Thailand Wazer

[argus-cronos]

If you edit a street (segment) you will see that the segment becomes updated by you, after you hit save in the editor, you can reselect the segment and you will see your name on it and your level of editing rank under "updated by"

Watch this for more infos

http://www.waze.com/wiki/index.php/Your_Rank_and_Points

The ปากชอง thing is, in the Client Thai characters are displayed right now. I've seen this the first time - more than 1 year ago. I think. It will only not being displayed in the Map Editor, you can check this on the Waze App. But as i've tried the last time i did not find it as a search result in the navigation menu.

When an aerial image is bad we use the GPS Points Layer, and this is one of the most important and helpful thing when drawing new roads and aligning them to the GPS Points. In areas of Chiang Mai, some parts of Chon buri or Si Racha the aerials are not on a correct position. BKK is much better.

Other places in the South or along Phet Kasem or as well as Mitthraphap there it's also required to check the GPS Points cause aerials are mostly inexistent or really bad.

Of course you know that ศ or any kind of "s" - spoken charcters (by foreigners) in thai will not be pronounciated in thai or more like "t,d" so this is another thing that we have to deal with.

เทเวศร์ sounds like Thewet to me as farang and i think it's comming closer to what a native thai speaker pronunciate, at least this is what we learn in a language school about thai language. Cause ror-ruea is silent, sor-sala at the end becomes t or d. Am i wrong?

Today their server has a runtime error but it is worth to check this out:

http://www.thai2english.com/

It helped me lot of times for some translations and understanding, there may be differences to the Royal Thai Institute but they are really close.

IMHO, province is the closest match to city. There are 76 provinces in Thailand (excluding Bangkok). But there are over 800 Amphoes here which are too many to remember. I will always use province as a city because waze has only one field for such a thing and 76 is just right, in my opinion. Also, If you use Amphoe, you may not realize where it is because there are Amphoe Muang in all provinces (except Phra Nakhon Si Ayutthaya).

Yep, you can check this in Udon Thani or Khon Kaen for example. Some editors have started to add Province names over the half of the country, this was not really helpful, so i've corrected a lot to display the amphoes as well in separate polygones. Cause if you do so, you will never find the right place in navigation mode.

For many scenarios you can use external search providers such as bing, foursquare or google... and the map is looking much clearer if we not spread province names all over the country.

Another thing is most foreign people except you will never know anyway that Baan "Om Ko" is in Amphoe Ban Dung which belongs to the Province of Udon Thani, but if you try to navigate to Om Ko you will definitely find the right way now. Or Udon Thani you will reach by a waze search and you gonna be navigated directly to the city, and not 50 kilometers outside of it. I would being happy with more fields in the editor but for now we can only use a minimum.

If you need more infos feel free to ask here or per pm.
Regards
Argus

[leoviotti]

WOW! I forgot to subscribe to this topic, and I see lots of questions here that I had, but forgot to ask!

Good to see there's more people involved.

I know there's a "better usage for mapping" that says you should never "commit" a road unless you made all the changes. Maybe this is acceptable - maybe not - but I see almost no one using Skype in Thailand (yeah, growing community, but VERY SLOWLY growing), and my main concern is that people install, think it's great, start to use an... no roads. Never open again. Forget about it.

What I started to do, in the areas I know better, and some others I go to, or passed by with some frequency, is to add streets, junctions, roundabouts, allow/disallow the most important turns when possible, set a city, and most of the time, save a bunch of streets as Street (not the main ones, mainly the sois) as "No name". I eventually go back to them and start renaming the ones I know, but at least this makes the map *exist* in some form. You can see "my work" (everyone's work, of course, but the area I maintain with more care) between Sukhumvit Rd, BangNa-Trat, Kanchanaphisek and On Nut (a "square" area). I think it's important we have the roads, even if they have yet no name, but if someone disagrees, of course, let me know.

About naming, I'm doing what I said last time - following the plaques whenever possible, at least what is more common to see around here - and when not, I use the naming convention argus mentioned, the closest I can get of the spoken name (many times with help of my GF). Again, I hope this is acceptable and useable, but suggestions are always welcome.

Now, one question... this week, after a trip to Phu Wiang/Khon Khaen, I noticed parts of the Highway 12 didn't have the "temporary frontage road", which I started to add. I check the GPS traces, and add them to the best of my knowledge and 2 or 3 aerial views I have access to. I decided to make them "Main Street", which was wrong... I checked the guidelines, and frontage-roads are "service roads". This brings my question...

MOST of the main highways in Thailand have "frontage roads", either continuous or in more populated areas (when crossing a city for ex). My closest example and main target here is BangNa-Trat Road, leaving from Samphawut/Sukhumvit. All the way to Chonburi, at least, there is a frontage-road (only area you can drive by motorcycles). Then, between that, we have the MAIN ROAD, higher speed, better asphalt... and ON TOP of the MAIN ROAD, we have the TOLL WAY. Should we add a "Service Road" all the way to Chonburi? After all, traffic "sense" kinda depends on the existence of the FRONTAGE and MAIN roads (and the TollWay should only be accessible through very few existant entrances, maybe even a "two-way" center road, which more or less matches reality). What's your input in this?
(I have now subscribed to this topic and will follow up more closely, as we build up the mega complex map of this maze-country!)

Also, I have finished, to the best of my view and knowledge, "straightening up" Sukhumvit Road, in Bangkok city, since it was mega-horrible to drive around and all I could see was a "snake" on the GPS in front of me. Being such an important road to the city, and considering all roads/sois existing from there are correct (which I still haven been able to check), wouldn't be advisable to lock Sukhumvit Rd, at least in the main urban area? Not something I would do, but would there be a problem in doing so? (btw, the BTS in the middle of the road totally messes up with the GPS navigation, I'm guessing too much electrical interference... don't rely much on GPS traces in that area)

Tks, and lets keep up!

[leoviotti]

Ah, I remembered what else I wanted to ask about...

I was driving around LadPrao today, and I noticed the elevated road appears in many areas in green - as a *RAMP*. As far I know, the Waze driving system uses some kinds of Road Information to determine routes (pretty much useless at the moment, but not forever), and for that reason, this should never be set as RAMP - am I wrong?

In case we set a new rule for this... we must discuss what kind of road would be the one "downstairs" and which one would be the one "upstairs". Going into the highways system, my guess is we could use the "service road" for the bottom - BUT the highways apear very wide on the map, making distinction of things on the screen quite difficult, if they are used inside a heavily loaded city, such as Bangkok.

Moreover, this is a fairly common setup for Bangkok: LadPrao, Rhamkhamhaeng, parts of Chaengwattana and many, many others. What to do? I don't know, RAMP just doesn't seem correct.

[argus-cronos]

Hello leoviotti good to see somebody is taking care here

The community isn't that small, but most wazers posting on the FB group instead of the forum.

I've noticed your great effort in the area of BKK. Many times there are no sources for naming roads. So to add roads even without a roadname makes sense cause there is no basemap here and another one may know the name and can edit the road again. But don't forget the end-nodes. I've added thousends to your network

I agree to your opinion about the service roads, there are so much here. I've added a lot of freeways to the map and somedays i have to go back and add the service roads as well, cause my first thought was to establish a long range routing first.

There is no problem to lock Sukhumvit, cause automatic changes frome the system still happens. Changes to oneway or other horrible things for instance. This road is a problem cause of the Skytrain and the GPS, but we have to live with that.

Ramkamhaeng elevated road woud be better a normal street type than a ramp, i used to set a few elevated roads in bkk to "street", but some other users set them to ramps or primarys. But i won't lock them to my level cause then they are not accessible anymore to others or you. Especially primary streets clutters the map. So it's better to use a slim roadtype for the client.
https://world.waze.com/editor/?zoom=6&l ... TTTFTTTTFT

Its also better if you lock sensible spots to your AM level, as CM i can override any locks in Thailand and i'm willing to help if there are problems.
So anybody feel free to contact me for unlocks or anything else even in Thai.

What about a meeting in Bangkok, i'm in the Area until the middle of january? So we could discuss a few things.

Regards
Argus

[leoviotti]

Hello leoviotti good to see somebody is taking care here
The community isn't that small, but most wazers posting on the FB group instead of the forum.

Oh... I don't really use Facebook that much, I guess I missed that!

I've noticed your great effort in the area of BKK. Many times there are no sources for naming roads. So to add roads even without a roadname makes sense cause there is no basemap here and another one may know the name and can edit the road again. But don't forget the end-nodes. I've added thousends to your network

I didn't know they were needed until now. I already checked the Wiki, and will be adding those from now on. Tks!

I agree to your opinion about the service roads, there are so much here. I've added a lot of freeways to the map and somedays i have to go back and add the service roads as well, cause my first thought was to establish a long range routing first.

Definitely the most important part of the main highways is done. What we need to work on now, and I think it's the "hardest part", are the endless details of a country built with no planning over... at least a few hundred years in the most populated parts. Good thing that I always find news ways when I'm mapping, makes it all worth-while... can't wait to have more people actually using the system (a few thousand in Bangkok, actively using it, at least) so the traffic reports get more accurate and relevant. Longdo and Google Maps still "beat the crap" out of Waze unfortunately. But they are no fun.

There is no problem to lock Sukhumvit, cause automatic changes frome the system still happens. Changes to oneway or other horrible things for instance. This road is a problem cause of the Skytrain and the GPS, but we have to live with that.

Ok, I'll try to review once again Sukhumvit urban area, at least until Samut Prakan where it becomes a highway more than a major street, and we go from there. But the BTS really messes it up, shame.

Ramkamhaeng elevated road woud be better a normal street type than a ramp, i used to set a few elevated roads in bkk to "street", but some other users set them to ramps or primarys. But i won't lock them to my level cause then they are not accessible anymore to others or you. Especially primary streets clutters the map. So it's better to use a slim roadtype for the client.

Totally agreed. Sometimes we have all the roads there, but I can't see what is what, just a "river of blue or yellow". I made some of them like this myself, in Pattanakarn (all Main Street), back in 2011... but once in a while I go back to those places and review them. I'll use your approach from now on, set the elevated ways as Street, seems more reasonable.

Its also better if you lock sensible spots to your AM level, as CM i can override any locks in Thailand and i'm willing to help if there are problems.
So anybody feel free to contact me for unlocks or anything else even in Thai.

I'll start doing that then. I usually avoid locking anything, in hopes local users will get there and add the soi *name* instead than only the *number* (even as alternate name, either in Thai or English), but I'll start locking most sensitive areas. It's "good" not many people undo corrections though (bad actually, I hope there would be more people working on the maps, haha!)

What about a meeting in Bangkok, i'm in the Area until the middle of january? So we could discuss a few things.

We can arrange that, of course. I'm rushing on a few things for the next 2 weeks, but then on, it should be pretty cool for about a month...
And it would be an honour to meet the 3rd most crazy mapper on the Waze system, for sure.

[argus-cronos]

Yeah the FB group is busy, unfortunately more than the Forum. I've posted a few pics about the routing on the freeways. So it's possible now to set a route from Laos to Malaysia through whole Thailand. Also from BKK to Phuket, Nong Khai, Khon Kaen, Ayutthaya, Udon Thani, Maha Sarakham, Krabi, Hat Yai and a few other destinations. The last thing was connect Chiang Mai, but i haven't finished it before my holidays.

The Wiki page Junction Style Guide is a great help and probably the best way to work with intersections. There are a few sites in the wiki where end-nodes are mentioned. They are important for routing. If they are not been added the routing starts from the next connected road.

It takes time. When i started editing in bangkok more than two years ago it was a mess of unconnected roads and a few poor freeways. But navigation is much better now in the city. As i came to Thailand last year, i was able to find a perfect route from Suvarnabhumi to Sukhumvit 20/1. And we don't stop

The locking has a few good side effects. People start to contact us, i've had a few mails in the past from editors in BKK. The other thing - as long as this d... automatic changes thing is existing in waze - you can protect roads that are close to each other from changing the direction. I've found a few roads messed up by the system a few weeks ago, and i know definitely that i have set the proper direction.
It is not necessary to lock anything of course especially unnamed stuff, but at least complicated intersections.

Soi names are a little bit tricky here. Eyerybody knows Tong Lor Rd. But on the plaques Sukhumvit 55 is the first thing we see. Sometimes im not quiet sure what to use or should been corrected. Mostly i use the numnered main part of the plaque cause also all visitors use these names to describe anything.
The other "nickname" would find a good place in the alt names field.

Another question is: What you know about real Speed-Cams in BKK? Two months ago i have found more than 2500 reported speedcams in the editor, which were never been approved, some were approved in Areas where definitely no speedcams are installed. I've heard about Stories from my friend which lives for more than 10 years here, that people really get bills. But i've never seen one during my rides. I've read in the newspapapers that they are about to install some, but not 2500 i guess
So this brings me to two opinions, most people don't know the difference between traffic cams and speedcams or they are really good hided


Well just let me know when you find a few hours. It would be great to have a laptop or anything else, so i can show you a few tricks. If you know some other editors who are willing to join us, just activate them

Just call me -> "๐๘๓-๑๓๙-๘๗๐๘"

So today is my birthday and we gonna rock that crap out of bkk tonight

See ya
Argus

[leoviotti]

The Wiki page Junction Style Guide is a great help and probably the best way to work with intersections. There are a few sites in the wiki where end-nodes are mentioned. They are important for routing. If they are not been added the routing starts from the next connected road.

An absolute must-read, I didn't know it existed, the wiki sometimes don't point un anywhere... google located it easier.

It takes time. When i started editing in bangkok more than two years ago it was a mess of unconnected roads and a few poor freeways. But navigation is much better now in the city. As i came to Thailand last year, i was able to find a perfect route from Suvarnabhumi to Sukhumvit 20/1. And we don't stop

I remember that, back in the end of 2010... I was trying to drive around Pridibanomyong, but most roads were non-existent or totally wrong. I started fixing there (I was living there back then). Unfortunately I stopped for a long time, the old editor was @$#ˆ$% slow to use (and even the new one, totally HORRIBLE to use from Thailand, until they turned the old one off a couple of months ago - now it's ok). I barely use the routing function though, but it would be nice to have that working... I have Sygic, the paid one, but sometimes it misses the roads by A LOT, or makes me go out from the tollway just to go back minutes later... anyway, long way to go, but much better now than it was before.

The locking has a few good side effects. People start to contact us, i've had a few mails in the past from editors in BKK. The other thing - as long as this d... automatic changes thing is existing in waze - you can protect roads that are close to each other from changing the direction. I've found a few roads messed up by the system a few weeks ago, and i know definitely that i have set the proper direction.
It is not necessary to lock anything of course especially unnamed stuff, but at least complicated intersections.

Right, first time I spoke to you was probably because something locked that I wanted to edit.

Soi names are a little bit tricky here. Eyerybody knows Tong Lor Rd. But on the plaques Sukhumvit 55 is the first thing we see. Sometimes im not quiet sure what to use or should been corrected. Mostly i use the numnered main part of the plaque cause also all visitors use these names to describe anything.
The other "nickname" would find a good place in the alt names field.

My only "problem" with the alternate names, is that they don't really show while driving, only maybe in a search. I like the system here, of odd-even numbered sois, makes it much easier to drive in the maze when you get how things work, but it's always good to have the soi name in display, when you ask for directions.
For ex, some people only know "Soi Anamai", if you ask for On Nut 39 while on Srinagarindra, or Srinagarindra 24 while in OnNut, they will look lost. Say "Soi Anamai" and they know instantly where is it.
Perhaps leaving a small segment of the road with the name and the main part with the number... or... I don't know, really don't.

Another question is: What you know about real Speed-Cams in BKK? Two months ago i have found more than 2500 reported speedcams in the editor, which were never been approved, some were approved in Areas where definitely no speedcams are installed. I've heard about Stories from my friend which lives for more than 10 years here, that people really get bills. But i've never seen one during my rides. I've read in the newspapapers that they are about to install some, but not 2500 i guess
So this brings me to two opinions, most people don't know the difference between traffic cams and speedcams or they are really good hided

Speaking frankly, they do exist, I've seen it a few times in Mittraphap Rd, in the mountain area in Nakhon Ratchasima, in the middle of the road and *always ALWAYS* with a person beside it. Other than that, I only know the surveillance cameras. And considering how I drive, when traffic allows, I would know if there were speed cams everywhere...

Well just let me know when you find a few hours. It would be great to have a laptop or anything else, so i can show you a few tricks. If you know some other editors who are willing to join us, just activate them

Will do, I'll be around in xmas week anyway... but I'm easier to find by Skype or Google Talk (same name as here, everywhere).

Just call me -> "๐๘๓-๑๓๙-๘๗๐๘"

So today is my birthday and we gonna rock that crap out of bkk tonight

See ya
Argus

OH, I just saw this message... happy late birthday anyway!

[argus-cronos]

An absolute must-read, I didn't know it existed, the wiki sometimes don't point un anywhere... google located it easier.

Right there is a hell of information in the wiki

I remember that, back in the end of 2010... I was trying to drive around Pridibanomyong, but most roads were non-existent or totally wrong. I started fixing there (I was living there back then). Unfortunately I stopped for a long time, the old editor was @$#ˆ$% slow to use (and even the new one, totally HORRIBLE to use from Thailand, until they turned the old one off a couple of months ago - now it's ok). I barely use the routing function though, but it would be nice to have that working... I have Sygic, the paid one, but sometimes it misses the roads by A LOT, or makes me go out from the tollway just to go back minutes later... anyway, long way to go, but much better now than it was before.

The new editor is much more comfortable in deed.

Right, first time I spoke to you was probably because something locked that I wanted to edit.

Then, job done

My only "problem" with the alternate names, is that they don't really show while driving, only maybe in a search. I like the system here, of odd-even numbered sois, makes it much easier to drive in the maze when you get how things work, but it's always good to have the soi name in display, when you ask for directions.
For ex, some people only know "Soi Anamai", if you ask for On Nut 39 while on Srinagarindra, or Srinagarindra 24 while in OnNut, they will look lost. Say "Soi Anamai" and they know instantly where is it.

I think naming with brackets should do the job for now, as long the name isn't too long. Better then adding small Segments and useless junctions. So anybody can see the names which they understand. And there are less errors cause of missing turnrestrictions.

Speaking frankly, they do exist, I've seen it a few times in Mittraphap Rd, in the mountain area in Nakhon Ratchasima, in the middle of the road and *always ALWAYS* with a person beside it. Other than that, I only know the surveillance cameras. And considering how I drive, when traffic allows, I would know if there were speed cams everywhere...

That's what i have seen also, mostly Highway Patrol or some P-guys on the tollroads standing beside. Cause im not that familiar with speedlimits and i don't want to be I've never received a bill, just paid HP on the highways and mostly in the area of rayong

Will do, I'll be around in xmas week anyway... but I'm easier to find by Skype or Google Talk (same name as here, everywhere).

Ok i will look for google talk, anyway i posted my number.

OH, I just saw this message... happy late birthday anyway!

Thanks was fun in deed.
Have a nice day
Argus