[OSM-talk] Tagging climbing routes and scrambles

Steve Hill steve at nexusuk.org
Sat Apr 19 08:56:02 BST 2008


Tom Hughes wrote:

> Because the name tag is always the name of an object, regardless of
> what that object is (the amenity=pub tells you what sort of object it
> is in this case). It is clear to everybody that a name tag is going
> to tell you the name of something without having to know anything else
> about it.

Yes, I think this is a very good way of looking at it.  Tags such as the 
name tag have a global significance - they apply to (almost) all 
contexts in the same way.  There are very few of these "global" tags (in 
fact I'm not even convinced "ref" should be considered global).

Most other tags only apply to a small number of contexts, so they become 
more meaningful if the tag includes a namespace.  Often the same tag 
will carry quite different meanings in different contexts, which means 
that when taken out of context, the tag becomes very ambiguous.  I think 
we really want a situation where you can just look up a tag to find out 
what it means, rather than having to work out which of the many 
definitions apply.

-- 

  - Steve
    xmpp:steve at nexusuk.org   sip:steve at nexusuk.org   http://www.nexusuk.org/

      Servatis a periculum, servatis a maleficum - Whisper, Evanescence





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