[Talk-GB] [OSM-talk] Improving ref=* documentation

[Mateusz Konieczny]

Aug 6, 2021, 13:26 by colin.smale at xs4all.nl:

>> On 08/06/2021 12:20 PM Mateusz Konieczny via Talk-GB <talk-gb at openstreetmap.org> wrote:
>> Aug 6, 2021, 12:13 by colin.smale at xs4all.nl: 
>>
>>>> On 08/06/2021 11:23 AM David Woolley <forums at david-woolley.me.uk> wrote: 
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> On 06/08/2021 06:57, Jay Turner wrote: 
>>>> > Perhaps "ref:signed=poorly"? 
>>>> > 
>>>>
>>>> That's subjective and OSM doesn't collect subjective information. 
>>>>
>>>
>>> Ahem... There are plenty of examples of (partially) subjective information in OSM. Tracktype and smoothness for example. Even highway=* gives rise to discussion from time to time, as one mapper's judgement differs from another mapper's. Only by reference to an authoritative source can all elements of personal judgement be eliminated from the equation. 
>>>
>> And even then we would run into problems as soon as there is more than one 
>> "authoritative source". 
>>
>
> There cannot be more than one "authoritative source" by definition.
>
> There can be indirectly authoritative sources, which are individually derived from the authoritative source and can potentially disagree with each other, as a consequence of a mistake or temporal considerations (update date/frequency etc). Such apparent conflicts can be resolved by reference to the authoritative source itself.
>
With strict definition it turns out that most of what would be considered "authoritative source"
actually is not.

UK has much better governance than average and is much richer than average, so maybe it
is quite rare to run into such issues. But it my experience it is common that supposedly
"authoritative source" is often mismatching with itself, reality, other supposedly equivalent
"authoritative source".

And there is often conflict what actually is "authoritative source".

Strict following of authoritative sources would result in plenty of misalignment,
invalid data, ridiculous data etc.

Actual example: some years ago firefighters in Poland ended using OSM data as source
as official authoritative source was
 (a) unavailable to them - AFAIK it improved since then
 (b) different administrative units had own databases, with roads on border between
       them mismatching location. In other words, authoritative sources disagreed
       where intersection of road and voiwodeship border is located - such as
       https://www.openstreetmap.org/?mlat=50.32434&mlon=20.29192#map=19/50.32434/20.29192
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