offline navigation for ubports
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OSMScout used to be a quite usable offline maps and routing app. It has migrated to OpenStore: https://open.uappexplorer.com/app/osmscout.fransschreuder
The issue is that I cannot download maps anymore. The links to the maps (inside the app) seem to be broken. Has anyone news or a solution for this?
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Hi,
I am a developer working on Sailfish and an author of OSM Scout Server: https://rinigus.github.io/osmscout-server/en/ . I would like to describe the solution that I have been working on to get offline maps on Sailfish.
OSM Scout Server is a server that can be activated by systemd socket activation and QML app. It provides map tiles (Mapnik raster tiles and vector in MapboxGL format), allows to search for locations and POIs, and provides routing data. The app part allows you to download, update, and delete maps as well as change the settings and check server's logs. In addition to the code, I try to import the Planet once in 2 months and we have two servers distributing these maps in relevant format.
For offline operation, you just need the server and a map GUI client running on the same device. For example, uNav can contact a specified port at localhost and get the data. On Sailfish, we have Poor Maps and modRana as the main clients. Recently, I also wrote an unofficial QML plugin for MapboxGL to get OpenGL accelerated maps (https://github.com/rinigus/mapbox-gl-qml). This works very well and we have already sports application ported to it, Poor Maps GL version and its developed continuation https://github.com/otsaloma/whogo-maps already. Since you probably have newer Qt, you may as well use QtLocation Mapbox GL plugin for developing the client.
Porting the server should be relatively simple. It has Qt C++ and QML mix with Silica components. So, QML part has to be translated, but it shouldn't be much work. The server can be used with CLI only as well, but I haven't worked on the map managing switches too much and mainly use it for debugging on Linux PC. To compile it, you would have to package or use packages for various backends. See https://build.merproject.org/project/show/home:rinigus:maps for a list. I suspect it will be way easier on Ubuntu than it was for me - many packages are probably there already or easily available from PPAs.
Porting the clients or writing new is not too hard either. I would recommend using Mapbox GL for maps - its just easier to get all POIs and maps are fast as well.
We have phones that have as little as 1GB RAM working with such solution. However, devices with 1GB have not been successful running MapboxGL widget, so they use slower raster map rendering.
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Thanks for the replies. I do have OSMScout installed , but it seems to crash a lot on my phone. I used to use a program called gpsmid https://sourceforge.net/projects/gpsmid/ on a sony phone, but I guess there's no way to run this on ubports?
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@tominto : How did you manage to download maps in OSMScout? I always get the error message that the map files cannot be downloaded (I assume that they are missing on the server/download location)
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I presume you mean OSMScout for Ubuntu Touch? According to http://libosmscout.sourceforge.net/documentation/companion_projects/ and its github page, this software has not been updated for a while.
In the server, I am also not following the latest versions of libosmscout (maintainer for this backend is welcome, I prefer to use Mapnik/MapboxGL/Valhalla/GeocoderNLP instead). Libosmscout has progressed significantly since last OSMScout for Ubuntu were released. You would have to update the library compiled for Ubuntu as well as update the OSMScout source to new API of the library. Then you could use either maps distributed by @Karry for Sailfish (he is keeping up-to-date Sailfish client) or import yourself from PBFs (importer should be generated with every github-tagged release for Linux and Windows).
In short, there are very good solutions available for mobile Linux based on QML/Qt, but you need someone to adapt and compile them for Ubuntu Touch.
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@gt I'm not having problems downloading. Just select the map you want and then tap on Download.
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@tominto : Great, I tried it again and now it worked. Seemed to be a temporary problem or someone fixed it. Thanks!
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The OSM maps that are available seem to be from 2015... Can anyone confirm this? - or am I doing something wrong? If they are indeed from 2015, how can we have access to the newer maps?
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@mihael +1 Or making them.
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@cesar-herrera Yesterday I just found that new maps are available to download! - 2018 openstreemaps for OSMScout
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@mihael oh right, in the download section of OSMScout. Thank you
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I have downloaded OSMScout to my Pro5, but I can't figure out how to download and install new maps.
Edit: Just noticed that the map list was scrollable. Now downloading...
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@tomoqv some maps are working fine but I didn't have luck with the map of Spain (https://github.com/fransschreuder/OSMScout-ubuntu/issues/54).
