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I find the augmented reality view very useful sometimes. Especially now we can altitude data to the POIs; that was a very nice improvement. I think there are a couple of things that would make it more useful though.

1) I find it very hard to see the radar sometimes. It would be nice if we could change the color of this so that it shows up better against light backgrounds.

2) It would be very useful if the distance to the highlighted POI were shown on the screen (only the highlighted one in the center of the screen, not all of them). Sometimes I would just like to know how far away it is, but at other times it would really help to discriminate two features that are almost in line with each other. If I can see the distance it would be clear, for example, that mount X (4.5km)  must be the one in front of mount Y (6.3km). Maybe other information might be useful too, such as bearing, elevation difference to current location, etc, but for me distance would be the most useful.

This sounds OK to me. If someone doesn't like having filtered data they can turn it off, and it's the same as now. Will the filter be applied only to the altitude data, or also to position?

Are you moving? Depending on some settings, you may have to move a certain distance and wait a certain time before it will record the second point, and therefore show a track. Try going for a five minute walk.

A thought: does "same type" perhaps mean "same type as SQL"? If it does, then "Ensure the database you are downloading data to contains the SQL map type!" would be clearer.

is there really ... "map must be"?

I knew I wasn't going completely mad! A couple of neurons just misfired, that's all. Somehow I got it fixed in my head that the warning was a pop-up message, and that's why I missed it when I looked again. If you go to "Change Type" one of the options is "External Map (SQL type)", and it says "WARNING: Ensure the database you are downloading data to contains the same map type!!".

No worries though. I'll just ignore the warning  

is there really ... "map must be"? I think there is only a suggestuin, and it mean as you wrote.

Strange. I wanted to get the exact message, so I just tried it again. I can't get the message though, not even a suggestion. I tried several times. I really did see a message though. I don't have enough imagination to make something like that up  

Ahh! I've been caught!  :oops:   Now I am forced to admit that I am so used to using MOBAC that I had never actually downloaded a map in Locus  

Now I have tried it, and I see what you mean. I still think it's easier in MOBAC though, because I can add all the zoom selections and then build the map, rather than iteratively adding to an existing map.

But, thanks very much for pointing it out, because one thing I do not think is possible in MOBAC is to add to an existing map (at least, not in the version I use). Now I know how I can do this in Locus, and I know for sure I will use it. For example, if I know I am going to go to a particular city in China I can add it to my existing map. I have one question though. When I add to an existing map it gives me a warning that the map must be of the same type. Does this mean I can't add, for example, some zoom levels created from OSM maps to an existing map that was created from Google maps? If not, what does it mean?

I'll have a play with MOBAC just to see if there are any advantages, etc.)

Well, you are working on a much bigger screen. You can also create maps with different zoom levels from different mapping sources. Most importantly for me, you can create maps with different coverage at different zoom levels, which means you can have a map which is useful both as an overview and as a detailed map in selected areas, and is still a reasonable size (as an example, I have a map of the whole of China, with selected cites included at full zoom).

! am a real sucker for punishment sometimes, so I decided to give the vector map creation another go. I learned a few things that may be useful to others.

Because of my memory limitations (i.e. my PC; I'm not senile. Yet) I tried to build some maps using a bounding box to limit the size of the generated map. For example, to create a map of Nashua, NH, from the full NH map:

osmosis --rb file=new_hampshire.osm.pbf --mapfile-writer file=NashuaGF.map type=HD bbox=42.704465,-71.541876,42.775014,-71.420628

I got the bounding box points from GE.
I also tried the same thing using the bz2 file from Cloudmade downloads:

osmosis --rx file=new_hampshire.osm.bz2 --mapfile-writer file=NashuaCM.map type=HD bbox=42.704465,-71.541876,42.775014,-71.420628

Both of these worked fine, even though I can't generate a map of the whole of NH. They only took 2-3 minutes.
As another example, create a Wheatley map from the Cloudmade bz2 file for England:

osmosis --rx file=england.osm.bz2 --mapfile-writer file=Wheatley.map type=HD bbox=51.720488,-1.323776,51.794130,-1.081554

There's a reason I chose to create this map from the Cloudmade files, but I'll put that in another post. This example is important, because although the resulting map is very small, the starting file is large: 368Mb. It seems the memory limitations are mainly associated with file writing, not the file reading. So anyone should be able to create small maps from large starting files, even if you don't have access to a big Debian server like Peter   You do have to be patient though; this one took about 2.5 hours.

A couple of additional notes;
You do not need to unzip the .bz2 file to get a .osm file, even though the Wiki here; //http://code.google.com/p/mapsforge/wiki/MapFileWriterOsmosis implies that you do.
You might get a lot of warnings at the end that it couldn't delete files "C:Documents and Settings<YourName>Local SettingsTempidx********.tmp". At least, I get this every time. You should go and delete these files manually, because they can be very large (>1Gb).

I also created a map of southern NH. I suspect nobody else will want this, but if they do then I'll upload it. I cannot create a map of some parts of NH, not even a very small map. I logged an issue at MapForge regarding this: //http://code.google.com/p/mapsforge/issues/detail?id=134&colspec=ID%20Type%20Status%20Priority%20Stars%20Owner%20Summary%20Modified

The real good news is that every map I have managed to create seems to work great in Locus  

regarding question 1, - what I had in mind is, when I download maps and be offline for longer period of time (more than 2 weeks for example) wouldn't it happen that my license 'token' or whatever will expire and I'll be kicked out from app?

See //http://forum.asamm.cz/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=621

OK. It all makes sense now  

Thanks again.

OK. Thanks for the explanation. Then I have a related question. If I turn "Record only whilst moving" off, and set an interval of 10m, then it should still not record when I am not moving. I need to move at least 10m before it will record a new point, correct?

I don't think the raw data should be smoothed

I agree. You can't "unsmooth" it later if you decide it wasn't right!

Aha!!
We;; I did start to wonder especially as you mentioned GE maps. This is a great shame as the main reason for using this was for exploring and being able to 'see' the aerial view offline. You ask if I know how to use Google Satellite, can these be used offline then? If so, please explain as this would be much better!!

For Locus, install and run this app:
//https://market.android.com/details?id=com.mjk.locusmaptweak&feature=search_result
You will then have a lot more online maps available.

A better way of building offline maps is to install MOBAC. See this thread:
//http://forum.asamm.cz/viewtopic.php?f=21&t=4&p=3145&hilit=MOBAC#p4
Read down the thread! Note that you need version 1.9 beta 1. Versions later than this do not have all the maps available, due to licensing issues. Offline satellite maps require horrendous amounts of space because they don't compress well, but MOBAC can help with this. You can select a large area (say the entire north of France, the Channel, and Dover), and only a few wide zoom levels, and "Add selection" Then select a smaller area, say the region that includes all the fortifications, select some higher zoom levels, and "Add selection". Then select a region that includes one fortification area, and select the highest zoom levels, and "Add selection". Repeat that step for each fortification area. This will give you a map that has the highest zoom levels where you need them, but still allows you to have a complete overview that puts everything in the perspective of the entire English Channel. And it will be a reasonable size  

Note that if you install the app above or use this version of MOBAC you are likely to violate the licensing rules of map providers such as Google. If you choose to do that, it's your responsibility. I think Google may have recently put a choke on the map downloading too. If you download a lot and it grinds to an almost complete stop, cancel the map building. Make sure MOBAC has the tile store enabled, wait a while (i.e. maybe until the next day!) and build the map again. It will use the cached tiles, and then add some more. Then it may grind to a standstill again, so repeat as necessary. I recently went through this to build a map of Boston. It took a long time, but I got there in the end  

You're request to Menion sound very useful too and I'd like to see that but of course if it's OK in your area it's going to be interesting to work out what areas need what shifts. However, I'd be happy to do the checking as I need certain areas of France and Germany at the moment and can reasonably easily check them out. I'll do that for my Germany areas anyway to let you know. Maybe we can find a pattern?!

I don't think there is a pattern. I am sure the arcGIS problem is just a mistake. I have no idea why the Cloudmade renderings of the OSM maps have a small offset. In China it is a deliberate policy of the Chinese government, and the offsets vary all over the country. Only the government and certain Chinese mapping companies have the offset information. If you want to see this, look at Google maps and switch between the Satellite images (which are correct) and the maps (which are not).

Many thanks for your help again, it really makes a massive difference when new to these things to have such a helpful community!

I am a great believer in forums and communities for products. As you say, they can make a massive difference to the usability of the product.  I contribute to and/or rely on several

If you go hiking, your elevation doesn't chnage abruptly by several meters between sored points

Unless you walk off a cliff  :mrgreen: