Talk:Tags

Multiple values in a tag

(referring to this and the two later edits. The discussion started at User_talk:Boppet and was split and moved to this topic talk page by Aseerel4c26 (talk))

To me, the reversions seemed to place doctrines like "one key, one value" above the reality of actual tagging. Millions of ways in North America and in parts of Europe like Switzerland with "overlapping" highway route numbers have multiple values in a single ref tag separated by semi colons. To maintain that these are "single values" is for me unrealistic. I believe that the wiki's job is to explain and guide, and not to fight lost battles. --Peter Davies (talk) 17:54, 22 January 2014 (UTC)

I am not with OSM that long, but that a tag consists of a key and a (one) value is anchored in our (current) data model in the data. There is only one key and only one value field (if I am not completely misunderstanding). Using ";" to separate values is a hack to the data model. Guess: A hack which works not always good (then if a data-using tool does not care for ";" in values). Then it would e.g. say that a way with "ref=A66;A1" does not have the ref A1. And I think you should not redefine such core principles by a simple edit (instead you should suggest a better handling at API v0.7). The ";" possibility for the exception of multiple values is still mentioned. --Aseerel4c26 (talk) 00:39, 24 January 2014 (UTC)

Dots after a sentence in the "Finding your tag" list and Germish

(referring to this and the two later edits. The discussion started at User_talk:Boppet and was split and moved to this topic talk page by Aseerel4c26 (talk))

I was also a little surprised by your notes that said some deletions were "not a sentence." For me, the English wiki is often hard to read because it reads as if written in German (or should I say that it sounds to be with German sentence structures written?). Now, of course, I understand why this has happened, and my desire is to make the wiki more intelligible to non-German speakers. English sentences are much more flexible than those of French or German. In English, no authorities claim the right to define rules of grammar, control vocabulary or change the rules of spelling. Just about the only rule of English sentences is that there must be a verb; and even this rule is often "more honoured in the breach than in the observance". Jesus wept is said to be the shortest sentence in the Bible. It seems to me to be potentially applicable here. ;) --Peter Davies (talk) 17:54, 22 January 2014 (UTC)

Let me be honest and direct (you know, like Germans are …): Well, ehm, sorry that your precious English language wiki pages get written by Germans (of course also by many others!). ;-) You're quite lucky, because if non-native English speakers would not do so your English wiki pages would be quite empty and you would likely find the best information on the German pages.

If "there must be a verb" is to be thrown over board here (and you think that most English speaking people will think that), please feel free to re-add the non-sentence full-stops (I could do it too, if you think it is more correct/useful). That would be fine for me. Thank you for this explanation, really! --Aseerel4c26 (talk) 00:23, 24 January 2014 (UTC)

How does a tag describe a changeset?

Is that some API or internal database detail? I don't think that should be described here, the database representation may change anytime and the API is just one of many "views" of the database.RicoZ (talk) 08:32, 30 August 2016 (UTC)

key uniqueness may xor must?

On the Tags page I can read "However, each collection may only contain a key once."

But at Elements#Tag I read "An element cannot have 2 tags with the same 'key', the 'key's must be unique."

Is it either the tag key may be unique or the tag key must be unique? I am confused. Banuel Baesler (talk) 21:15, 8 March 2022 (UTC)

"may only contain a key once" means "key must be unique". 22:59, 8 March 2022 (UTC)