cross-posted from: https://psychedelia.ink/post/526072
My impression of Organic Maps immediately improved when I started driving. It talks! It knows exit numbers! It can tell you which lanes to use! Sure, it isn’t as polished as Google Maps, but all of the functionality is present. The UI is high-contrast and easy to read, although I wish the text showing exit numbers/street names was a little bigger. When you’re simply on the road and following directions, Organic Maps feels every bit as intuitive as Google Maps.
As my fiancee and I prepared to set off into the boonies, I plugged in the address of our hotel. About 45 seconds later, Organic Maps returned the 300-mile route to our destination. It can take a lot longer to calculate longer routes using your phone’s processor instead of a huge cloud server. It didn’t really bother me though; 45 seconds is nothing compared to the 6-hour trip ahead. If that’s the cost of using a maps app that doesn’t spray your personal data all over the internet, I’ll pay it.
I have OSMAnd+, and as a map, it’s great. Data is usually better than GM, and everything is clear. But what it and all other OSM map apps suck at: Searching.
I’d even use a map that send my request to google maps to interpret the search, because currently I’m using Google Maps simply because it’s the only usable one for me.
It’s a bunch of things, focusing the search better on my current location, fixing slight spelling errors, better incremental search, integrated search for both streets and PoI’s. I want to use something OSM based, but I return to google maps every time, simply because I can actually find what I’m looking for :/
Absolutely agreed.
The underlying map is great, the interfaces are great (especially on OrganicMaps), the way it can give me offline access to everything is great but in that crucial moment getting off a train/bus/whatever and thinking - hang on, which direction did I need to go? - the search just undoes everything else because often you literally can not find the location you need. Then it’s hand-scrolling to roughly where you think it is, putting down a general pin and then eye-balling the actual location.
Don’t get me wrong, it’s fun in a sort of 90s-unfolding the city-map kind of way but not if you actually have an appointment somewhere.
OSMAnd+ is a feature beast. It seems like you can customize EVERYTHING.
I find search improved a lot tho.
Maybe I need to have another look, might have been a year.
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Not open source, but qwant.com/maps leverages OSM data and makes things searchable.
Interesting, entering something (that’s close, but not 100% correct, so exactly what I’d search for) in the search field pops up a suggestion that has what I want, but pressing enter gives no result. That’s pretty bad UX, especially as they are so close to doing exactly what I’d want.
I want to like OSM, but like you say, its weakness is search. I have to get the search just right, and make sure I enter the postcode as XXN NXX. And maybe then it might give me the right result.
However, in GM, I can mash the postcode together as XXNXX and it understands. Or if a mall has changed its name and I didn’t know, GM gives me what I want, not what I said.