[OSM-talk] Path vs footway vs cycleway vs...

[Roy Wallace]

On Sun, Nov 29, 2009 at 9:21 AM, Liz <edodd at billiau.net> wrote:
> On Sun, 29 Nov 2009, Roy Wallace wrote:
>> I would strongly recommend reading the wiki carefully and using that.
> but Roy, the wiki is written by committee and it is a good example of the
> failure of the committee process
> the minority report cannot be distinguished from the majority report
>
> so a newbie reading the wiki is just going to become confused when it is a
> non-vehicular way

I think you missed my point - let me clarify.

If a newbie asks "hey guys, what's a footway?" and they get 50
responses saying "well, I think it's..." and "well I've been using..."
and "no, no, it's really...", that will get us nowhere. Plus, what
about the newbies who *don't ask?!*

The newbie reading these conflicting responses either 1) becomes
confused, or 2) begins to think that best practice is to invent your
own meaning for existing tags and then pass this secret knowledge on
to only the newbies who ask via email. This is not a good outcome.

Please let me stress that I am not saying the wiki is in a good state!
But it is the best thing to refer to as a reference for tag meanings,
because it is *documented*. That is, for the 10,000's of mapper who
are out there adding footways right now and are *not on this list*,
one must assume they are doing so on the basis of the definition in
the wiki. That is certainly what I did and will continue to do.

So if consistency is the goal, you cannot rely on various personal
opinions that exist only in people's minds and in email discussions
from time to time (which no doubt only a small proportion of mappers
ever read). You must write it down for reference. And if what's
written down has flaws, they must be fixed.

Note also that by the wiki serving as a "reference" I do not mean that
the wiki page for, say, footway must give only the one "true"
definition. It should 1) document the usage of tags as they occur in
the database, 2) detail any ongoing controversy and 3) if a consensus
exists, give a clear recommendation on how the tag should be used by
new mappers.