Tuesday, May 8, 2012

OSM map

How to create OSM based printable map with including a GPS track (suitable for running/hiking)?


Of course the above mentioned tasks needs to be done under Linux.

List of tools

so far just listing some tools that I had tried out to fulfill this task, more details will follow...
  • Maperative
  • QLandkarte GT
  • Mkgmap
  • Josm + OSMrenderer (http://www.use-it.be/europe/docs/OSMmanual/)
  • MOBAC
  • Viking

Experience

MOBAC

So far MOBAC (Mobile Atlas Creator) looks quite good to me as it's easy to use and supports lots of mapsource already (OSM Hike&Bike rendering for example) and you can easily extend this. Furthermore its easy to use and it does download required map data automatically for a given zoom level. Printable maps can be created as PDF for different zoom levels.
Current limitation ... which renders it useless for my purpose ... it does not yet support a rendered gpx track to be shown and included into the printable PDF.
On the other hand this feature is acknowledged to be missing and some code support already exists. I'll see how good my Java skills will be in order to fix it ...

Viking

Viking is basically a GPS data editor and analyzer. But you can also use it to generate a printed map containing your GPS trace (or track). You open a gps file and then add a new "Map Layer". Select map source and then the map tiles should download for your area. Viking allows to save the map as bitmap image file (png or jpeg).


In order to add a OSM hike & bike map rendered map type you can extend viking via a ~/.viking/maps.xml file

<objects>
<object class="VikSlippyMapSource">
  <property name="label">OSM hike/bike</property>
  <property name="hostname">toolserver.org</property>
  <property name="url">/tiles/hikebike/%d/%d/%d.png</property>
  <property name="id">200</property>
</object>
</objects>



Bitmap to PDF

To convert large image files to PDF (containing multiple pages) you can use PosteRazor.


Do you have a good idea? Please let me know.