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<p>I have mapped for a few years but starting out solo without any involvement in the community. So I am a newcomer to how the community works at large, and the fragmentation of views of how one should map or not and the differing ways to map that is already in the database has been quite confusing. By now I pretty much understand that the question I ask in the thread title cannot be answered. There's a bunch of differing opinions on how we should map, and no uniform decision can be made so we just map the way we like.</p>
<p>There are both advantages and disadvantages to that approach. If I as a mapper is also in control of rendering the end products I want to see, like maps, then fine. Sure it's a bit tricky to make a renderer that need to adapt to heterogenous tagging methods, but I know I can at least get all my own mapping work show up as I like in the end product.<br /><br />However if I as a mapper only map and want to see my work to be broadly available to end users in its full glory it becomes relevant what OSM-Carto and other widespread renderers do, it becomes important what the database and API designers think is important to support or what can (or should) be ignored. Mappers can vote on tags, but for anonymous mappers like me without an own rendering pipeline the true power lies in those that control the software. OSM-Carto is to quite some extent used to guide mappers how they should map. A recent(?) example is that landcover pattern is nowadays rendered on top of rivers to encourage mappers to draw a river area, which I nowadays do to make it render properly.</p>
<p>By not rendering valleys and peninsula and possibly other tags often used on "non-verifiable geometry" it's a signal to mappers that those are not considered important or desirable. We could say that we shouldn't care about what OSM-Carto does, and for advanced users that have their own renderers that makes some sense, although it risks further increase fragmentation in mapping methods.</p>
<p>But how many of us mappers have our own renderers? A few on this list have it of course, but broadly speaking it's probably less than 1% of all mappers. And if you don't have your own pipeline or is simply interested in the free end products that anyone can access for free all over the world, one have to take into account what OSM-Carto does.</p>
<p>Even if the mappers community end up with a consensus to map in one way (or at least a consensus that it is an okay alternative), and those in charge of OSM-Carto choose not to render it, then it's really not working out... because OSM-Carto is the only renderer that can represent "the community".</p>
<p>I know many think that we should not care about rendering at all, and the way to see our own work is to download it in JOSM and enjoy the geodata objects we've made, as OSM is supposed to be a geodatabase, not a geoservice provider. I don't think that is how the typical mapper see it though.</p>
<p id="reply-intro">On 2020-12-24 15:46, Brian M. Sperlongano wrote:</p>
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<div dir="ltr">Right, which is why when a member of the DWG declares that something cannot be done, it is a reasonable ask to say "what is meant by that?" I thank Andy for his clarifying remarks.</div>
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<div class="v1gmail_attr" dir="ltr">On Thu, Dec 24, 2020 at 9:21 AM Tomas Straupis <<a href="mailto:tomasstraupis@gmail.com" rel="noreferrer">tomasstraupis@gmail.com</a>> wrote:</div>
<blockquote class="v1gmail_quote" style="margin: 0px 0px 0px 0.8ex; border-left: 1px solid #cccccc; padding-left: 1ex;">> Has the DWG ever taking swift and immediate action to enforce a particular<br />> tagging scheme? <...> but I can't think of an occasion when we've enforced<br />> a particular tagging scheme in that way.<br /><br /> On what grounds DWG could take any action?<br /> There is no such thing as "the only right" tagging scheme.<br /> There is currently no team of experts which could decide which<br />tagging scheme is better in case of a dispute (organising voting of<br />sufficient number of mappers is practically impossible).<br /> If a local community decides to use scheme A that is it they use<br />schema A. DWG or anybody else can/should do NOTHING.<br /><br />_______________________________________________<br />Tagging mailing list<br /><a href="mailto:Tagging@openstreetmap.org" rel="noreferrer">Tagging@openstreetmap.org</a><br /><a href="https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/tagging" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/tagging</a></blockquote>
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<div class="pre" style="margin: 0; padding: 0; font-family: monospace">_______________________________________________<br />Tagging mailing list<br /><a href="mailto:Tagging@openstreetmap.org">Tagging@openstreetmap.org</a><br /><a href="https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/tagging" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/tagging</a></div>
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