[OSM-talk] Proposal for import guidelines

Jason Cunningham jamicuosm at googlemail.com
Wed Sep 26 11:51:39 BST 2012


On 26 September 2012 11:02, Richard Fairhurst <richard at systemed.net> wrote:

> - I only _use_ OSM data for the UK, where we don't have imports, and I'm
> not
> on DWG so I don't have to deal with the angry mails. I'm simply trying to
> help and getting hostile doesn't really encourage that.)
>
> Richard
>

I was typing up a response when your email came through. I was based around
the numerous imports in the UK of Ordnance Survey VectorMapDistrict Data. I
guess I'm using a broad definition of import

In the UK we have available data from Ordnance Survey in Rasta and Vector
format. There is a wiki page on how we should use the data with a
requirement we "should" add a source tag.
http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Ordnance_Survey_Opendata
For me the main use of the vector data is adding rivers, water bodies,
coastlines, and boundaries. For these types the Ordnance Survey data is
commonly the best source, but I'd argue strongly it still needs checking. I
read the initial proposal as meaning that if I added a 3 ponds by tracing
over rasta image availabe in Potlatch or JOSM it would not be considered a
"manual drawn action", but if copied the vector data then it would fall
under "automated edit" because it would be an "imports of external data".
It would not be a bulk edit but would still require several actions I'd
consider to be over the top (eg adding bot= and bot_url=)

Subsequent discussion suggests that the addition of this vector data would
not be considered an 'automated edit', but I think it would help to make
this clearer. I prefer the wording used by Tobias Knerr

On 26 September 2012 10:51, Tobias Knerr <osm at tobias-knerr.de> wrote:

>
> An 'automated edit' is one where the editing is not carried out by
> manual drawing actions. This includes (but is not limited to):
>
> - imports of external data without inspection of individual objects
> - any changes performed by a script/bot
>
> Of course there are special cases where e.g. a powerful editor is used
> to blindly do the exact same thing a script would do, but things like
> these are what the "not limited to" is for.
>


I'd suggest changing 'automated edit' with something along the lines of
'blind import', and defining it based around lack of inspection of impact
of individual objects. I'd slightly change one of the lines to
-  imports of external data without inspection of individual objects, or
consideration of impact on existing surrounding objects.

Jason
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