[OSM-dev] Rendering of "surface"

[Jaak Laineste]

2011/6/5 John Smith <deltafoxtrot256 at gmail.com>:
> On 6 June 2011 03:22, Richard Weait <richard at weait.com> wrote:
>> Why must the "problem" of rendering surface tags be solved on a
>> specific rendered layer or service?
>
> The answer is obvious, it's easier to push a small change onto the
> main mapnik layer than running their own system.

I'm coming back to the original issue. My two arguments supporting to
render surface:
1. In our country we still have about 25% of roads unpaved, so surface
(paved/unpaved) is way more important parameter for almost any user of
any road map. The current primary/secondary/etc classification is here
relevant for officials and no much more. So also in our cartographic
tradition we still use primary dimension (colors) for surface, and
secondary (width, style) for other road parameters.
2. Current lack of surface style in Mapnik main stylesheet has impact
to real mapping: people tend to  not add the surface tag, just because
they do not see it rendered in The Map. And this is a major issue for
many applications.

 ps. we are working on own rendering server and we will solve it for
ourselves. It is not us just being lazy not to set up own custom
style. But: (1) it would not solve the issue of non-tagging for most
who do not see our customized rendering. And (2) most important style
fixes should be in the main stylesheet, and my impression is that this
is one of those. For both practical use, and to enforce proper
tagging. Maybe non-paved road thing looks like alien for you in
Germany or UK, but in less or no-developed countries (covering 95+% of
world population/maps) this is important everyday issue. Please don't
ignore us.

-- 
Jaak Laineste