[OSM-talk] Edit war on the wiki "map features"

Ralf Zimmermann osm_list at ralfzimmermann.de
Tue Nov 25 19:55:48 GMT 2008


Gustav Foseid wrote:
> We need to have a place to document the most used tags and tags that 
> should be known, and easy to find, for newcomers as well as trained 
> mappers. That is the Map Features page, and it should be reserved for a 
> core set of tags, recognised by the most important renders and/or 
> routing application. Smoothness is _not_ such a tag.

As for the tags that are being rendered by Mapnik or tiles at home, if somebody 
makes a list of those I would put them on the wiki somewhere close to the 
renderer. This is because of two reasons:
a) If a tag is not rendered on a map that is made for the general public this 
does not mean that this tag is not important on a specialized map - for example 
a map made for inline skaters.
b) Remember: We are not tagging for the renderers. It is good to have the 
end-user in mind when you map and tag. But the renderer is not an end-user! And 
if they were - those would only be two flavours of a huge list of possible uses 
of the OSM data.


> The place for an "approved" tag which is not widely used is Approved 
> features, not Map Features.

I disagree in this point. How do we decide what is a widely used tag? And how 
can a new tag widely used when it is not on the Map Features wiki page?

Therefore I would not try to split up the list. When I visit the Map Features 
page my expectation is that I see the whole catalog of tags available (or at 
least get a pointer to a new page which explains that group of tags).


The voting process and its imperfectness has been discussed a lot. And this is a 
different topic really. But I still see the "voting" process being useful. It is 
a very good way of quickly getting opinions that could leave to one of two 
decisions:
a) The proposed new tag somewhat fits into the world of existing tags.
b) There is no better idea out there on how to better tag this new feature.
And even though the new tag might not be the perfect solution - if nobody comes 
up with a better idea during the voting process - this is a good start for 
calling the tag "approved" and recommend it for everybody elses use.


RalfZ
Munich, Germany




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