Waze in South Australia

[yellek]

OK I've added a few roads in the Paradise Athelstone area, I'll wait to see whether they appear. I also added a few POIs (Thorndon Park etc) but when I go back to them I can't edit them. I assume an area manager needs to get to them?

A few questions on mapping:

What do people do with:

roundabouts
roads that go from divided back to 2 way
the O-bahn
Junctions that split turns into different lanes (e.g the corner of Gorge and Maryvale roads in Athelstone)

[Apty]

New here, just started mapping, etc, etc, etc.

I live down bottom of Fleurieu - Goolwa - Victor and travel up through the Hills to visit my kids most weekends.

I have spent HOURS on OpenStreetMaps http://www.openstreetmap.org/ mapping this area, and now I'm starting over again. OSM is an open-source map I think and surely waze could use that.
I've just discovered why they don't: http://www.waze.com/faq/#18
Not sure I can agree with them, as there are other commercial enterprises using OSM happliy.

We'll see how I go - I may just get sick of 'reinventing the wheel (car wheel)' and stop bothering with waze. With few users, and only the occassional one down here I doubt I'll find much benefit in it.

Might see you on the road one day. Try not to crash into me when you're distracted mapping the area. LOL

Best wishes, Graeme.

[waynemcdougall]

OSM is an open-source map I think and surely waze could use that.
I've just discovered why they don't: http://www.waze.com/faq/#18
Not sure I can agree with them, as there are other commercial enterprises using OSM happliy.

I think the big issues are:
a) just how Waze can contribute updates back to OSM (seems a difficult technical problem to me)
b) how Waze can make money by selling their enhanced map information later on

Other commercial enterprises aren't getting map updates, or have a different business model.

But OSM is in the process of changing their license, which may open the way for Waze to use their data.

[ryancurnow]

Quick post, bigger one coming.

What do people do with:
roundabouts - If it's big, add it. If it's small, up to you. If you're adding junctions to smaller ones like you should, it's just a matter of Select-edit-create roundabout-6-submit to change it. No hassle.
roads that go from divided back to 2 way - I create a junctionand have both one-ways and the 2-way parts come together. I put a turn restriction in if you can't pull a u-turn, and there you go.
the O-bahn - I'd add it, and list it as "No entry", maybe as "Service Road"
Junctions that split turns into different lanes (e.g the corner of Gorge and Maryvale roads in Athelstone) - Depends on how the road is laid on waze. Both one line, then simple t-intersection. 2 "lane" you could think about doing individual lanes, but try and keep it tidy. The idea isn't so much to perfectly match the lane layout, it's to have a working map. having individual lanes ends up being a mess, and makes it harder to find problems. Case in point? South Road/ Main South Road intersection. Spaghetti!

[ryancurnow]

OK.... this is looooong so will be broken over a few posts.

So, Hi, I'm Ash, also known as ryancurnow, and I'm area manager for Adelaide. Pleasure to meet you all, so on, so on. I'm a bit... different, as those who have conversed with me know, but mostly harmless and sort of passionate about my maps and areas therein. Live in the Marion area, rarely drive, but get buses and if I'm going somewhere new I'll record the roads. I use an iPhone 3gs, and have the external battery as the constant GPS drains it hard. BUT, I have achieved a decent number of points, mostly from my work in cartouche as AM. As there are a few wazers on here now, I thought I should be all managerly and take the time to make a speech and such! *Gets on soapbox* *not sure where the soapbox came from, but anyway*

So, welcome one and all. Mostly the SA wazers, and particularly those in Adelaide, cos that's as far as my area goes. But I'll help you all. As you are aware, waze is created by the users - you! That means you get to help me (YAAAAAY!), your egotistical leader, fill in the roads on SA and finally beat those eastern state people! (But we should still be friends.) Likely, right now you are chugging along running Waze on your phones, recording roads and sometimes adding an update request filled with praise for me. That, sir/madam/combination thereof, makes you cool, awesome, and other good things. Good for you! But perhaps (And judging on how busy the forum has been, quite likely) some of you may be wondering, "But Ash, how can I do more to help this cause? I wish to help SA rise up to it's rightful place at the top!" Well, lucky you asked, because here's the levels of helping:

Drive. Run Waze while doing so. If on a new road, record it with the steamroller. Simple. This is the easiest way to help out. Driving known roads helps the system work out details, like direction, speed, turns, and so on. As more people use it, we get closer to having that awesome system you see in the demo video. As for unknown roads, that lays it down so people can see the layout and add details like names, areas and such. Just remember to only run the roller when the road isn't there. Running it while on a known road results in multiple lines in cartouche, and because they're really close together, they can be a pain to edit... which brings me to,

[ryancurnow]

Drive part 2: the cartouchering. So now you've added all those roads, you're feeling pretty pleased for yourself. With all your steamrollering over unknown roads, you must have added a few suburbs worth! So what now? Well, now is the important part. To be really useful, those roads you marked need to be processed. About 24 hours after being driven, they should appear in cartouche (world.waze.com/cartouche) and you can enter all the relevant info - Name, Direction, Type and so on. 2 important parts to do here. First, check the suburb and enter it. This helps cartouche work out boundaries, and stop calling so many areas "Stirling". Second, make sure any roads it touches have a junction. Thankfully it's not often I see roads that have been processed but not connected, but it happens. Please, please add proper connections!

Tell those in power what to do. You've been really good. You go through all the roads you've recorded, You're adding the names, Suburbs, adding juntions and checking turns, everything is beautiful until... "No Permissions". Aww heck, you drove that road, you're sure of it! This is where I come in more directly. When you come across something you can't do, that you don't understand or that's a bit wierd, do what you can, then get a super permilink (From the link in the lower right) and copy that to a message to me, your magnificent manager along with details on what is left to be done. I will add it to my pile of busywork, and get it done for you! So, how to contact me? Either on this thread (Not so good, it's a bit messy), PM me (Quite good, I do check here regularly) or e-mail me! (ryan.curnow@gmail.com, just make sure the subject has "waze" in it). I also accept Love, Praise, funny stories, and donations of food and/or unwanted spouses.

[ryancurnow]

Tell me where to go. Right now, I oversee Adelaide. It's nice, it's cool... but there's more to SA. So if you're living in an area outside my control, that you're working on, and you want to see some management to tidy up the place, send me a permalink and I'll look into taking that on too. It's cool, I'm here to help and as long as you're following the above 3 guidelines, I'm very happy to put in the work too!

Send someone love from the road and that person would be me for now. Some people never leave home. They buy food online, have it delivered and need never see daylight. Living in PJs may seem fun, but most people get out sometimes. And you would too. So, when you are happily driving about, and find an error, you know what to do! Send me an update request! This part is not to tell you to do that. This part is to say when you do, consider adding in a bit of detail. I get maybe 1/3 of requests sent to me that have no details, and usually I can find out what the problem is and fix it. But sometimes, I can't. It might have already been fixed, it might be hidden, I don't know. But that time I spend searching could be better spend sleeping or eating or something, so if you can, take mercy. Drop a few hints as to the issue before you send the request off!

Help fill out the suburbs. There's more to life than main roads. So why stop at just the roads you drive all over? "Because the permissions only let me edit roads I've driven" o_O Well, smartypants, that's not quite right. Cartouche's permissions should allow you to edit all sorts of wonderful things within (I believe) 1 mile of where you've been. May not seem much but that's actually a lot of area on a trip. So get in there, especially around your suburb, and add all the streets, parks and stuff in your end of town! And if you have fun with that, and expect to be putting a fair bit of time into this, you'll fill in your area soon. So what then? You have no permissions to edit elsewhere, so maybe it's time to...

[ryancurnow]

Get permissive all over this map. I, for instance, can do mostly whatever I please anywhere in Adelaide. Why? Clearly because I'm amazing, and also because I'm an Area Manager. And you can be too. (Both awesome, and an AM). That's not to say you have to take on all the responsibility, I'm happy to do most of what you don't, but getting a few smaller parts of my area (Like, the areas you drive most) taken over would mean you can take care of adding roads and keeping an eye out for problems, while I can deal with the update requests and fix issues as they arise. Sounds good and fairly easy, right? Well, there is one thing - it means you would need to be sort of active. You should probably visit at least once a week, and expect to be doing this for at least the next 6 months. In return, you get no permission errors in your area, and can freely add/edit/remove roads that need it. Fair deal? Sweet, here's what to do: Get in cartouche, and get a permalink for the area you want to manage. Fire off an e-mail to alpha@waze.com with the permalink, some sweet encouraging words and your username, and within a day or 2, you'll usually have AM status. But what if you want to really get involved? Then you should...

Fix my problems. I like to think I'm a pretty good manager. I fix roads, lay suburbia, and do loads of cool things. One thing I hate, and can't keep up with is map problems. In cartouche, try opening up the map problems layer. The CBD is mostly OK, but the rest is hideous. So if you have some spare time, some knowledge on finding and fixing issues (Don't worry, I'll link you to the wiki pages for details on fixing them) and a complete lack of sanity, this is probably the biggest thing you can do to help me out. Even if you just keep watch over your area, it's a big boost.

[ryancurnow]

Trade your sanity, get some status. Just because I'm an eager beaver doesn't mean you should miss out. Perhaps you're in an area I'm not yet managing. Like an outlier city (Like Murray bridge). Maybe you just look at how little I've done to your part of the map (Gawlelizasalisbury anyone?) and think you could do it? Or maybe you're just an egotistical maniac drunk on power and decide you want to take over. Whatever your motive, you should feel free to request whatever area you like to be AM of, and take on as much responsibility for it as you like. You too could be leading the glamourous life of fixing update requests, and fixing up the roads laid by newbies that drive everywhere with their steamroller on. Have fun with that.

Get organised with me. This is more long term, but maybe one day. What I envisage is each area having an AM to fix it's issues, and I'm just overseeing it all. Oh, it would be wonderful, we could have a thread on the forum with details of major works to be done and people in that area could get on and take these jobs. It could all be smooth, organised, and the envy of other states. Wwhat do we need for this? Dedicated people putting their hand up to take on areas they're happy to run. Most of this work would be starting around getting areas mapped, so even if you just want to be AM to lay roads, that's great and is another area covered. I'll look into this more when more areas are covered.

Play with numbers. I've put this last because it's not a huge priority at the moment, but what does every navigation aid have that we're not doing right now? house numbers. This will be a BIG task, to number all the houses and roads, but waze is clever, and once numbers start popping up can make assumptions what numbers lie where. How can you help? You can add house munbers in cartouche or on your client (On iPhone it's report-update map-update details-house numbers). Not big right now, but just another thing on the list!

Ok, that was.... huge. I listed those in order of work required, which also happens to be similar to how helpful they are to me. If anyone has any questions, comments or such, let me know, and I'll do what I can. Just remember, I'm but one person controlling a big area, I'll do as much as I can as quickly as I can, but there *will* be delays. I'd love all the help I could get!

~Ash (ryancurnow)

[ryancurnow]

Just to let you know, my "Update Request" list isn't loading at the moment, I've been keeping an eye out for them as I check the map, but if I miss yours or it takes a while to get to it, sorry in advance! I'm going to give it a day or two and see if the problem comes good, if not then start pestering higherup to fix the problem.
Of course, you can still get in touch on any of the other methods (PM, here or e-mail)