[Qgis-developer] Adding default OSM backround maps

Tue Mar 21 12:29:10 PDT 2017

Hi

Its really great to see this Paolo. I think the OSM requests all sound reasonable and if we do start representing a high load on their servers we could consider adding a caching proxy between QGIS clients and OSM tile server so that we don't hit their servers too hard.

One thing that I would suggest is that we do not use the default tile renders for OSM - it would be much nicer to provide something 'consumer' orientated rather than the OSM renders which are great for visualizing a broad range of OSM feature types but not IMHO very nice looking cartography. Reaching out to the folks at http://giscience.uni-hd.de <http://giscience.uni-hd.de/> to see if we can use their tile renders might provide a nicer out of the box experience for our users. Of course we would still acknowledge OSM as the source of the data and giscience as source of the renders. Here is an example of their render:

http://korona.geog.uni-heidelberg.de <http://korona.geog.uni-heidelberg.de/>

Regards

Tim

> On 21 Mar 2017, at 4:58 PM, Jorge Gustavo Rocha <jgr at di.uminho.pt> wrote:
> 
> Hi Paolo,
> 
> I can help on this.
> 
> 1. The UserAgent is already a configurable feature in QGIS (under
> Options/Network). Any user can change it, but we can propose another
> default value.
> 
> 2. The QGIS community is very much aware of OpenStreetMap. If we really
> need to make our users more aware, does it make sense to add a new
> button to QGIS to report map errors? (context dependent, when the
> OpenStreetMap layer is shown) It would have the same functionality of
> the notes in OpenStreetMap web interface.
> 
> 3.1 On the "add layer" dialog, we can show the OpenStreetMap url (which
> might change over time) and licenses (for data and tiles) taken from
> settings or an (external) resource. We can make this not hard coded, to
> be modified easily, without upgrading QGIS. We can also check if the
> service is enabled for us, before allow users to add that layer (related
> with 4.).
> 
> 3.2 When the tiles are used in the composer or on the web client, we can
> not enforce an attribution string. We might add or suggest it, but users
> should be free the create and edit the attributions. It the
> responsibility of the user, not a QGIS responsibility.
> 
> 4. We have to handle when tiles are not loading, either because there
> are network problems, server busy, etc. We can customize the user's
> feedback regarding the load of the default OpenStreetMap tiles. But we
> definitely need to know formally when they shut our access down. This is
> related with 3.1 issue. If the access is disabled, we can also disable
> adding default OpenStreetMap tiles option.
> 
> Regards,
> 
> Jorge Gustavo
> 
> Às 09:52 de 21-03-2017, Paolo Cavallini escreveu:
>> Hi all,
>> we have been exploring the possibility of adding default XYZ maps to
>> QGIS, so to make life far easier for users.
>> The good news is that the OSM board is quite positive about this.
>> The not-so-good news is that their (I believe reasonable) requirements
>> imply some more development from our side.
>> Is anyone interested in taking this?
>> Requirements below.
>> All the best.
>> ===
>> 
>> 1. You seem to be using an user agent of "Mozilla/5.0 QGIS/2.18.3". We
>> strongly recommend that you don't pretend to be a browser by adding the
>> "Mozilla" bit. OpenStreetMap sees increasing traffic from "fake" user
>> agents, and it is likely that we will penalise user agents like that at
>> some point in the future - meaning tiles will still be served, but
>> slower than to "honest" user agents that don't pretend to be a browser
>> when they are not. We understand that this is difficult terrain and that
>> other data sources might actually *require* that you pretend to be a
>> browser - perhaps per-datasource overrides of the user agent are a
>> possibility.
>> 
>> 2. As you know, OpenStreetMap thrives on contributions by mappers, and
>> one of the main reasons we make our tiles freely available is the hope
>> of attracting new contributors. It would be nice if QGIS could do its
>> part to help us here, by making their users aware that OSM is open for
>> everyone to contribute. Perhaps a link to
>> http://www.openstreetmap.org/fixthemap can be placed somewhere in the
>> layer description or something.
>> 
>> 3. Our data is licensed under ODbL 1.0, and our map tiles are CC-BY-SA
>> 2.0. The latter could change at any time; the former is
>> relatively constant.
>> 
>> The legal consequences of this situation for your users are:
>> 
>> * If they publish an image in which our tiles are visible, they must
>> attribute OpenStreetMap as the source, and specify that the map image is
>> CC-BY-SA 2.0, and specify that the data behind it is ODbL 1.0. All these
>> requirements can be fulfilled in one go by linking to
>> www.openstreetmap.org/copyright but there is no legal requirement to
>> link to that page.
>> 
>> * Everyone is allowed to create derivatives of OpenStreetMap data - for
>> example by tracing features on the OSM tiles - and freely distribute
>> them. Such derived datasets, unless they are "insubstantial"
>> (https://wiki.osmfoundation.org/wiki/Licence/Community_Guidelines/Substantial_-_Guideline)
>> inherit the ODbL license and must, when publicly used, on request be
>> made available under ODbL.
>> 
>> 4. If the load coming from QGIS should be unexpectedly high and impact
>> our service performance, there might come a time where we'd have to
>> throttle or even switch off this access. You should have some mechanism
>> or plan that deals with that to avoid frustration among your user base -
>> maybe a mechanism where QGIS installations request updated tile sources
>> from a central service so you could notify them of the OSM tiles not
>> being available (or being available elsewhere) should the need arise.
>> 
> 
> J. Gustavo
> -- 
> Jorge Gustavo Rocha
> Departamento de Informática
> Universidade do Minho
> 4710-057 Braga
> Tel: +351 253604480
> Fax: +351 253604471
> Móvel: +351 910333888
> skype: nabocudnosor
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Tim Sutton

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