User:Bgirardot/Using OSM Notes to Contribute to Crisis Mapping
Greetings!
If you are visiting this page it means you are a very important contributor to our crisis mapping efforts. Your local knowledge will allow us to make the maps and mapping data we provide to first responders on the ground a lot more valuable to them. We have hundreds of mappers around the world working to build maps in times of crisis, but we very rarely have are people like yourself with local knowledge of an area. You are an expert and we are very grateful to you for spending some time helping.
Adding notes to OSM
We are trying to make it as easy as possible for you to share your knowledge with us. You will be dropping a marker on a map and then typing into a text field the information you know about the spot under that marker. It will take you 60 seconds to share 1 piece of information with us.
If you do not have local knowledge of the area we still need you! But you will have to learn a little more about mapping because this Notes feature only really works if you know the area so well you can tell us things about without seeing aerial imagery for the area. Anyone who would like to learn how to directly edit the live OpenStreetMap data and has about 1 hour can go to the "Learn to Map" videos the MapGive site provides. A text tutorial in multiple languages is available on our LearnOSM website.
If we already have the area mapped with buildings, your part in this is going to be very easy.
- Find the area on the OpenStreetMap website.
- If you see a building or area mapped that you have information about, name, purpose (School, clinic, gas station, store, market, telecommunications tower, etc) just click the "speech bubble" on the right hand side of the window.
- Drag the marker to the building or area you want to share information about.
- On the left hand side you can type in the information about the building or area, it will help if you include your email address, but it is not required, we would only use it to email you and ask you a question if we could not accurately map from the information you provided, or we can email just to say thank and let you know your information has been added to the map for the organizations on the ground.
- Click the "Add Note" button and you are done! Thank you very much!
- It would help us out if you could register with the OpenStreetMap website before you place the note, but that is not required at all to drop a note on the map and we are thankful for any information you share with us.
Below is a graphic that illustrates the process.
