OSGeo map symbol set

Motivation
The OSGeo Cartographic Library and all software projects obviously need a free map symbol set.

Mailing List
This topic along with the OSGeo icon set (Toolbar button icons) are discussed on the Graphics mailing list

Available Material

 * Free map symbol sets from GFOSS.it: Simboli cartografici: trees, geology, meteorology and north arrows


 * Cartography symbols from GRASS


 * QGIS's symbols


 * GpsDrive and OpenStreetMap maintain a repository of c. hundreds of Point Of Interest (POI) rasterized and SVG symbol icons under a permissive OSS license. Things like "banks" and "hospitals" are very well covered.
 * see http://www.gpsdrive.de/development/map-icons/overview.en.shtml
 * http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Symbol_Rendering
 * http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/index.php/Tags_to_Symbols_Mapping
 * http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/index.php/Osmarender/Symbols


 * US Government
 * National Park Service (public domain) http://www.nps.gov/hfc/carto/map-symbols.htm
 * Arc symbols for wildland fire (public domain?) http://gis.nwcg.gov/gstop_symbol.html
 * US Geologic Survey (public domain) Topo Symbols
 * BLM International Recreation Symbols
 * Emergency Management (Homeland Security Working Group of FGDC)
 * FGDC Digital Cartographic Standard for Geologic Map Symbolization http://ngmdb.usgs.gov/fgdc_gds/geolsymstd/download.php


 * GeoServer default SLDs: http://svn.codehaus.org/geoserver/trunk/configuration/release/styles/ (useful?)
 * updated URL? http://svn.codehaus.org/geoserver/trunk/data/release/styles/


 * AtlasStyler collection of SE symbols and SVGs: http://en.geopublishing.org/openmapsymbols/
 * IAN Symbol Libraries SVG FREE http://ian.umces.edu/symbols/
 * Open Icon Library - a free and open Icon collection, PNG: http://openiconlibrary.sourceforge.net/
 * Map Icons Collection, (CC BY SA 3.0): http://mapicons.nicolasmollet.com/
 * OpenCPN's collection of SVG sources + XPM, and PNG marker symbols (git repo; GPL >= v2)
 * Google Road Symbols for QGIS
 * The Noun Project

Related Material

 * See also OSGeo icon set - (Toolbar button icons)
 * GRASS GUI icons: visual dictionary (Toolbar button icons)

Other Technology
(please keep focus on free as in freedom technologies which we can distribute and make use of without barriers)

Microsoft has a symbol server

Symbol Availability
see also the GpsDrive/OpenStreetMap matrix above

Format

 * The preferred interchange format is SVG.
 * QGIS has a way of swapping fill color on SVG if you add some tags
 * How to convert Fonts to SVG

Interested people

 * Markus Neteler (proposer)
 * Dave Sampson
 * Martin Landa: GRASS developer
 * Wolf Bergenheim
 * Stefan A. Krüger: AtlasStyler developer
 * Maksim Sestic
 * Alex Mandel
 * Hamish: GRASS, GpsDrive dev
 * Brian Hamlin
 * Milena Nowotarska
 * Anders Söderman
 * Michael Diener