[Tagging] 'Unknown' value.

[Rafael Avila Coya]

Hi all:

I was the one who organized the import of 14,000+ places nodes in 
Liberia back in September 2014.

The idea of giving place=unknown (together with a fixme=* tag) to places 
that were not possible to determine its value was proposed during the 
discussion in the imports list [1] [2].

place=yes was also proposed, and now I guess it would be better than 
place=unknown

Back in 2014 many areas of Liberia lacked hires imagery. Now we have 
imagery for all the country.

2 days ago, the number of nodes with place=unknown was 977 (so 7% of all 
the imported nodes). In a short time I retagged more than 100 (they are 
861 nodes with place=unknown left (6%)), a quite easy task.

So I strongly oppose to the removal of these nodes, that could be 
retagged quite easily in a short time.

As for the nodes that cannot be retagged, we could change them to place=yes.

Cheers,

Rafael.

[1] 
https://lists.openstreetmap.org/pipermail/imports/2014-September/003419.html
[2] 
https://lists.openstreetmap.org/pipermail/imports/2014-September/003421.html

On 03/02/18 23:16, Nelson A. de Oliveira wrote:
> On Sat, Feb 3, 2018 at 4:18 PM, Dave F <davefoxfac63 at btinternet.com> wrote:
>> I recently seen a variety of keys being given the value of 'unknown'.
>> I'm struggling to see its purpose. It confirms nothing & adds no value to
>> the database. Am I missing something?
> 
> You are right.
> 
> It's interesting if you take a look at some values.
> 
> maxspeed=unknown basically happens only in the Netherlands, from the
> same author (it seems) who is mapping/importing railway data.
> 
> owner=UNKNOWN in California, USA, from an old buildings import
> 
> place=unknown in Africa (due to this import
> https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Import_Liberia_UNMIL_Places#Tagging_Plans)
> 
> bench=unknown are mostly in Italy (from some possible bus stops/routes import)
> 
> foot=unknown in England
> naptan:Landmark=Unknown also in England (both foot and naptan:Landmark
> look that are old data)
> 
> wheelchair=unknown mostly in Iraq and Saudi Arabia (also from older imports)
> 
> By taking a quick look at them, most seem to be from imports, created
> by the same mappers or old data.
> 
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