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Reviews

Open a place panel and choose Reviews to read available ratings, opinions, and photos from Mangrove. Reading requires no OpenMapX account. Writing requires sign-in and a review signing key.

Reviews are public contributions to Mangrove. Deleting your OpenMapX account does not delete those reviews. Keep your key if you want to manage them later.

What you get​

The tab shows an aggregate rating and individual reviews, newest first, when available. A review can include a nickname and photos. Your public key identifies your reviews; after you review a place, the write action becomes an edit action. Links to other review platforms can appear where the place has suitable references.

To contribute:

  1. Sign in, open the place's Reviews tab, and choose Write a review.
  2. Set up or unlock your signing key when prompted.
  3. Add a rating, opinion, and any photos, then submit.
  4. Use the controls on your review to edit or delete it later.

Avoid personal or confidential information in a public review or photograph. The image relay accepts JPEG, PNG, WebP, and GIF files up to 5 MiB each.

How it works​

Reviews come from Mangrove​

Mangrove is the external review store. OpenMapX retrieves and caches reviews through its server and relays signed submissions to the provider. A temporarily unavailable source can leave the tab empty or show an error; an empty result does not establish that no other platform has reviews.

A place is addressed by a subject URI​

A Mangrove geographic subject identifies the place using coordinates and a name:

geo:LAT,LON?q=NAME&u=UNCERTAINTY

OpenMapX checks proximity and identity evidence, such as a matching name or OSM reference, before attaching a review to a place. Source differences can still cause missing or incorrectly matched reviews. Check the place before posting.

Writing a review is signed in your browser​

The browser signs each write, edit, or deletion with your private key. OpenMapX forwards the signed record. The public key identifies the author and connects reviews made under that identity, even when the nickname changes.

Setting up your signing key​

The setup wizard can create a key or import a compatible existing private JWK. Choose how it is stored:

ModeProtection and recovery
PassphraseThe browser encrypts the key before uploading it; unlock with that passphrase
Passphrase + passkeyAdds a supported device credential as another unlock method; retain the passphrase as recovery
UnencryptedThe server stores a readable private key; setup requires an explicit confirmation

In encrypted modes, the unlocked private key stays in browser memory and locks after 15 minutes without a key operation. Signing out clears the session key. The review-key passphrase is separate from your OpenMapX sign-in password.

Keep a recovery copy

Losing the key and every working unlock method prevents you from editing or deleting reviews under that identity. Resetting your OpenMapX password cannot recover it. Creating a new key creates a different reviewing identity.

Privacy and portability​

Under Account settings, find the Mangrove signing-key section. Unlock the key and choose its export action to download or copy the private JWK. Store that file privately: anyone who obtains it can act as your review identity. The export is compatible with supported Mangrove clients and another OpenMapX instance's import flow. It is not included in a normal data-access archive.

Encrypted modes protect the stored key from a database-only disclosure. They cannot protect an unlocked key from malicious code served by a compromised OpenMapX application. Passkeys for this key do not encrypt saved places or other account content. See the user-data trust model.

Enabling and configuring​

The built-in reviews and reviews-mangrove integrations need no Mangrove API key. reviews-mangrove is enabled by default. Writing also needs working account and database services for the key envelope. Operators manage provider enablement under Admin → Integrations. Disabling the provider prevents normal review retrieval and submission through it; it does not delete published reviews or stored keys.

Attribution and licensing​

The Mangrove integration declares CC BY 4.0 for review content and displays its source credit. Contributions are published to the external dataset. Review the linked Mangrove terms before contributing or operating the integration.