[OSM-talk] Tagging climbing routes and scrambles

Ari Torhamo ari.torhamo at gmail.com
Thu Apr 24 03:16:20 BST 2008


Hello,

I started to follow this thread for a while ago. I became interested on
the other hand because there seems to be two very different views (or
points of view) from people, who apparently know the subject very well,
and on the other hand because some of the argumenting has been based on
how the use of namespaces would affect the inexperienced OSM:ers - like
me. 

I truly am a complite OSM newbie, who even hasn't got he's first GPS
device yet (and hence hasn't made any tracks either). I had to go to
Wikipedia to find out what a namespace stands for (though I got a vague
idea already from this thread). I might also mention that I'm not a
programmer, computer geek, web developer, or anything like that. I'm a
relatively experienced computer user though (but try to stay away from
the command line, if I can :-). I do understand the idea of a namspace
now, but I would need to know more about the practical implementation to
know if using namespaces would feel too complicated to me. I have tagged
a few roads and streets so far, so I'm somewhat familiar with tagging -
at least in the simple form of it. 

Initially, I can mostly see benefits of using namespaces (supposing I
understand the concept well enough). It seems to me that tagging would
become more 'refind' or specific, in a sence that same tags might
default to different tag properties, depending on the context. I don't
know if this is true, but it also seems to me that there would be often
less tags (or values?) needed, as the individual tags would convey more
information because of the context that the namespace would give them. I
also have a vague feeling that I might like the unambiguity that using
namespaces would bring. Generally I feel that more 'structure' to
tagging would make things more clear. 

I can see possible disadvantages too. How would it be to use namespaces
in practice. Would they make the work flow less smooth? It would be
interesting to see a few real life scenarios, perhaps a best case,
typical case and a worst case, where one would be able to compare the
case of using namespaces to not using them. I mean the whole thing, how
an inexperienced person finds the right tags and namespaces; how many
different tags and namespaces there would be; how to know whether to use
a namespace or not in a particular case; would the required amount of
knowledge for tagging grow, or would it just be different? And any other
aspects that I can't think of now.

I see myself as a possible test case for this matter, and there might be
others hanging on the list too :-)


Regards,

Ari Torhamo





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