Touch Mapper

Tactile map maker. Creates files for 3D or embossing printing from OpenStreetMap data. See https://touch-mapper.org

Development

Install dependencies

./init.sh

Setup AWS CLI

aws configure

Create AWS resources

make dev-aws-install

API Gateway for accessing email sending Lambda is for now not created automatically. The same API GW endpoints can be used by all Touch Mapper instances.

Install static website to S3

make dev-web-s3-install

Last line of output gives the URL (https://something.cloudfront.net) where the web UI can be accessed.

Run OSM -> STL converter service

In a tab of its own:

install/run-dev-converter.sh

Local web development

In web dir, in separate tabs:

make watch
make serve

You can now access the web UI in http://localhost:9000

Feature roadmap / nice to have

• Describe map contents in the web UI to
  • Roads: intersections between roads, and between roads and map borders; street numbers
  • Points of interest, esp. bus stops: https://developers.google.com/maps/documentation/javascript/places#place_search_requests
  • Support hot-keys for area adjustment, so that choosing the area is practical for a blind user
• Print labels for roads and/or points of interest
  • Maybe use short labels, and offer a separate legend that maps the labels to longer descriptions. The legend could be electronic.
• Replace spinning 3D preview with one or more larger static images, maybe created using Blender Render, using ambient occlusion
  • 3D preview is too small and unclear
• Remember user's past maps
• Avoid significant overlaps between roads and buildings. This would enable reliable two-color 3D printing.
• Smaller scale modes: only show water/land/green areads; N largest roads; city borders
• Non-square maps

Technical TODO:

• Move converter from EC2 to Lambda
• Do all the work in a Java application that could be based on the first stages of OSM2World transformation pipeline. Benefits:
  • Do road processing mostly when they are still line segments rather than 2D objects
    • Create embosser input
    • Avoid roads intersecting with buildings => enable two-color 3D printing
      • Maybe use https://sourceforge.net/projects/jts-topo-suite/
    • Much easier to describe map contents (eg. roads intersecting with edges)
  • Better performance
  • Simpler processing pipeline