[qwertay]

Wikipedia shows that average people are pretty good at assembling data. The problem is drive by contributors are not very good at developing software. Wikipedia is super basic software wise while GIS and everything around it is extremely complex.

The data in OSM is pretty good but there are no apps for it that are actually good other than leaflet JS for embedding on sites.

Have to remember that a maps app is way more than just data. Its efficient routing, its good text to speach, its pulling in data from multiple sources like the gps location of the bus I'm waiting for or the roads closed for construction currently.

You would also need a whole bunch of heuristics for the OSM dataset that the current apps don't have. OsmAnd would not be able to tell the difference between the turning lane on an intersection and an entire road that just has no name because the way the data is entered is there is just an unamed path joining the roads so the text to speach would say "bear slightly left" instead of "turn right on to foo street".

[berkes]

Graphhopper is an excellent open source routing engine.

I'm not sure if you are really saying that Open Source is unfit for GIS. Because there is a lot of proof it is a perfectly suited model for GIS.

[moooo99]

Absolutely true, Graphhopper is amazing.

But I completely agree with the point of the original comment. Open Source software often comes with questionable usability and is often not well fitted to be used by the average consumer. While lots of open source applications offer the same, if not more, features than their commercial counterparts, it often feels like you need a special degree to use a simple android application or desktop app.

Without a good and usable, cross platform application to use with OSM, OSM will never be something used by the average consumer.

[berkes]

Then the conclusion would be "Open Source is unfitted as model to build end-user software for the average consumer".

Which I still disagree with, but that is a different discussion. It has nothing to do with Open Source being unfit as model for sofware around OSM or GIS.

Edit: to be clear: Bing Maps, Apple Maps, Facebook, WhatsApp are just some of the (average) consumer facing products that use OSM for their data. Some solely use OSM as data, others enrich and/or use it to mix with other sources. This to show examples of how OSM data is used in and by apps that you probably use. But where the data is Open Source, the app using it, is not.

[blendergeek]

> Have to remember that a maps app is way more than just data.

Agreed.

> Its efficient routing,

This is a hard one especially for long routes when calculated on a phone rather than on a server.

> its good text to speach,

Ummmm. Text-to-speech is almost always provided by the OS rather than the app.

> its pulling in data from multiple sources like the gps location of the bus I'm waiting for

There are surprisingly good apps for bus navigation using OSM in some parts of the world. Unfortunately, where I live, bus companies seem to "license" that data only to Google.

> or the roads closed for construction currently.

This is literally part of the OSM dataset.

> You would also need a whole bunch of heuristics for the OSM dataset that the current apps don't have. OsmAnd would not be able to tell the difference between the turning lane on an intersection and an entire road that just has no name because the way the data is entered is there is just an unamed path joining the roads so the text to speach would say "bear slightly left" instead of "turn right on to foo street".

Rather than "heuristics for the OSM dataset", we generally need a more complete dataset. A "turning lane on an intersection" and an "entire road that just has no name" should be mapped differently. The turning lane will probably be mapped as a "link" type road with a "destination:street" of the road that it is going to (if it is mapped as a separate road at all). The generic no-name street will be mapped as a road with "noname" (yes, there is a special tag for this). Further, in many cases, a "turning lane" will be mapped with the "turn:lanes" tag on a road leaving no room for confusion with generic unnamed roads.

I will admit that in current mapping in many places you will often get "bear slightly left" rather than "turn right on to foo street". However, this is almost always caused by a (current) lack of completeness in the data rather than a need to create some sort of set of heuristics to figure out what is "actually" going on.

I think the hardest part for a good maps app that you did not mention is search. Searching in OsmAnd (offline) is abysmal. In fact it is worse than that. It is so bad that I will switch to a web browser, search on DDG, open a link in GMaps, find the coordinates and copy them to OsmAnd for routing because I know Osmand search does not have a snowball's chance in h** of remotely finding what I want in any sane manner.

[matkoniecz]

> "entire road that just has no name" should be mapped differently

https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Key:noname (used for example by StreetComplete that I really recommend if someone has Android, wants to contribute and is not interesting in learning to use a complicated editor).