Rodnik.today is a social layer on top of OpenStreetMap for exploring and sharing information about public water sources worldwide
Rodnik.today uses OpenStreetMap as the source of data. Use it to explore public water sources or plan water supply during your long trips. Share local knowledge and up-to-date information with other community enthusiasts.
Verified information gets reported back to OpenStreetMap and improves quality of maps all over the world.
Rodnik.today is based on the following principles:
Rodnik.today is a geo-monitoring web application for sharing user reports on the state of public water sources worldwide. The platform was launched on August 28, 2021, and serves as a community-driven resource for documenting and monitoring natural water sources across the globe.
The System contains information about almost a million water sources around the world. Objects are marked on the map. Any Internet user can submit a report on the current state of an arbitrary object, attach several photos and subjectively assess water quality. All reports uploaded by the user are visible to all, so anybody can get the latest field information on the object of their interest.
The platform provides an interactive map interface where users can explore water sources worldwide, filter them by various attributes, and access historical data on specific water sources.
Water sources in Rodnik.today can be created by users to expand the database with previously undocumented sources.
Process:
Parameters for Water Source Creation:
Reports are user observations about the current state of a water source, providing temporal data on water quality and availability.
Process:
Report Parameters:
Editing Water Sources:
Editing Reports:
Rodnik.today implements a user interface to geo-data from its internal and third-party open resources. Currently, the global OpenStreetMap project is used as the geo-database. In future, it is planned to integrate with other global and local open sources of geodata.
The Voluntary GIS (VGIS) approach is used to collect live day-by-day data from the community. The system maintains its own VGIS data layer on top of the static map data to keep track of the current state and the retrospective of water objects.
Key Components:
Key Improvements to Traditional GIS:
More than a year have passed since the release date of the trial (v.0.1) version of the system. Now there are over 30 registered users in our Community. These users have already entered almost 3000 water source reports in Spain, Russia, Andorra, Italy, Israel, Greece, Turkey, Finland, South Korea, Japan, Northern Ireland, Latvia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, France, Slovenia, Hungary, Azerbaijan, Serbia, Montenegro, and more.
With 0.1 version the proof of concept of the System has been completed. Version 1.0 is currently under development.
The system uses a MySQL database with key tables including:
springs
- Core water source informationreports
- User observations with timestampsphotos
- Images attached to reportsusers
- User account informationspring_revisions
- Historical record of changes to sourcesThe Project was started by a small group of programmers and outdoor enthusiasts from Russia. Very soon a community of people interested in the problem of public water sources rallied around the idea. The project has become international with development centers in Finland, Spain, Russia, Armenia, and Turkey, with software development based particularly in Helsinki.
WATER IS LIFE
Public water sources hold tremendous significance in our lives, impacting our lifestyle, health, culture, recreation, history, and entertainment. Despite their uniqueness across different geographies, they possess universal importance. By accumulating global knowledge about these vital resources and providing easy access to this information, we contribute to a significant public good.
Reasoning Behind Rodnik.today:
The project welcomes contributors with interests in hydrology, GIS, sustainable development, and volunteered monitoring. The development team is open to collaboration with communities running water-source related projects.
Rodnik.today is open data, licensed under the Open Data Commons Open Database License.
Rodnik.today is created by a community of outdoor enthusiasts. The project is non-profit and non-commercial. We love nature and we want to make the information accessible to everyone. You too? Please, join our community!
Learn more about Rodnik.today (Google document, work in progress).