direct links to maps down

[gganz]

I'm travelling frequently and have the maps of the whole wold on my phone and tablet (> 1000 in total). I used to download the maps from http://direct.mapswithme.com/direct/latest/ to deploy them to my two devices without having to download them twice. Now I just wanted to update all my maps but the server locked me out (403 Forbidden). Can you please take care of this. Thx

[tatiana-yan]

You can not update maps without updating app (new things appearing in maps, old code does not know about it and will crash). So the easiest and less traffic consumable way is to update all maps on one device (update can be started right after app update: it'll ask you to update everything or manually). It is less traffic consumable way cause in app we use diff when updating maps -- you do not download all maps, just diffs, it's much smaller. And then transfer maps to another device with the same updated version of app.

[RussianNeuroMancer]

@tatiana-yan but what if someone need to do similar deployment on new devices? He have to re-download all maps on every device or you permit download files from http://direct.mapswithme.com/direct/latest/ ?

[gganz]

It was very convenient to download from http://direct.mapswithme.com/direct/latest/ and I have really no idea why they blocked it. No user will benefit from this blocking. Maybe another case of paternalism which is so popular among software companys.

[dimqua]

@gganz probably they trying to decrease the amount of outbound traffic from their servers.

[axelsimon]

It sounds like using a less server-centric solution for file distribution and moving to something like IPFS could be interesting then.

[tatiana-yan]

If you want to place maps directly to device it means that you have an access to device filesystem. So you can take from one device and put to another one. You do not need to download twice.

We want app to control download process because maps version must correspond app version, world.mwm version, world coasts version, countries.txt, configs, etc. App has callbacks on map download and does some job. Incorrect maps download and placement produces hard to reproduce bugs, support reports etc. So I recommend to download maps with app. And diff mechanism makes it less traffic consumable: update of maps on two devices takes less than one complete download.

[rlucassen2]

@tatiana-yan: there is an option called "Auto-download". What's the purpose of this option? Does it get map updates automagically?

R.

[DirtYiCE]

This also broke the map download within the fdroid version of this app. https://gitlab.com/axet/omim/issues/78

[tatiana-yan]

@rlucassen2 yes, maps update will start automatically after application update.

[tatiana-yan]

@DirtYiCE actually applications based on maps.me should use they own map servers. One reason is that we provide sources but not server infrastructure, another reason is maps and code should correspond: some changes should be done in maps and code at the same time. We do not control forks code and our maps should not correspond it.

This guys even use our support e-mail in they app and our support team often spend lots of time to find out that user uses another app and error is not related to maps.me. Do you think it's right to do so?

[linux019]

This guy removed all ads and all analytics code from the app. This is only one reason why I switched to open source version of app instead of Google play version. I agree that you are paying for servers infrastructure but not all people like to see ads

[rlucassen2]

They pay their servers with ads I suppose. So either you use their app and accept the ads / pay 7 dollar per year to be add free, or you use the OSS version. But using the OSS version also means that you set up your own network. I'm willing to contribute to such a network, but apparently I'm the only one. This is not how OSS works. An OSS project can only survive when it is supported by the community. If it's not, it will die.

R.

[DirtYiCE]

@tatiana-yan I couldn't find any support email in the app, only support.maps.me, which looks like more of a knowledge base than a support address. Maybe he removed it in the meantime?

Updating the server and client code at the same time works in case of a webpage, in case of a downloadable application, less. Forcing the users to download xMB of updates right now on a metered connection just because the developers didn't bother about compatibility is a lame move (even if many companies do it all the time).

I can understand that a company does not want to pay the server costs of users using a random third party fork of their app. But don't forget, the base of your maps is openstreetmap, a community made map, available for free. If you're going to make a profit from it, at least give something back.

[tatiana-yan]

@DirtYiCE just search https://gitlab.com/axet/omim/blob/master/data/strings/strings.txt for support@maps.me

[tatiana-yan]

I am developer and came to this topic to help with technical things, to clarify that the best way to update maps is just to allow app to update it: it needs less traffic than complete download even if you have several app installations and it allows app to control all maps and configs correspond each other and properly located. I'm not a manager or someone translating company position. I know much more about technical things. But, as I know we never provided any serverside to another apps. I have no idea why do these guys use our servers we never shared to them. We have a free opensource app with very flexible licence. I think it's a good contribution.

[juanitobananas]

We have a free opensource app with very flexible licence. I think it's a good contribution.

I believe so too. Thank you very much, for this cool piece of software! :smile:

We are planning on hosting a copy of the map files (https://gitlab.com/axet/omim/issues/85) so that the F-Droid version doesn't need to use your servers. Is it okay if I download the maps for every release and host them? Are you aware of any legal/licensing issues?

Again, thank you!

EDIT: typo

[RussianNeuroMancer]

We are planning on hosting a copy of the map files

I guess this is still not resolve this issue for people like @gganz who need to download all maps manually for usage with original app, which is what this issue about .

In this comment @tatiana-yan suggest copying downloaded maps from one device to another or download diffs via app. Which is valid advices for people who downloaded many or all maps to their devices, and still have these devices on hands.

However, as I understand, there is no way to do bootstrap manually anymore, i.e. no way to download maps manually for start on fresh device. So, @tatiana-yan this particular use-case will be ignored and nobody going to fix this, right?

Correct me, if I understand something wrong.

[rlucassen2]

Axet, the author of maps isn't responding anymore. I consider the project as dead. Since two days on gitlab a new project has appeared called "maps" which is empty for the moment.

R.

[tatiana-yan]

@juanitobananas We are going to build osm-only mwms free of any proprietary data. It will be legal to use it. It will take about a week. I'll post the update to this topic.

@RussianNeuroMancer yes, if you install the app to new device you should download maps from the app. And it's the only supported way to get the maps for official app.

[juanitobananas]

We are going to build osm-only mwms free of any proprietary data. It will be legal to use it. It will take about a week. I'll post the update to this topic.

@tatiana-yan, yay! :fireworks: Thank you so much for that! Looking forward to it!

[dimqua]

@RussianNeuroMancer it's still possible to download maps manually by using the direct links.

[burivuh]

Any use of our official release data with proprietary layers outside of the official application is illegal. Here is the link for OSM-only maps:

http://opensource-data.mapswithme.com/regular/weekly/

Starting 26th of April we'll setup a cron job to generate them weekly on one of our servers.

[juanitobananas]

@burivuh, Thank you very much for this!

http://opensource-data.mapswithme.com/regular/weekly/

Is it okay with you if the F-Droid maps app downloads maps directly from there? Or do you prefer if we try to setup mirrors for the maps.

Again, thank you very much!

[burivuh]

Well, we have no problem with that, at least in the near future. Data is hosted on several nodes, but all of them are in one country, so at least backup mirror will be good.

[juanitobananas]

Cool! Well, we will try to setup mirrors anyway.

Starting 26th of April we'll setup a cron job to generate them weekly on one of our servers.

As far as I've understood from reading several GitHub and GitLab issues, the maps' versions are important. Is it safe to assume that the version (v) in countries.txt will change only when the maps change? Or might the maps change more often?

Or asked differently: Would it be enough for us to monitor countries.txt in order to download the maps?

[tatiana-yan]

As far as I've understood from reading several GitHub and GitLab issues, the maps' versions are important. Is it safe to assume that the version (v) in countries.txt will change only when the maps change? Or might the maps change more often?

Or asked differently: Would it be enough for us to monitor countries.txt in order to download the maps?

We have backward compatibility for maps. It means you can use maps which older than app but not maps which are newer than app. If you want to build the app from our release branch take the last maps version. Countries.txt and World.mwm should be from this version and it'll be compatible with old mwms users already have on their devices.

[gganz]

Hi @all Does that mean I can use http://opensource-data.mapswithme.com/regular/weekly/ as a replacement for the old http://direct.mapswithme.com/direct/latest/ ? I dont need any non-OSM layers. Thx

[burivuh]

Yes, you can.

[Zverik]

Seems like these maps were last updated in March. Could you please reinstate weekly updates?

[burivuh]

Plan is all the same, we just hit a bit of delay in establishing automatic osm-only data pipeline and, you know, long May holidays. I hope in a week or so we'll return to the schedule.

[gganz]

Yes, you can.

Great, thanks a lot!

[burivuh]

First update has been rolled out

[Zverik]

Awesome, thank you!

[dbf256]

@burivuh No updates for ~1 month? http://opensource-data.mapswithme.com/regular/weekly/

[burivuh]

Well, it takes some time to fix all the problems with a new data pipeline. Current version sometimes down, sometimes broken, sometimes without server resources. We are fixing it. For now it is about one update in about 3 weeks.

[pataquets]

Thanks everyone for the work. Some ideas/suggestions/doubts:

• Would be the mirrors updated more frequently than in-app versions? Or just an alternate way of getting maps but not earlier? Updating them more frequently would allow testers, mappers, etc to have feedback sooner.
• Would it be possible to share the map generation pipeline files, scripts, etc. in a repo? This would allow interested people contribute back improvement and also help by easing setting up alternate map servers. Seems to me that there is enough interest and it would be a win-win.

[tatiana-yan]

Would it be possible to share the map generation pipeline files, scripts, etc. in a repo? This would allow interested people contribute back improvement and also help by easing setting up alternate map servers. Seems to me that there is enough interest and it would be a win-win.

See https://github.com/mapsme/dockerfiles https://github.com/mapsme/omim/tree/master/tools/python/maps_generator

[pataquets]

Thanks for sharing! Tried downloading an updated version and it worked. One small caveat: the map does not have terrain height info, so height/altitude map for routes always displays a 0m elevation, flat route. I don't know if it's just an omission of something expected.

[tatiana-yan]

Hello. It is osm-only build so some information is absent cause we get it from other sources (traffic information, altitudes, booking hotels, opentable restaurants). For altitudes we use SRTM and you can set SRTM_PATH in map_generator.ini

[dimqua]

@burivuh maps are out of date again.

http://opensource-data.mapswithme.com/regular/weekly/

[tarasis]

Current date of weekly files is 23-Dec-2019.

You need to update INSTALL.md as it still talks about direct download from http://direct.mapswithme.com/direct/latest/ it took searching through issues to find out what to do instead.

[dbf256]

Looks like "weekly" maps generator from mapsme team is broken again again, but there is some end-user weekly updates site: https://hide.webhop.me/mapsme/. New regions could be requested here https://forum.openstreetmap.org/viewtopic.php?id=68433 (but there is no guarantee that they will be added).

[M-Murat]

In INSTALL.md there is a link to http://direct.mapswithme.com/direct/latest/ It doesn’t work. I would like to use it as a developer. Please, update the file or make the link working.

[h1z1]

This appears to be down again or some other protection is preventing updates? Keep getting 403s.

[nobodyisherecu]

Almost 403 😐

[cscode2000]

Still getting 403. Very sad. I need to transfer maps to a device with no internet connection. It's no problem to download the latest apk, so there should be no problem to download the latest mwm, too.