I never thought I'd see this: Open Map Data from the Ordnance Survey

Ordnance Survey have always been quite protective of their data. Whatever the political and economic arguments for and against this, it's not really affected my work, as I've always had access to OS data through working in academic institutions or as a consultant on government agency projects. But what happens now I'm trying to work independently?

Last year OS released a number of free digital map products, and I've only just caught up with them. I've only had a look at two raster products so far - VectorMap District and OS Street View, which have nominal scales of 1:25k and 1:10k. Other products at smaller scales are also available.

OS have "generalised and simplified" these products to "allow you to easily visualise a variety of information in its geographic context". So they provide a simple background for other spatial data, uncluttered with unnecessary information. This also means that OS can still charge for their fully detailed products. The products are licensed for any use, as long as OS is attributed (licence here).

Data is supplied from the download page via an emailed link, and comes in 10x10km or 5x5km tiles. This can mean a lot of tiles: 400 tiles for one 100x100km national grid reference square of Street View for example. I've used QGIS's excellent VRT functionality to look at many tiles without building an overly cumbersome single raster image - you'll need the gdal plugin to use this.

OS VectorMap District map of Seascale, Cumbria. Contains Ordnance Survey data © Crown copyright and database right 2011.

OS Street View map of Seascale, Cumbria. Contains Ordnance Survey data © Crown copyright and database right 2011.

How does it look? It's OK - fairly uncluttered, reasonably clear. It's not up to the elegance of the full 25k or 50k OS maps, but fine for a backdrop to other data for websites and reports. I think it fulfills the aim of providing adequate context for other spatial data, but you couldn't use these for planning a walk for example - there's no right of way information.

OpenStreetMap using Osmarender. © OpenStreetMap contributors, CC-BY-SA.

I think it looks better than OpenStreetMap or GoogleMaps for web based stuff, and because it's downloadable as tiff it's better for use in "serious" GIS applications.
One problem with the VectorMap data - it's supplied as a tiff (but not GeoTiff - so no spatial reference system information), with a colour table with low saturation colours. I don't like this - the colours look washed out, and while this is OK for some background mapping, I prefer to set the background appearence myself, using transparency.

OS VectorMap District map with colour saturation increased with a factor of 75%. Contains Ordnance Survey data © Crown copyright and database right 2011.

There's a fairly simple fix for this, by building your own colour table, which can the be loaded into QGIS. I've made a couple of spreadsheets to help me do this in Gnumeric and Excel formats (downloadable here and here). You'll need to save the colour table from QGIS, paste into columns A-F in the first sheet, and select a "Saturation Factor". "1" produces fully saturated colours, "0" has no effect. 0.75 works pretty well. The adjusted colour table can then be saved as a CSV from the second sheet, and loaded into QGIS.
Useable colour tables can be downloaded here: 25%, 50%, 65%, 75%.
I'll be having a look at the vector data too - and will post again with the results.

Mission Accomplished

You've all been dying to know, haven't you? Mmmmmm? So what does TOBU stand for?

I named my blog after Tales of Brave Ulysses, a track from Cream's 1967 psychedelic blues classic Disraeli Gears. Because I knew I might have a lot of time on my hands out here in Indonesia, I decided I would try to read Ulysses, James Joyce's classic, and incomprehensible, novel of Dublin life.

It was either this or the latest Jackie Collins.

Ulysses describes a day (16th June, 1904) in the life of Dublin characters, through conversation, internal monologue and the infamous stream of consciousness passage at the end of the book. The non-hero is Leopold Bloom, a half Jewish ad-canvasser, and the book casts him as Ulysses, wandering through the capital like his namesake through the mediterranean. Joyce deliberately blurs the boundaries between thought and speech (there are no quotation marks), so the result is deliciously ambiguous - did he say that, or just think it?

Joyce avoids the traditional authors' tricks of how to reveal the characters' thoughts (first person narrative, artificially expressive dialogue), instead using myth and allusion to acknowledge the artifice of the author. Yet the result is unmistakeably real. No other book I've read has so realistically portrayed what it is to live and think as a human. Random childhood memories jostle with practical thoughts, higher emotions and bodily sensations; like suddenly remembering your first teddybear when you were thinking about politics, and trying to fart while popping to the shops for some milk. Life IS like this book.

It's also funny. Here's some laugh-out-loud moments from the modernist classic:

Cheese digests all but itself. Mighty cheese.
Who can argue with that?

O, fie! Out on't! Pfuiteufel! You naughtn't to look, missus, so you naughtn't when a lady's ashowing of her elemental.
Frankie Howerd evidently got his act from Ulysses.

Lord love a duck, he said, look at what I'm standing drinks to! Cold water and gingerpop! Two fellows that would suck whisky off a sore leg.
I love that expression.

And with that he took the bloody old towser by the scruff of the neck and, by Jesus, he near throttled him.
This is quoted in Lucky Jim, recalled by Dixon as being "a line from a book he'd once read". I'm rather impressed Jim Dixon has read Ulysses, even though with typical diffidence he won't admit to it.

Do fish ever get seasick?
We've all wondered about that.

I shall be celebrating with a gorgonzola sandwich and a glass of Burgundy when I get back to civilisation.

Star Highway

I've become a tourist. After finishing a week's training in Maumere, I've been riding the trans Flores highway, all the way to Labuanbajo.

I didn't have much luck finding a bike to hire at first, they were all little scooters (so not really up to some of the big hills along the way), and hiring a big, proper bike turned out to be quite expensive. But with typical Indonesian generosity, someone at the government office where I was training offered to lend me his bike for a couple of weeks. So I was the proud borrower of a 200cc Honda Tiger - which is as big as bikes get over here.

The trans Flores highway does this for 100s of km.

So I headed off on the first leg from Maumere to Riung, to meet other volunteers there. 300km and 10 hours later I arrived - an average speed of 30km/h is typical here. The route was spectacular - arching over Flores' spine of volcanoes down to Ende, a dusty town down by the sea, back up to Air Gila, down to Mbay, then along the broken asphalt to Riung.

Don't look down - you wouldn't want to run out of road here.

The nature of the countryside is what makes the trans Flores highway. Flores is mostly mountain, so the road winds up and down through sequences of hairpin bends, with sometimes sheer drops on one (or both) sides. Great motorcycling, although there are the usual hazards of roadworks, gravel, goats, and some big holes. Really big holes - where there is more hole than road. But there's a lot of work being done to improve the road, widening some corners and fixing the surface. So in places there are stretches of new asphalt snaking up the hillside, something that anyone who loves riding bikes likes to see. 

Look what's waiting round the corner. I actually thought the road just stopped when I saw this.

After a couple of days at Riung, enjoying the beaches, islands and beer, it was time to head to Bajawa, a cute little town nestling between volcanoes covered in lush forest. Then on to Ruteng, and finally Labuanbajo. I was heading to this tourist spot to try to see Komodo Dragons on the nearby island of Rinca - but being out of tourist season, couldn't find a boat going out there. But I did see a real, live volcano - something that the villagers there seemed very proud of.

A real live volcano!

I earned my keep by cooking in Bajawa - volunteers Sarah provided the wine, and Rachel gutted the fish. Teamwork.

So this has been a fun road trip - something positive to end my time in Indonesia. I've covered 1250km, I don't know how many hairpin bends, and goodness knows how many Bintang. It's been so good to catch up with all the other volunteers on Flores, who've welcomed me with a place to stay and a cold beer at the end of my day's ride. I'll miss them.

Labuanbajo - end of the road at the western tip of Flores