Proposal talk:Amenity=power supply

Overlap with amenity=charging_station

There is more overlap between this and amenity=charging_station than you may think. A charging station may not only have dedicated car-charging connectors but also standard domestic power outlets (standard for that locality). Some electric vehicles come with several cables to cope with the variety of standards for car-charging connectors and also a cable for a domestic outlet. Dedicated car-charging connectors may offer faster charge times or have other benefits, but domestic outlets are more widely available. You probably can't charge anything but your car at a dedicated car-charger outlet but if the facility also has a domestic outlet you could charge other things. See Driving a Tesla Across the Lonliest Road in America for somebody using dedicated car-charger outlets and domestic outlets.

Not only that, as electric vehicles become more common, it will be increasingly common for camp sites to offer car-charging outlets alongside the power hook-ups.

Either way you'll end up with dual-purpose POIs that are both amenity=charging_station and amenity=power_supply. It may be worth thinking about this some more to avoid amenity=charging_station;power_supply.

--Brian de Ford (talk) 16:21, 22 June 2019 (UTC)

How about amenity=charging_station with power_supply=yes? --Discostu36 (talk) 18:06, 22 June 2019 (UTC)

Because currently (pun intended) there are charging stations which do not offer a domestic-style power feed and there are power hook-ups which do not offer dedicated car-charging outlets.

Even if both have the same connectors, there's a matter of intended usage. Park your camper for a week at a car charging station and some people might get upset. Go to a camp site and unhook somebody's camper for a few hours so you can top up your car and some people might get upset. We need something more like amenity=electricity with charging_station=* and power_supply=*. Or something like that. Or maybe something completely unlike that. --Brian de Ford (missing signature added by Discostu36)

I don't really see a problem here, because I agree with you that the intended usage matters. If the main intended usage is to get power for your camper or boat, tag it as amenity=power_supply. If the main intended usage is to charge your car, tag it as amenity=charging_station. If there is also a secondary usage, add a secondary tag (e.g. power_supply=yes for charging stations that can be used for something else than a vehicle). -- Discostu36 (talk) 20:09, 22 June 2019 (UTC)

The problem is convergence. From both directions. If we go down your route with adding power_supply=yes to amenity=charging_station when required, we'll also have to add car_charging=yes to amenity=power_supply when required. We'll end up with two combinations of tags meaning the same thing: a charging station that's also a power hook-up and a power hook-up that's also a charging station.

And, in fact, the latter is likely to be far more common than the former. I know of only one car charging point within 10 miles, and if somebody parked their camper there for a week people would be very, very upset (and there's no water or sanitation facilities there). Camp sites are far more likely to allow car charging even on a temporary basis - letting somebody top up at an unoccupied pitch for a couple of hours even if the car has to make do with a domestic outlet rather than a faster car charging outlet. In future camp sites are likely to offer both types of outlet.

We might as well deal with the convergence thing now, than wish we hadn't ignored it later. --Brian de Ford (talk) 20:33, 22 June 2019 (UTC)

Sorry, I still don't get it. You write that both tag combinations mean the same thing, but you also write that you can't park your caravan at a charging station for a week and can't drive to a caravan site to charge your car. So, then it's not the same thing, is it?

If you think that amenity=charging_station should be marked as deprecated and replaced by a more generic main tag and a sub tag for the charging of vehicles, maybe you should write a separate proposal for that. --Discostu36 (talk) 04:23, 23 June 2019 (UTC)

The two tag combinations equate to the same thing. Currently one such combination (not the one you gave) is more likely than the other (the one you gave). However, just because I couldn't get away with parking my camper at a car charging station for a week, that doesn't mean I couldn't park there for an hour to charge (or merely power) something other than a car. A car charging station provides power using one or more types of outlet, and if I have a cable that fits that outlet I can charge whatever I like. The difference is how long I can do so. --Brian de Ford (talk) 11:52, 23 June 2019 (UTC)

I second Brian arguments and this is a point for this proposal, because it depends on which definition you will choose for amenity=power_supply. A charging station is a specific use of power supply (and can even be a place involving several power supplies) then we should look on how a charging station interracts with power supplies. Currently it's not clear. Fanfouer (talk) 11:40, 23 June 2019 (UTC)

So both of you are saying that amenity=charging_station with over 30.000 uses should be marked as deprecated and incorporated into this tag as a use case? And maybe railway=power_supply and amenity=device_charging_station as well? Or do I misunderstand? -- Discostu36 (talk) 20:19, 24 June 2019 (UTC)

I don't get to what railway=power_supply refers exactly but I'd be in favour of replacement of amenity=charging_station with amenity=power_supply as more meaningful and general term, yes. It's also possible to remain with amenity=charging_station (or other amenities) and move power_supply to another key (man_made=power_supply, power=supply ?) Fanfouer (talk) 20:31, 24 June 2019 (UTC)

I'm not saying we should deprecate amenity=charging_station. I'm saying we have a problem ahead of us because with this proposal the same POI will be come under both amenity=charging_station and amenity=power_supply. Whilst multiple values separated by semicolons are allowed in some tags they are disliked by some people and I'm not sure if that would be considered valid on a top-level tag. This will happen because in the near future camp sites will offer a post stuck in the ground with a hook-up for a camper and a charging point for an electric car. They'll have to, because nobody will want to be without power overnight because they need to charge their car. I don't know what the solution is, just that we need one. --Brian de Ford (missing signature added by Discostu36)

Ok, but I'm really a bit lost. I've started a rewrite of the proposal but it will be quite radical. I thought it'd be easier to propose a tag for the small cabinet in front of my office... -- Discostu36 (talk) 10:13, 25 June 2019 (UTC)

I've now rewritten the whole proposal to cover this. I'm not sure yet how to incorporate the different sub-tags for charging stations. -- Discostu36 (talk) 11:23, 25 June 2019 (UTC)

Sockets

The proposal states

power_supply=* - What kind of sockets can be found here? What is the voltage and maximal current?

We already have a full set of tags for this, grouped in the socket=* name space. This is well developed and has all the features we need. I don't see any reason to introduce a new tag for this. --Mueschel (talk) 09:58, 23 June 2019 (UTC)

power_supply=* is an existing, well established tag, predating socket=* by at least 7 years. If you would like to deprecate power_supply=*, please submit a proposal for that. Bkil (talk) 10:13, 23 June 2019 (UTC)

I'm not talking about deprecating it, but have a look at the usage: 'power_supply' has less than 600 usages with actual socket types (and 6500 with pure yes/no/extra_box/wind). power_supply:voltage|current exists less than 400 times combined. 'socket:*' on the other hand has more than 20000 uses, all with specific information, currents and so on. It makes adding several socket types to one object simple - compared to 'power_supply' that can't handle this. The 20 times higher usage count is a clear indication which tag to prefer for detailed information. 'power_supply=yes/no' is still a good choice to mark whether power is available somewhere or not --Mueschel (talk) 10:25, 23 June 2019 (UTC)

It doesn't make much sense to keep two separate key for the same thing. Conceptually, socket=yes could be used for the same purpose. Although, I'm not quite satisfied with the chosen term "socket" that is both too generic and can be misunderstood as per the recent mailing list threads, and socket=yes does not make it clear what kind of socket is available there (usually understood to be a mains power outlet). Good tags must be able to stand on their own. The wiki page of it would need to be cleared up, and actually if we were to submit a proposal, I think the values as well (the ones at power_supply=* make more sense to me in most cases) Bkil (talk) 10:54, 23 June 2019 (UTC)

"socket=yes" was never a proposed or even used tag (database count: 0). It's clearly stated that "This tag is a pre-tag and is only used in conjunction with a sub-tag". "power_supply=yes/no" states whether an existing POI (like a shop or camp site) has a power supply, and "socket:*" describes the details. If it's a stand-alone amenity, we're back at this proposal for amenity=power_supply - I don't object this proposal, just the proposed tagging of sockets and currents. --Mueschel (talk) 11:02, 23 June 2019 (UTC)

Would you support a proposal to update power_supply=* with subkeys taken from socket=* and deprecating socket=* instead then? Bkil (talk) 11:21, 23 June 2019 (UTC)

Agreed, working on specific topic of sockets require a dedicated proposal as to reduce chances of cross rejection during vote Fanfouer (talk) 11:31, 23 June 2019 (UTC)

Definitely no. 'socket:*' is well accepted, documented and used in many applications. I suggest to deprecate the use of socket types as values of 'power_supply' and use his tag for basic information only. --Mueschel (talk) 12:00, 23 June 2019 (UTC)

Is it actually a place or a device ?

Resolved: Changed. Discostu36 (talk) 20:26, 24 June 2019 (UTC)

The proposal states that amenity=power_supply is a place but many elements lead to think that it's actually a device (a cabinet with sockets)
We have to make this clear at first since it can't be both Fanfouer (talk) 11:16, 23 June 2019 (UTC)

Use cases

The proposal currently depicts several usecases :

• Camp sites power supplies (caravan, tents or any camping activity)
• Shorepower supplies in marnina, harbours

I see additionnal situations :

• Street power bollards (even underground retractable ones). See https://popuppower.co.uk/products/power-bollards/
• Public transport facilities (domestic electronic appliances charging for instance)
• Construction sites. See https://pictures.attention-ngn.com/portal/46/43219/products/1534498073.7401_6_o.jpg
• Any socket in private space (at least indoor) with appropriate access=* specification
• Industrial facilities (including pneumatic or hydraulic supplies) Fanfouer (talk) 11:54, 23 June 2019 (UTC)

Also mentioned on the mailing list:

• Ground power for aircraft. At smaller airfields these are usually mobile units, so better handled as a sub-tag for the airport itself; at larger airports there are fixed units.

• USB sockets at cafes and the like so people can charge phones. --Brian de Ford (talk) 11:02, 25 June 2019 (UTC)