Sadly there is no browser view, but they have selection of app stores on their page for the app (and IIRC they are working on a desktop version).
It has routing, searching, more map details (e.g. park benches, trash bins on the map), OSM editing, and pretty slick look in my opinion.
I recently switched to Organic Maps after learning about it here on Lemmy and haven’t touched Google Maps as much. I know it is not a perfect 100% replacement, but while it lacks certain things (e.g. public transport, but I use local public transport app anyway for better accuracy), it has so many features google lacks:
- hiking trail overlay that is more up-to-date
- stores maps on your phone in vector format (offline use is so much nicer)
- privacy focused
There is more to this than I know and write here, and probably many here already know about Organic Maps since there was the whole fiasco of google removing this app from play store awhile back, but thought it’s cool that the company behind it is in Estonia (man I still remember Skype, thanks Estonia ❤️ I’ve spent so much time on skype before it was aquired by Microsoft).
Edit to add extra info from website: Company is based in Tallinn, Estonia - Organic Maps OÜ
Just in case there are map nerds looking at this thread who might not know about a related app to fill OpenStreetMap attributes while having fun doing it: check out StreetComplete; PokemonGo but instead catch wrong / outdated / unmarked map information and get credited for it!
The company is Estonian in that absolutely anyone can start an Estonian company if they really want to. We’re like the Delaware of Europe.
The two owners are Russian and Byelorussian. They have close to no social media presence, even their LinkedIn and Github accounts are completely empty. According to public records, one lives in the UK and the other in Argentina.
There are 39 other companies registered in the same office space (not the building - the same exact office in that building) in downtown Tallinn. Total of 1424 companies registered in that building.
Interesting, well at least the code is open-source and I’ve myself also skimmed through some of their code and didn’t find anything suspicious. But didn’t know that about Estonian laws allowing anyone to spin-up a company even if they are living outside of Estonia. Thanks for the info!
Just to add my two cents about online presence: my online presence is also limited to lemmy, linkedin, and github. The only one with my real name and picture is linkedin.
Github I only use for work and doesn’t have any of my personal info and linkedin pretty much has one photo of me and works as my online CV.
I also try to keep my own visibility online low and don’t see problems with that. But these kind of mailbox companies are always bit suspicious…
Nevertheless, thank you for looking into this and posting about it.
But didn’t know that about Estonian laws allowing anyone to spin-up a company even if they are living outside of Estonia. Thanks for the info!
Yup, it’s called an e-residency.
Just to add my two cents about online presence: my online presence is also limited to lemmy, linkedin, and github. The only one with my real name and picture is linkedin.
Well yeah, but are you trying to market a SaaS company? If you were, it’d make sense to have more of an online presence. If not, you’ve got everything you need, but a lot of people also run personal engineering blogs to non-invasively advertise their companies, etc. Hell, one of the folks who used to work in Toggl’s marketing team has a really awesome online comic that pretty much put the company on the map for a lot of people. A lot of the software engineering and business or time management related comics had a Toggl watermark.
It’s organic (heh) marketing, pretty much. If you have a growing company, it seems to help a lot.
But didn’t know that about Estonian laws allowing anyone to spin-up a company even if they are living outside of Estonia. Thanks for the info!
Ohh, okay have to check better whether a company is just a mailbox company from now on, thank you for bringing this to my attention!
Well, I guess that makes sense. I would definitely limit my online presence and try to keep myself private still even if I started my own SaaS company and use the company/product channel to communicate and market, but then again maybe that is why I’m not a marketer or have my own company, and would probably not succeed in a small startup lol.
Good insights and very well put. Learned some new stuff and it never hurts for me to go through the code again :) (was planning to check some of their code anyway because of interesting implementations!).
My main issue with Organic Maps is how bad the night mode map view is. They’ve effectively just turned the background black without adjusting street colors; so all the main orange/gold main roads have no contrast and disappear into the blackness. I’m sadly forced to keep it in Day mode just so it can be read and used, regardless of time of day. :-/
Til: I just learned the project is working on a desktop version.
Also join !organicmaps@sopuli.xyz to discuss the app!
We need 253 more subs to beat r/organicmaps counterpart!
Yay! we’ll get there, lemmy is growing, I’ve noticed that my procrastination moments with lemmy are no longer “scroll for 2 minutes and I’ve seen the whole of lemmyverse”. I’m actually procrastinating now.
I briefly tried the development version of their desktop version on Windows 11 using WSL and would not recommend it yet, but I can imagine it works better on Linux since it is a flatpak!
(before I get butchered on lemmy: I daily drive linux at home, windows 11 is for work).
Also recommend StreetComplete to help fill in OSM data. It’s fun too :)
Not feature-complete enough to replace OsmAnd for me yet (and maybe it never will be). OsmAnd is a nested menu nightmare of bloat and maybe Organic Maps isn’t aiming for that.
OsmAnd is also cool, but yeah I prefer the simplicity of Organic maps myself and haven’t needed much more in my day-to-day life.
Best part is: both are good replacements for google/apple (in the context of getting rid of big tech) and thankfully we can choose!
