OS maps to go free online

[awk]

Thank you. That's been really useful.

[Adventure Racer]

Not as handy as having the vector files obviously, but there are some very good programs to convert raster to vector. The quality of those raster files is such that I'd imagine you should get pretty good results.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison ... n_software

[Adventure Racer]

e.g. here's a pdf made using one-touch mode with WinTopo freeware - rather more detail here than in the ISSOM map of that bit (though 2 of my 5 controls in there would need adding by hand, as Elgin doesn't seem to map trees )

[Adventure Racer]

Well that method of getting maps from Elgin no longer seems to work - any thoughts, martin?

[mikey]

Ollie has done some great work with Open Maps

http://blog.oobrien.com/

Looks useful for informal street events etc - I don't know how (if) it can be transferred to (or usewd with) OCAD.

[Adventure Racer]

Have been discussing that on the HOC forum (which is what led me to check Elgin again - it's even worse than I thought, as not only does direct linking not work, I can't seem to get at the large scale data at all). As I commented there, the easiest way to get to OCAD would be to work with the underlying map data rather than use Ollie's conversion. I had a look at the data, and it would be fairly straightforward, but I imagine Ollie has already done most if not all of the work required for the conversion, so no point repeating that. I'll drop him an e-mail (unless he wants to comment himself on here).

[seabird]

Was worried this would happen. But only found the time to get down to saving a few of our urban areas - for future reference. Hope awk managed to save a few different ones!

[Angry Haggis]

As I commented there, the easiest way to get to OCAD would be to work with the underlying map data rather than use Ollie's conversion. I had a look at the data, and it would be fairly straightforward, but I imagine Ollie has already done most if not all of the work required for the conversion, so no point repeating that. I'll drop him an e-mail (unless he wants to comment himself on here).

I presume you are talking about OpenOrienteeringMap, which is based on the dataset from OpenStreetMap. The source data is in XML and I have imported it into a PostgreSQL spatial database, i.e. it's in SQL format. The exceptions are the coastline which is a shapefile, and the symbols and pattern fills, which are PNG images.

I have had a quick look at the OCAD format spec, which looks rather intimidating. It may be easier for someone to convert a shapefile with all the data into it into a DXF (or AI) and then that can be imported into OCAD.

[Adventure Racer]

I have converted to OCAD file format directly - though a long time ago now, and I can't find my code to do that - so it's far from impossible once you realise it's not as complicated as the docs seem to suggest. The secret to working it out (and what I'll be doing if I get into the idea of doing the conversion) is to start off by going in the opposite direction by creating a simple OCAD with the symbols you want to convert, and then examining that file using the docs to work it out, rather than doing it all completely from scratch.

As you say, going via DXF is probably easier, but the advantage of going directly is that you can convert the OSM road/path types directly into OCAD symbol types rather than having to do that manipulation by hand.

[martin]

The detailed maps appear to be back on line in Elgin.
Get your base maps while you can.

[Adventure Racer]

Indeed they are - was obviously a bad time to check (maybe just a server outage rather than something more deliberate).

[Red Adder]

I've tried them for schools maps but, in the east at least, they are either not entirely accurate or not quite up to date - may be a reasonable starting point but not quite the bee's knees.

For base maps I still find the aerial photos from Freshlogic Studios the best easily available starting point.

[Angry Haggis]

The OS consultation has gone online today - if you are involved in mapping for orienteering you may wish respond to the consultation as the results could significantly open up possibilities for orienteering mapping in the future. Potentially it might mean a substantial change to the BOF nationwide OS licence. It also means we might be able to put as many OS-based orienteering maps on our websites as we like, without needing paid licences or "window" restrictions, if they are based on the proposed free datasets.

Note the consultation does not cover the very highly detailed MasterMap dataset such as is found in ELGIN at the highest zoom levels, however it is looking at the national 1:10000 dataset, amongst others, becoming available for all for free. It is also considering opening up some of the vector datasets.

Section 7 (starting on page 56) - "Release of free products" is perhaps the most interesting bit to read.

http://www.communities.gov.uk/publications/corporate/ordnancesurveyconsultation



The consultation closes in mid-March and you can respond by email.

[rockand]

To simplify getting a large template map from elgin edit the url below.

http://80.168.56.101/mapguide2009/mapag ... scale=2500

This url will give a 2000 by 2000 pixel, or 1km by 1km area around Bramhall park.
Change setviewcenterx and setviewcentery to get your required centre location (these are the location values in metres at the bottom of a streetmap.co.uk map)
Increase setdisplayheight or setdisplaywidth to give a bigger area.
Change setdisplaydpi or setviewscale to alter the scale

When you have opened the url, use left mouse click to zoom/unzoom and right mouse click to copy or save as a template. Use mspaint or similar to convert the png file to a gif or bmp or jpg format that Ocad likes.

Hi, it seems that the site is now requesting username and password to get the maps, anybody got any login details or another url to access the maps, thanks in advance.

[SeanC]

I don't think anyone should hand over usernames and passwords via a public forum, especially to a person who is new to the forum and no-one knows who they are.