several OSM map sets rendered at different zoom levels, this feature can be used as a slippy map zooming function)
- Display of the current or of a stored track (great to visually check which parts have already been explored)
- Route display (GPX)
- POI management (GPX and OV2 formats), with position averaging function.
- Switch off the display after a certain time (configurable) of non-use, for increased battery life. --Kaitu 12:32, 13 May 2009 (UTC)
Comparison
Feature | Tripmaster | Event Logger | NMEAlogger | ttMaps |
---|---|---|---|---|
Save NMEA Stream | yes | no | yes | yes |
Produce GPX files | yes | yes | no | yes |
Coordinates not "corrected" (realigned) by TomTom Map | Depends on setting | Depends on setting/version | yes | yes |
Maximum sample rate | 1 sec | 4 sec | 1 sec | 1 sec |
System load | medium | medium | fair | replaces main application |
Supports altitude | yes | yes | yes | yes |
Supports geoid altitude correction | yes | yes | no | yes |
Supports external SD-card | ?
|
yes | no | yes |
Supports local timezone | no | yes | no | yes |
Supports compressed log files | no | yes | no | yes |
Flexibility/settings | high | high | low | high |
User interaction | high | high | medium | high |
Shows the track over map | no | route display via .ITN files | no | yes |
Raster maps display | no | no | no | ECW (*) |
Automatic start at boot | ?
|
Depends on setting | no | Depends on setting |
Works on most recent (9.026) navcore version | Depends on hook | yes | ?
|
yes |
Can work also without TomTom's navigation application | no | no | no | yes |
Open source (GPL) software | no | no[1] | no | no |
- (*):ECW is an image compression format, within which geographical referencing and map projection information can be embedded, suitable for very large images. --Kaitu 18:42, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
OpenTom
OpenTom was a center of 3rd party open-source development for the TomTom. There were two intentions of this project:
- One was to write and document the writing of add-ons for the normal TomTom software.
- The other was to write a new software stack from scratch. Currently, there are no maps or navigation facilities.
Using OSM POIs with TomToms
If you are using Linux, you can use osm-ov2 to download OpenStreetMap data from Geofabrik, extract points of interest and convert them to OV2 format for use in TomTom satnavs.
Using Osmosis with GPSBabel is also possible.
TomTom Users in the OpenStreetMap community
User | Model | Logger | Comment |
---|---|---|---|
AlexZ | ONE V3 | NMEALogger | |
Bmarand | ONE V1 | TTTracklog | |
Christopher | ONE V2 | NMEALogger | |
Cimm | only the Bluetooth receiver with 3rd party software | ||
Christian Krützfeldt | ONE V3 | ||
Clive | |||
Cohort | ONE V3 | EventLogger v8.3 | |
cputrdoc | GO 920T | EventLogger | |
eclispe | ONE V2 | NMEALogger | |
EmJay | Navigator 6 on PalmOne TREO 650 | ||
farrpau | ONE V3 | EventLogger | |
Franc Carter | GO 910 | - | experimenting with TripMaster, EventLogger and NMEALogger to see which I like |
User:Gorn | GO 910 | EventLogger | |
HBR | GO 720T | EventLogger | Just starting HBR 00:50, 4 January 2009 (UTC) |
jcr83 | ONE V1 | ttMaps v0.7.0 | |
Jean-Yves | ONE V3 | EventLogger v8.0 | |
Joghurt | several | ||
Jon | GO 510 | ||
Jonnybob | ONE XL | Tripmaster | |
kaitu | ONE V2 | ttMaps | |
Keichi | ONE V3 | EventLogger v8.0 | |
user:kollokollo | ONE V3 | TTTracklog | |
Langläufer | GO 930T | NMEALogger 2.0 | Tripmaster 3.1 also works fine, but I only want a small logger |
user:la_poigne | Start | TTTracklog | |
Magne | GO 910 | ||
Marc | tried the cross compiler, want to compile extra stuff, people needed | ||
Mercator | GO 910 | NMEALogger | |
mike alder | GO 910 | for mapping and OSM display on unit | |
Navisence | Rider V2 | EventLogger | |
NukSu | ONE XL | NMEALogger | |
phobie | ONE V4 | NMEALogger | |
Pjw1965 | ONE V1 | NMEALogger | |
Robert (Jamie) Munro | |||
User:Rob Latham | ONE | Tripmaster | |
Rodrigo Moya | |||
RWoelfel | 510 | Tripmaster | |
Sannifrosch | ONE v3 | TTTracklog | successfully using TTTracklog on my device |
Simone | 300 | NMEALogger | |
Thomas Petazzoni | GO 920 | Event Logger | |
Tor Harald Thorland | GO 720T | NMEALogger 1.5 | |
ULFL | Rider | Tripmaster | |
Willi2006 | Wireless GPS receiver (Bluetooth) | using the Bluetooth receiver with JOSM on a netbook with Windows 7 | |
Wookey | have tomtoms, interested in improving software infrastructure for their use with OSM |
Additional TomTom Pages
Organised Editing/Activities/TomTom
Automated edits/TTmechanicalupdates