[OSM-talk] it's not a fake, but "it's complicated"

[Andy Townsend]

On 05/02/2020 15:45, Mario Frasca wrote:
> ... but apparently when an activity is closed, it's too late to ask 
> them to review.

I don't think that that's a reasonable approach for any OSM mapper to 
take (whether they're working for a company or not).  I also don't think 
that's a typical reaction from paid mappers generally (apart from 
spammers of course), and with a DWG hat on I've contacted many, many 
mappers both doing it for a job and as a hobby.

An exception might be if someone has broken something that was quite 
complicated (perhaps an imported multipolygon forest the size of a small 
country) and they technically aren't able to fix it again, or there have 
been other edits in the mean time that might be difficult for a 
relatively new mapper to resolve, but "I can't be bothered" is rarely 
given as an excuse.

On to the "whether it is a good idea to map things this way" part of the 
question (which might be a better fit for the tagging list):

You can see examples of both approaches at 
https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/382577754#map=19/8.97397/-79.53502 .  
To the southwest there are multiple nodes within one building and to the 
northeast there is "one building per shop".  If there are multiple shops 
within one physical building I'd certainly map them as nodes within a 
building, but it can sometimes be difficult to decide where one building 
ends and the next starts. 
https://www.openstreetmap.org/#map=19/53.09756/-1.38685 in the UK is an 
example (not originally mapped by me) that shows shops as closed ways 
and buildings (that are connected, but are actually separate buildings) 
as closed ways, and the two don't necessarily map 1-1 with each other.  
This matches real life, but is a pain to maintain when (for example) a 
large shop shuts and opens as two smaller ones.

In the Panama example even if the "buildings" northeast of 
https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/382577754 could be considered separate 
(and it sounds like you're saying that it would be wrong to) presumably 
the walls at least should be parallel.

Have you had an explanation of why they're taking this approach?

 > I've now moved to tagging as many of them them as 'fixme'. maybe 
public shame will do the job.

I don't think that will help here - higgledy piggledy buildings are easy 
to spot, and a glut of fixmes for "obvious to spot problems" will drown 
out existing fixmes that might not be otherwise obvious.

The usual advice I'd give is (and apologies if this sounds like a broken 
record):

  * Comment politely on the changeset that introduced the problem, with
    a translation into a language that the mapper will understand,
    explaining what the problem is.
  * Also, if appropriate, mention it to the rest of the local community.
  * If they persist, repeat explaining again why it is a problem.
  * If that doesn't work, raise it with the Data Working Group via
    data at osmfoundation.org

In this case there have been a couple of questions asked of this mapper 
in changeset discussion comments (though not about this particular 
issue) - any more and with a DWG hat on I'd definitely consider drawing 
their attention to the fact that other people are trying to get in touch 
with them.

Best Regards,

Andy (from the DWG, but as usual here writing in a personal capacity)



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