<!DOCTYPE html><html><head><title></title><style type="text/css">p.MsoNormal,p.MsoNoSpacing{margin:0}
p.MsoNormal,p.MsoNoSpacing{margin:0}</style></head><body><div>> <a href="https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Abbreviations">https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Abbreviations</a><br></div><div>> ==> If the name can be spelled without an abbreviation, then don't<br></div><div>> abbreviate it.<br></div><div>><br></div><div>> I notice that for *many* churches in London, ON; "Saint" has been<br></div><div>> changed to "St". For example:<br></div><div><br></div><div>It also does say "If the name is incorrect when spelled in full, however, do not falsely expand it" so one of the questions will be: is it incorrect when expanded? That's likely not to have a blanket answer for all churches.<br></div><div><br></div><div>Be also aware that there are many exceptions to this "best practice" in OSM.<br></div><div><br></div><div>OSM originated in Britain and many of OSM practices and standards are based on British mapping and naming, so let's take for example London, England. (London is actually _relatively_ poorly mapped these days, but it's still something.) There is no consistency:<br></div><div>- <a href="https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/369161987">https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/369161987</a> name "St Paul's Cathedral"<br></div><div>- <a href="https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/26638075">https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/26638075</a> name "St Pancras Old Church"<br></div><div>- <a href="https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/4969133">https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/4969133</a> name "Saint Mary's Church"<br></div><div>- <a href="https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/32912540">https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/32912540</a> name "Saint Mark's Kennington"<br></div><div>as you pan around, you will see churches named with both formats<br></div><div><br></div><div>OK, so surely the pedantic and orderly Germans have figured it out? Ah, no:<br></div><div>- <a href="https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/51688847">https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/51688847</a> name "St.-Thomas-Kirche"<br></div><div>- <a href="https://www.openstreetmap.org/relation/8436062">https://www.openstreetmap.org/relation/8436062</a> few hundred metres away, name "Sankt Michael"<br></div><div>- <a href="https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/51069986">https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/51069986</a> name "St. Nikolaus"<br></div><div>- <a href="https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/58608090">https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/58608090</a> name "St. Hedwigs-Kathedrale Berlin"<br></div><div>- <a href="https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/11776713">https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/11776713</a> name "Sankt Rita"<br></div><div>if anything, from panning around it appears church names with "St." are a bit more common<br></div><div><br></div><div>> But the general rule of thumb was to trust local mappers first instead of expanding things based on external preference<br></div><div><br></div><div>Yes, this will be my foremost recommendation. Local mappers and local usage.<br></div><div><br></div><div>My second-most recommendation is not to change long-standing existing tagging without good reasons. I do note that the renamings of churches in London seem to have gone against this.<br></div><div><br></div><div>The church's own usage, including signs on the church and their written communications, would also play into it for me.<br></div><div><br></div><div>BTW, for <a href="https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/118730476/history">https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/118730476/history</a> it appears "Lutheran" has been misspelled in OSM since 2012.<br></div><div><br></div><div>> FWIW, the "don't un-abbreviate names" exception is only documented as applying to municipality and street names: <br></div><div><br></div><div>Yep. I was one of the people pushing for those exceptions, so to add for context:<br></div><div><br></div><div>- in city names, this prevents incorrectly unabbreviating cities like St. John's or St. Catharines (the latter I had to fix once)<br></div><div>- in street names, this prevents incorrectly unabbreviating streets named after people whose names were never spelled with Saint (for example "St. Clair Avenue") and where it's not clear whether the name actually refers to a specific saint (for example "St. Andrews Road" or "St. Clarens Avenue")<br></div><div><br></div><div>--Jarek<br></div><div><br></div><div>On Tue, Jul 4, 2023, at 13:32, Justin Tracey wrote:<br></div><blockquote type="cite" id="qt" style=""><div>FWIW, the "don't un-abbreviate names" exception is only documented as <br></div><div>applying to municipality and street names: <br></div><div><a href="https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Canada/Tagging_guidelines#Naming">https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Canada/Tagging_guidelines#Naming</a><br></div><div><br></div><div>But yeah, in general, OSM data in Canada is weird when it comes to <br></div><div>abbreviations, and I would not jump to conclusions about anything mapped <br></div><div>by someone local.<br></div><div><br></div><div> - Justin<br></div><div><br></div><div>On 2023-07-04 09:57, James wrote:<br></div><div>> oh boy this can of worms again. This has been discussed at length before.<br></div><div>> <br></div><div>> Including possibly following a GoC nomenclature database.<br></div><div>> <br></div><div>> But the general rule of thumb was to trust local mappers first instead <br></div><div>> of expanding things based on external preference<br></div><div>> <br></div><div>> On Tue, Jul 4, 2023, 9:47 AM Pierre-Léo Bourbonnais <<a href="mailto:leo@leograph.com">leo@leograph.com</a> <br></div><div>> <mailto:<a href="mailto:leo@leograph.com">leo@leograph.com</a>>> wrote:<br></div><div>> <br></div><div>> I would suggest to contact the user who change names to<br></div><div>> abbreviations and send them the link to OpenStreetMap official<br></div><div>> policy on St/Ste/Saint/Sainte abbreviations. They can add the<br></div><div>> short_name tag if they want to keep the abbreviations somewhere in<br></div><div>> the tags.<br></div><div>> <br></div><div>> If no response after one week, revert with my blessing!<br></div><div>> <br></div><div>> > On Jul 4, 2023, at 9:19 AM, <<a href="mailto:fbax@execulink.com">fbax@execulink.com</a><br></div><div>> <mailto:<a href="mailto:fbax@execulink.com">fbax@execulink.com</a>>> <<a href="mailto:fbax@execulink.com">fbax@execulink.com</a><br></div><div>> <mailto:<a href="mailto:fbax@execulink.com">fbax@execulink.com</a>>> wrote:<br></div><div>> ><br></div><div>> > <a href="https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Abbreviations">https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Abbreviations</a><br></div><div>> <<a href="https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Abbreviations">https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Abbreviations</a>><br></div><div>> > ==> If the name can be spelled without an abbreviation, then don't<br></div><div>> > abbreviate it.<br></div><div>> ><br></div><div>> > I notice that for *many* churches in London, ON; "Saint" has been<br></div><div>> > changed to "St". For example:<br></div><div>> > <a href="https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/119789042/history">https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/119789042/history</a><br></div><div>> <<a href="https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/119789042/history">https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/119789042/history</a>><br></div><div>> > <a href="https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/118730476/history">https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/118730476/history</a><br></div><div>> <<a href="https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/118730476/history">https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/118730476/history</a>><br></div><div>> ><br></div><div>> > Should these changes be reversed; or has policy changed?<br></div><div>> ><br></div><div>> ><br></div><div>> > _______________________________________________<br></div><div>> > Talk-ca mailing list<br></div><div>> > <a href="mailto:Talk-ca@openstreetmap.org">Talk-ca@openstreetmap.org</a> <mailto:<a href="mailto:Talk-ca@openstreetmap.org">Talk-ca@openstreetmap.org</a>><br></div><div>> > <a href="https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-ca">https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-ca</a><br></div><div>> <<a href="https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-ca">https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-ca</a>><br></div><div>> <br></div><div>> <br></div><div>> <br></div><div>> _______________________________________________<br></div><div>> Talk-ca mailing list<br></div><div>> <a href="mailto:Talk-ca@openstreetmap.org">Talk-ca@openstreetmap.org</a> <mailto:<a href="mailto:Talk-ca@openstreetmap.org">Talk-ca@openstreetmap.org</a>><br></div><div>> <a href="https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-ca">https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-ca</a><br></div><div>> <<a href="https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-ca">https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-ca</a>><br></div><div>> <br></div><div>> <br></div><div>> _______________________________________________<br></div><div>> Talk-ca mailing list<br></div><div>> <a href="mailto:Talk-ca@openstreetmap.org">Talk-ca@openstreetmap.org</a><br></div><div>> <a href="https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-ca">https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-ca</a><br></div><div><br></div><div>_______________________________________________<br></div><div>Talk-ca mailing list<br></div><div><a href="mailto:Talk-ca@openstreetmap.org">Talk-ca@openstreetmap.org</a><br></div><div><a href="https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-ca">https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-ca</a><br></div><div><br></div></blockquote><div><br></div></body></html>