[OSM-talk] Import guidelines & OSMF/DWG governance

[Pierre Béland]

2012-09-18 Lester Caine


> Having to clean up some of the mess made by imports that were not as 
well sanitised as they should have been, personally I get irritated at 
any 'import' is loaded. 
 
Lester,

I have often seen such arguments agains imports. In Canada also, there are contributors talking agains Canvec imports and saying we should have more fun tracing from GPS.

We have to analyze the problems more seriously and find solutions to them. A great work is done in Canada importing Canvec data. And like in France, I dont think that this is creating a lot of problems. Experienced mappers are doing a great job.

But we have to be carefull at new mappers, monitoring work done, contact them.  Has it was seen before, many mappers do not follow the distribution list.  It is not easy to follow mapping in an area, know the mappers contributing, and eventually contact them.  I suggest it would be more usefull to build tools to monitor local mapping and let local mappers monitor the work done in their area.

An international organization like OSM should not make the same mistakes has large organizations centralizing everything, adapting rigid rules.



Pierre 



>________________________________
> De : Lester Caine <lester at lsces.co.uk>
>À : OSM <talk at openstreetmap.org> 
>Envoyé le : Mardi 18 septembre 2012 10h24
>Objet : Re: [OSM-talk] Import guidelines & OSMF/DWG governance
> 
>Pieren wrote:
>>> DWG does also not usually require people to use a separete import account if
>>> >they are doing small imports (even though the policy does not mention an
>>> >exception for small imports). This, however, was orders of magnitude above
>>> >"small".
>
>> What is the difference between one small import well done by 100 users
>> and 100 small imports well done by 1 user ? Excepted that this crazy
>> man should be congratulated by all of us ?
>
>Having to clean up some of the mess made by imports that were not as well sanitised as they should have been, personally I get irritated at any 'import' is loaded. At least though a small account that results in problem data can be managed. When we have thousands of change sets to work through it becomes a lot more difficult. The current 'import' process is not ideal and we do need some improvements. Ring fencing 'import' processes in their own accounts was one attempt but still not ideal. DWG are doing the best they can in mediating problems and do need a better 'footprint' of international coverage, but if nobody will step up to the plate, then we simply have to accept the job they are currently doing. And I find they are doing a thankless task more than acceptably.
>
>Now if there is a substantial set of data available which we are allowed to import then that data should be available ... as an overlay or some other way ... such as the OS data is available as overlays we can trace from. This way we can cross check imported data, and fix things that the original importer got wrong. Importing from third party mass data without an easy path to cross check against the original data is I think the problem here? I believe the original intention was that the 'raw data' would be identified by the separate user account, and then merges from that can easily be identified to the user actually making the changes. That perhaps is not obvious these days?
>
>We need to cooperate and agree the best way of doing things, but we do still have a way to go to get systems that work world wide.
>
>-- Lester Caine - G8HFL
>-----------------------------
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