> Mapbox gl-js version 2.0 or higher (“Mapbox Web SDK”) must be used according to the Mapbox Terms of Service. This license allows developers with a current active Mapbox account to use and modify the Mapbox Web SDK. Developers may modify the Mapbox Web SDK code so long as the modifications do not change or interfere with marked portions of the code related to billing, accounting, and anonymized data collection. The Mapbox Web SDK only sends anonymized usage data, which Mapbox uses for fixing bugs and errors, accounting, and generating aggregated anonymized statistics. This license terminates automatically if a user no longer has an active Mapbox account.
Seems their client code does some things related to "billing, accounting, and anonymized data collection" and they don't want programmers to disable or modify that code.
Is that right? Anyone who has followed this have more information? I haven't used mapbox in a few years but I think it's great technology.
This GitHub issue where this change is announced provides a number of more in-depth explanations why this is a bad thing for most users of the software: https://github.com/mapbox/mapbox-gl-js/issues/10162
Using Mapbox GL JS 2.0 offline using a local tile server still requires an account and a per tile fee.
OpenLayers is a bit more of a Swiss Army knife. It's a valuable part of many web GIS workflows, but its vector tile rendering is a long way behind MBGL's.
Maplibre is still very nascent and needs a lot of work until it is ready to be used in anger. I do wonder if it would be better to put effort into Openlayers rather than trying to maintain this library - as others have pointed out, OL provides so much more.
I find that Openlayers has more of the capabilities I need when building complex mapping UIs.
Openlayers Web GL suppot is rudimentary.
[1] https://www.geoguessr.com/ (no affiliation)
Also while the Cesium core remains Open Source more and more of the tools and extras needed to make something really useful are starting to require expensive licenses.
