OSM ways should be given better names

[novalis]

OSM ways without names should be given better 'descriptions'.

For example, a 'highway=footway' tagged way could be named 'footway' if it lacked a name (same goes for paths, platforms, residential roads, ...).

Relations and ref=* tags should also be used. ('Platform 5', 'Route 15', ...).

Q: How should this be done in a language 'neutral' way? By adding mappings to graph_config.xml?

An alternative I've thought of, is to write a 'pre-processing' script, which takes an OSM xml input file, and creates another with names added to previously nameless ways.

[novalis]

I personally prefer the idea of a mapping in the config file, since we frequently use automatically downloaded OTP files.

--novalis

[novalis]

I've had a patch which gives OSM ways names better names locally for a while, but never got around to submitting/committing it... There is now a patch attached.

The following changes are made:

• The OSMWithTags class is extended with a new method, getAssumedName, which determines what to call the way.
• OpenStreetMapGraphBuilderImpl is extended with a _creativeNaming property, containing a [tags] -> [name] mapping
• type=route route=road relations are processed to extract name/ref tags, which are then copied to the contained ways as otp:route_ref, otp:route_name
• The generated name is stored in a otp:gen_name tag on nameless ways.

The mapping supports a few basic operations:

• Key based mapping: 'highway=platform'
• Multiple keys may be specified, which need to be separated by a semicolon (;)
• Wildcards by the lack of a value for a key: 'highway=footway;tunnel='
• Substituting a tag's value within the generated name: 'Platform {ref}'

Mappings are processed on a first-matching basis.

Less generic naming didn't seem feasible, due to the lack of information/data. e.g. sidewalk/underpass/overpass...

These are the mappings I use: {{{

...

}}}

--flaktack

[novalis]

Applied in r1191. Thanks.

--novalis