[OSM-talk] National borders in the British Islands

[Dave Stubbs]

On Fri, May 30, 2008 at 9:48 AM, elvin ibbotson
<elvin.ibbotson at poco.org.uk> wrote:
> On 30 May 2008, at 00:19, Dave Stubbs wrote:
>
> This strand of the discussion (below) though echoes the earlier thread I
> kicked off (but gave up pursuing because there seemed to be more prejudice
> than logic in the discussion) about the idea of numerically-based properties
> in the database mapped to human-friendly language in editors and viewers.
>
> OMG is your brain mush? This whole nonsense is over what admin_level
> (a numerical tagging scheme) maps to. It's the perfect example of why
> numbering the bloomin tags doesn't necessarily actually solve
> anything. It's also the perfect example of how a global numbering
> system is utterly irrelevant given our ability to invent domain and
> ordering specific ones on a whim.
>
> Oops! I touched a nerve there :-)

Yes, it's the "there seemed to be more prejudice than logic in the
discussion" bit, which is complete rubbish.


> I'm no brain surgeon but, from what I've
> seen on telly, most peoples brains are, fundamentally, a bit mushy.

I hope not.
We obviously need a numeric scale, here's the english mappings ;-)
 1 - rock
 2 - wood
 3 - cauliflower
 4 - brain
 5 - mashed potato
 6 - mushy peas
 7 - soup


> As I understand it the numbers are not the problem, it arises from
> people not knowing which is the right number to use (eg. England/Scotland
> border admin_level 2 or 4?).

Actually no, people knew exactly what number to use. The wiki actually
told them that for the UK internal borders the correct number was 2.
The problem is more fundamental than that... depending on who you talk
to it'll either be 1) whether or not the english/scottish border is a
national boundary, or 2) what is admin_level is supposed to be
counting in the first place.


> [snip]
>
> Most of that discussion was about highways but similar arguments seem to
> apply to boundaries. I think most British mappers would be happier selecting
> from a boundary sub-menu of 'National', 'County', 'District', 'parish', with
> each choice invisibly mapped back to the appropriate numerical boundary type
> than with the clumsy 'boundary=administrative' 'admin_level=4' approach.
>
> Yes, I'm sure they would rather pick from such a menu. Mapping to the
> relevant boundary and admin_level tags should be trivial as the wiki
> page manages it. I'm sure implementations are welcome.
>
> Exellent! We agree, then :-)


Awesome :-)
Although I just noticed you missed out the entry for the description
of the UK internal borders from your sub-menu.

Dave