ramble++;
Clifford, yes I could sense what you were trying to say: I have a
thirty+ year Quality background at Apple, Adobe, IBM, the University
of California (and others) as an employee, contractor, subcontractor
and consultant. You are doing fine, you just did fine.
OSM does sample edits, and some people listen and pay attention when
the tools talk to them: your step 1. OSM does categorize errors
(your step 2): both within tools, like JOSM does with Validator, but
also longer-term problems that can be solved by both human and
one-at-a-time (usually somewhat manually) as well as bot -- bot if
small samples are first built and "proven smart" about how they'll be
unleashed. A (selfish, but valid) example: "correct (within
parameters) all the geographical mistakes to multipolygons in
California caught by geofabrik Inspector." A human or a bot might do
that if you have some time on your hands, some of which might go
towards crafting bots.
But first we pull and tug about what the right set of those samples
are. Briefly, assume we can identify and reach consensus upon some.
Then we land in a fuzzy part of your step 3 of "determine root cause"
so we can get to step 4. Sounds about right, but we have bifurcated
(multi-furcated?) into so many root causes that we have to get very
plural ("root causes") and then even begin to categorize those.
Continuing, we can apply smarts and tools and a quality approach even
to those. Such a long-term, multi-rolling approach to quality must
continue. This is an important middle about how it both gets talked
about and implemented.
(Potential root causes are likely manyfold: a fundamental
misunderstanding about the concept and implementation of
"multipolygon" is probably one, mapping tools which don't fully
express multipolygon concepts across data format translations is
probably another, and so on).
There is another thing about Quality which doesn't often get said out
loud: "I know superb quality when I [see, experience...] it." That
is a sublime, slippery, elusive "don't forget" about the topic. This
means finish lines and checkered flags, while they can be reached
many ways, usually do so as they make a large number of people
happiest. The ones who clearly articulated not only what the finish
line is, but milestones along the way and how we cross them. That
means consensus, good project management, being stepwise, thoughtful,
communicative and achieving a definable goal with harmony. It is
much easier talked about than done, but that doesn't make it
impossible, just worthy.
Good specifications of finish lines (milestones, hurdles along the
way...) are worth a great deal. OSM has some difficulty now
articulating the decades-away finish line (which is OK, but let's
keep an eye on it), but we can set up short hurdles to hop over
during the upcoming intermediates. How we do that is an important
part of the next ten or twenty years of OSM (in my opinion).
We can't just say "someday this'll be the best damn map on Earth."
We have to say how.
I recently said "no" to an important OSM contributor who wants to do
a building and address import. I know for a fact that the data are
noisy, obsolete and we can do better, so I said "I'd rather get them
right offline first before we import known wrong data." That's the
right call. How do I know? I live among the data and because of
their age and errors, found them less rather than more useful in the
map. Sometimes Quality is that simple. Mostly it is not. I just
know using old map data sucks. Upload is the last step, not the
first: get it right in your editor offline before you start spilling
buckets of paint.
OSM lives and breathes as as Earth's cave wall, we paint our neon
tubing and scribbles alike. Think before you upload. Make each
changeset a few smart brushstrokes on a shared canvas. Leave the
place better than you find it. Your mother doesn't live here.
Tinkering with OSM's gears is allowed, especially if you are handy,
an artist, a cartographer or a lot of things life has to offer, such
as a thinker about Quality.
Many people, long process. Lather, lather, rinse, repeat. Talking
about Better can, even should result in Better. I'll close by saying
it again: good of you to urge along the conversation in this thread.
ramble--;
SteveA
California
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