[OSGeo-Discuss] Auto-generation of HTML maps and web galleries

[Kjell Are Refsvik]

On 8. juli. 2008, at 16.53, Tyler Mitchell (OSGeo) wrote:
> ...
> I'd highly recommend this approach - no programming needed, only  
> editing a simple text file, then running the command.

A final attempt at making the generation of maps to my web-page  
easier, I have an alternative approach to suggest:

1. Go looking for .osm (XML) map files
2. Convert XML to text files and run the output text-file through  
GNUplot and output as PNG

To test, I threw in a snippet of a converted .gpx file into the latest  
GNUplot:

33.900649900     35.483151600
33.900643300     35.483158300
33.900644900     35.483195000
...

... (lan/lot) and this is what came out:

http://www.ia-stud.hiof.no/~kjellare/misc/GNUplot_gpx_snippet.png

This has been done before, but I think it is safe to say that it is  
not a widely used approach:

http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/2005/09/
http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/index.php/Print_OpenStreetMap_with_Gnuplot

This reduces this part of the project to a relatively basic character  
conversion job done with some bare-bones unix conversion utilities.  
And - given that plenty of OSM-data is out there - lets me stay away  
from the binary shapefile-format.

As my thesis in general is going to discuss open formats and longevity  
of data and software, this looks like more the kind of solution that  
in sync with the rest of my theoretical discussion.

Has anyone got any strong opinions or warnings about this approach?

Kjell Are Refsvik