[OSM-talk] Mechanical Edit?

Mateusz Konieczny matkoniecz at tutanota.com
Tue Jul 27 06:33:07 UTC 2021


1) Making documentation page and asking relevant communities (global or local ones
depending on coverage) would make it 1000% fine (if such communities would clearly
agree with the edit)

See
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Automated_Edits_code_of_conduct

2) Is fixing typos exempt from mechanical edit discussion? See
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Talk:Automated_Edits_code_of_conduct#Is_typo_fixing_exempt_from_discussion.3F

Old page versions described fixing typos and fixing own edits as sole cases where
mechanical edits are OK. Or maybe it was intended as examples and clear cases
where it is OK but still requires permission?

But that would mean that even fixing my own mistakes requires making proposal, getting
people to agree etc.

And it misses that with community agreement one may make far more complex changes.

So in 2018 I made edit adding 
"*Useful edit that would be tedious to do manually - approved by community and discussed"https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/w/index.php?title=Automated_Edits_code_of_conduct&diff=next&oldid=1550737

Such edits are definitely allowed.

At that time I interpreted it that this two cases obviously cover things where mass edit is OK
without through going with full proposal process. But maybe I was wrong?
Looking back at it I sadly failed to note whether I discussed/consulted this change.

In February 2021 I opened
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Talk:Automated_Edits_code_of_conduct#Is_typo_fixing_exempt_from_discussion.3F
but sadly noone commented so far.

So, if you just mapped 400 natural=treee_row - is it necessary to create wiki page, 
ask local community before you replace it with natural=tree_row? (alternatively - look at 
every single one when changing them)

If you see 4 000 natural=treee_row mapped worldwide - is it necessary to create wiki page,
ask local community before you replace it with natural=tree_row? (alternatively - look at 
every single one when changing them)

Should I repair my mistake from 2018 and ask more widely how it should be formulated?

Jul 27, 2021, 06:41 by eh.non.eh.mous at gmail.com:

> Can some of these experienced people step up? What was the excuse or difficulty that prevented a mechanical edit in this example?
>
> The system is going to grow in complexity as more features are added, and more people tag things as they like. When we are able to get people to agree on
> something (such as deprecating something), should we not clean up where we can?
> Conversely if we can't trust a central information share about the nature of deprecated items, then it provides little use.
> In fact the quoted "Automated Edits code of conduct" is on the wiki, so if deprecated is not something everybody agrees with, then
> it seems fine to treat the "Code of conduct" the same. Useful sometimes, but ignorable when it suits anybody's fancy.
>
> On Tue, Jul 27, 2021 at 1:26 PM Tomas Straupis <> tomasstraupis at gmail.com> > wrote:
>
>> 2021-07-27, an, 04:33 Casper Kersten rašė:
>>  >> If you think that a simple search-and-replace is a good idea – then leave your hands off it and
>>  >> let someone fix it who has the time and energy to do it properly.
>>  >
>>  > DWG member or not, what counts as “proper fixing” is not for you, but for the community
>>  > to determine.
>>  
>>    1. There is no way to determine what community thinks (talk list
>>  does NOT represent whole community, wiki is even further - it
>>  represents opinion of a few).
>>    2. I totally agree with Frederik that all semi-automated
>>  "improvements" without proper one-by-one analysis are bad. Changing
>>  without understanding the context will be reducing the quality of the
>>  data. I've seen tons of new people thinking that they would run
>>  several automated "updates" and will "fix" the data - none were
>>  successful, most were damaging and their changes had to be reverted.
>>  Students with no education can run updates - it is extremely easy to
>>  do, if (and where) that would have been the way - it would have
>>  already been done by more experienced people.
>>  
>>  -- 
>>  Tomas
>>  
>>  _______________________________________________
>>  talk mailing list
>>  >> talk at openstreetmap.org
>>  >> https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk
>>

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