[Tagging] "No abbreviations in names" edge case

[Colin Smale]

I think we need to add some clear nuances to the rule of "thou shalt not
abbreviate". 

In order to be able to work correctly, the "abbreviator" must of course
have some context such as language/locale, which can mostly be derived
from the location, but this is always going to fail sometimes. 

Expanding abbreviations grates a bit with the "on the ground rule".
Navigation applications as well as visual maps need to be able to
reproduce what the human will see on the ground - often in a language
they don't know. Sometimes the abbreviated version is more recognisable.
There should IMHO be an explicit tag to hold the version "as displayed
on the signs" for any case where the "abbreviator" could be confused. 

Maybe we should distinguish between types of words: 

"road types" such as Avenue, Street --> limited set: these can probably
be expanded reversibly 

"personal titles" such as General, King --> limited set: these can
mostly be expanded reversibly; in Dutch, "Ingenieur" has two possible
abbreviations Ir. and Ing. depending on the granting University.
Expanding them both to Ingenieur loses the distinction, and the
"abbreviator" cannot make the right decision without having a list of
names. 

"personal names" such as "Winston Churchill" --> infinite set: these are
often (but not always) abbreviated - how far do you go with the
expansion? Should "W. Churchillstraat" be expanded to "Winston Leonard
Spencer Churchillstraat"? Perhaps we should leave personal names as they
are on the signs. 

Colin 

On 2014-06-19 05:40, Nathan Oliver wrote: 

> On Wed, Jun 18, 2014 at 9:39 PM, Paul Johnson <baloo at ursamundi.org> wrote:
> 
> On Wed, Jun 18, 2014 at 4:50 AM, François Lacombe <francois.lacombe at telecom-bretagne.eu> wrote:
> 
> Could someone precise me why abbreviations should always be avoided in tagging please ? 
> 
> This is already explained at length in the wiki, but chiefly because it disambiguates things a lot. Data consumers can create abbreviations from full words, but expanding abbreviations accurately in an automated fashion is about as hard as writing a program that can pass a Turing test.

Indeed. This was driven home for me when my GPS announced "You have
arrived at your destination, the Cathedral of Street Paul." 

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