[NBLUG/talk] Open source Linux Foundation alternative to Google Maps

[Brad Morrison]

Derek: I usually still use Google Maps on my LineageOS OnePlus 6T 
smartphone, but I access it through the web browser. The problem is that 
only the app has turn by turn directions, so if I am alone in the car, I 
have missed the correct turn on occasion...

I believe that I have mentioned this to you before in person, but maybe 
there are others on the NBLUG talk list that are also running LineageOS 
(or any smartphone without the Google Play Store or Apple App Store) 
that we don't know about.

As far as the corporate supporters of the effort to create an open 
source alternative to Google Maps, I'm guessing that the motivation is 
as much financial as competitive control. Does Google charge corporate 
users of its mapping software to use the data? I would assume that 
Amazon would have to pay licensing fees if their scanners for parcel 
delivery use Google Maps and their parcel routing software uses Google 
Maps, but it might be more that they just do not want Google to have 
access to all of that delivery data - ? It would give Google a way to 
target Amazon's most frequent/Prime customers.

I have done some inquiries with various people in the ESG investment 
realm about open source software use as the subject of shareholder 
resolutions at publicly traded tech companies. Long story, but open 
source software inventories are rarely known by shareholders (AKA 
publicly available) and there have been very few shareholder resolutions 
on the subject of open source software use. Someone mentioned to me that 
they had filed an open source shareholder resolution with Oracle in 2007 
that got about 3% of the vote, which apparently was not as bad as it 
sounded, since Larry Ellison owned about 25% of the voting shares at the 
time. I thought that using as much open source software as possible 
could be considered a fiduciary responsibility in the sense of not 
wasting company resources on unnecessary proprietary expenses. It's a 
big project of mine, I'll update as news trickles in...

Tom: I have not used OpenStreetMaps nor Organic Maps on my phone. I also 
like that Google Maps has the public transit schedules built into their 
directions feature. I don't mind using Google Services as much now that 
I am not forced to have a Google account. I take the bus from Santa Rosa 
to see my parents in Kenwood fairly often and I do miss not having 
access to the NextBus app that Sonoma County transit uses to allow a 
transit rider to check where the next bus in, so you know if it is going 
to be relatively on time.

Brad

> On Fri, 16 Dec 2022 12:58:41 -0800
> Brad Morrison <bradmorrison at sonic.net> wrote:
>
>> Well, I screwed up the first link to the City of Santa Rosa's
>> technology auctions
>> (https://www.publicsurplus.com/sms/ci.santa-rosa.ca.us,ca/list/current?orgid=14286),
>> so while I'm correcting that, here's another story I read this
>> morning about an effort coordinated by the Linux Foundation to bring
>> a valid competitor to Google Maps into being. It seems to have quite
>> some big names attached to the project, but we'll see how much they
>> are willing to invest.
>> https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2022/12/linux-amazon-meta-and-microsoft-want-to-break-the-google-maps-monopoly/
>>
>> I'm sure that Derek will be happy to hear that!
> Indeed!  That does look like good news.  Skeptic that I am, though, I'm
> going to wait and see just how open they are.  (Amazon, Meta, and
> Microsoft... that doesn't make me super-optimistic.)
>
>  From my point of view as an un-Googled Android phone user, the biggest
> problem is lack of a decent mapping app.  The OpenStreetMaps data is
> actually ok in my experience (not great, but mostly good enough) -- but
> there's only one open source Android app that I've found, and it's not
> so great.
>
> I ran into someone a while back who's pretty familiar with OSM, and he
> pointed out that they're set up to distribute datasets, not so much to
> be a real-time data provider for applications.  So one barrier is that
> any good mapping app will need some servers (could be AWS or whatever)
> to host the map data.  It's not clear where an open source mapping app
> will get the money for that.
>
> - Derek
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 3
> Date: Fri, 16 Dec 2022 14:52:08 -0800
> From: "Tom Most" <twm at freecog.net>
> To: talk at nblug.org
> Subject: Re: [NBLUG/talk] corrected link to City of SR tech surplus
> 	auctions & Linux Foundation competitor to Google Maps
> Message-ID: <ab332835-1279-4f6a-9f88-50e4c0a0394c at app.fastmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain
>
> On Fri, Dec 16, 2022, at 1:11 PM, Derek B. Noonburg wrote:
>>  From my point of view as an un-Googled Android phone user, the biggest
>> problem is lack of a decent mapping app.  The OpenStreetMaps data is
>> actually ok in my experience (not great, but mostly good enough) -- but
>> there's only one open source Android app that I've found, and it's not
>> so great.
> The app you're using is OsmAnd+? There is another one I like: Organic Maps. It's oriented toward pedestrian use, so there is a high and consistent level of detail. Like it shows *all* the street names, and house numbers (if in the OSM dataset).
>
> Tom
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 4
> Date: Fri, 16 Dec 2022 15:23:02 -0800
> From: "Derek B. Noonburg" <derekn at foolabs.com>
> To: "Tom Most" <twm at freecog.net>
> Cc: "General NBLUG chatter about anything Linux, answers to questions,
> 	etc." <talk at nblug.org>
> Subject: Re: [NBLUG/talk] corrected link to City of SR tech surplus
> 	auctions & Linux Foundation competitor to Google Maps
> Message-ID: <20221216152302.293d5676 at numbat>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
>
> On Fri, 16 Dec 2022 14:52:08 -0800
> "Tom Most" <twm at freecog.net> wrote:
>
>> On Fri, Dec 16, 2022, at 1:11 PM, Derek B. Noonburg wrote:
>>>  From my point of view as an un-Googled Android phone user, the
>>> biggest problem is lack of a decent mapping app.  The
>>> OpenStreetMaps data is actually ok in my experience (not great, but
>>> mostly good enough) -- but there's only one open source Android app
>>> that I've found, and it's not so great.
>> The app you're using is OsmAnd+? There is another one I like: Organic
>> Maps. It's oriented toward pedestrian use, so there is a high and
>> consistent level of detail. Like it shows *all* the street names, and
>> house numbers (if in the OSM dataset).
> Cool, thanks.  I just installed it, and I'll give it a try.
>
> And following up on my own point:
>
>> I ran into someone a while back who's pretty familiar with OSM, and he
>> pointed out that they're set up to distribute datasets, not so much to
>> be a real-time data provider for applications.  So one barrier is that
>> any good mapping app will need some servers (could be AWS or whatever)
>> to host the map data.  It's not clear where an open source mapping app
>> will get the money for that.
> Actually, both OsmAnd+ and Organic Maps pre-download all of the map
> data to your phone -- there's no need for real-time data fetching at
> all.  So scratch my point about that being a barrier.
>
> - Derek
>
>
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