Putting Namibia on the map - literally

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Written on: 05. 06. 2010 [14:01]
gjensen Gerard Jensen registered since: 02.01.2009 Posts: 39	Has anyone ever tried to find a really usefull street map of Namibia? Sure, there are those "tourist maps" that give you some basic information of where to find the next guest farm, restaurant orpolice station - but what I am actually thinking about would be an accurate map of every nook and crany of the city you actually live in, not some crude quick and dirty drawing someone places on a napkin. In the past, collecting such information was tedious and awkward, to say the least. And once you had all that data, what exactly would you do with it? Sit down and draw the maps all by yourself? Nobody has *that* amount of free time available. So I strolled around the Internet, and came accross http://www.openstreetmap.org/ where anyone with an Intenet connection can actualls start collecting map infos. Kind of like what that big colourful data monger (a.k.a. Google) is doing - but with the twist that anyone can use the collected data for whatever purpose they see fit. Aparently, the first naviagtion apps already sport a connection to OpenStreetMap - all it now takes is more information about roads and cities in Namibia to be included. We have gazillions of tourist guides that woosh about the country always with a GPS at their side, newer cellphones these days also sport GPS facilities (thinking about the HTC series of cellphones for example), so actually it's about time we start "putting Namibia on the map" - or for that matter: correct and extend the information that has already been recorded. Who wants to join? With OSMTrack for iPhone for example, you're up and tracking in no time. There is also an Android version available, so owners of an HTC Hero (just as an example of an Android phone) aren't left behind. I think if we start as a group of enthusiasts (of which not everyone needs to have a GPS - track information is just one part of the mapping adventure), we should get pretty impressive results pretty quickly.
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