Yes, and this has always struck me as odd to allow how it is. Maybe limit to a zoom level?
But if nothing else it slows down and deters. When you make it a one click option it is just way too easy. At least you have to go through and click on each segment and to some whether we want to admit it or not is enough deterrent because it is now not easy.
As an example but not directly related to the simplify, we just finished up a conversation in chat where a really green editor said, and I quote:
"if google didnt want people to be able to help then it wouldnt give the option. "
To bring that statement back to this topic, making mass edits harder for newer users (either by limiting it or removing it) we get them to learn the right way and what each individual tool is and does. It isn’t just there screaming “push me, push me, Yeah lots of points”.
To have access to AM tools in toolbox you have to be an AM and rank 3.
Probably should keep my comments to myself, but what a collosal waste of time we are engaged in. Not sure that I understand all of the uproar.
As an example: If there are say 100K issues with an area and they go unfixed for months and months upon end, then Wazers have a suboptimized solution. That means that the local -group- of editors hasn’t had the time available, or hasn’t taken the time, to clean up their area.
But if a single editor then goes in and fixes many but not all of the problems … real problems that no one else has fixed … then he gets roasted. And if that work was completed with the help of legally available tools then he is farming … and apparently that is bad.
So … what we are really telling our L3-L5 folks is to go in and fix a little bit … but not too much … lest you skyline yourself.
Lets face it, there are vast areas of the map that have LOTS of problems … and we have tools to help visualize and fix many of those problems. Shouldn’t we be encouraging their use rather than spending hours worrying about silly useless points?
I get the concepts of “owning” everything you touch and leaving every segment perfect. If that is the true mandate then the map will never be cleaned up let alone perfected.
I assume that while we are putting Editors under scrutiny for aggressively working +/- 3 miles of their drives … we are 100% absolutely positive that those editors on a torrid 60K+ points per week, 3M+ points per year pace are leaving absolutely every single segment perfect.
To the contrary. We know that what they are doing is valuable, and we accept and are thankful for their work.
If mass deletions of segments is the actual fear, then let us please deal with that. Unless we have documented situations we are dealing with, then it sounds like that fear is merely a convenient anode.
Establishing a National Lock Standard, implemented with Regional considerations (higher standards, not lower) goes a long way to reducing errant deletions.
We could then have Staff implement the standard en masse … lest someone touch 100K segments to adjust the locks and get banned for farming.
I will sit over here in the corner and await my fate.
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For myself, I will do “simplify geometry” as a final step on segments/areas that I have already inspected, and which seem otherwise OK.
Simply because I have seen how extremely confusing and frustrating it is for new editors to see a more-senior editor’s name all over tons of segments when there is so much apparently wrong in an area.
Myself what I will do sometimes is if there is an area that needs a lot of work I will use remove unneeded nodes then use the simplify function. This way I can then run the report on the area to find the issues without the report failing due to too many issues and work this report for a few days if needed.
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This is all getting pretty off-track. I agree with Helgramite’s post. I write only to address a couple of points made by others.
Not very helpful when these URs sit for six or twelve months with no responses. That’s often the case in rural areas, even in smaller cities.
And yes, users are actually driving these roads, which is how most of them came to be either one-way or two-way at the time they were frozen by the errant editor. The two-way roads were driven in both directions before the freeze. The one-way roads were only driven in one direction before the freeze. Someone might come and drive it the other way, but Waze will not care, not anymore, not after the segments have been frozen.
So you say. In actual fact, this kind of mess exists today in a metro area with a population over 60,000. There is certainly a place for Waze here, but when people turn it on and the routes they get are completely screwed, they turn it off, probably for good.
The portion of my post that you quoted was defending the proposal of limiting the simplify segments tool to selected segments only for AMs. Limiting it to selected segments only “slows down and deters” in the same way.
Not sure if I’m late to the party or not, but I’d like to share my thoughts on the Suppress Unneeded Geometry feature. It has come to my attention that some AM’s have been using this feature to farm points which obviously isn’t good. This is a tool that should only be available to CM’s & higher. I say, make the feature still available to AM’s but it will only apply to selected segments. Only CM’s and higher can run the tool without having to click on segments. I know it may not seem like a lot but, I have seen this feature address a few routing mysteries.
Just to throw my two cents in (let me know if I get change back) when I am hitting an area that’s a huge mess, I used to use scripts to do all-the-things in a section, 2 way roads, allow all directionality, etc, and I’d do that over a small area in some confined space, say between two sets of major roads or something. Then I’d go back and fix the details, like directionality, road names, city names, etc. It’d save me a LOT of time vs doing every single one of those fixes individually.
But I think the problem is people pan-and-click and aren’t actually providing anything useful to the map, and often times making things worse.
But to slow down the people who abuse it, you slow down the people who use it. It’s a balancing act I suppose.
View point places at Zoom 3 seems to have stopped working. It works at 4, but not at 3.
How wide is your map? There is a known issue once it gets past 2048 pixels or something like that.
Pretty wide. I’ll try it on my laptop which has a smaller screen and is set to a lower resolution. But it worked last week on the work computer. Maybe I have the browser zoom set too low.
Feature request: Remove empty alternate street names.
Either by selection or by the whole screen (L5+). Some regions have lots of these useless alt names. Removing them is a pain, since the regular street names vary. Would be nice to have tool for it.
I’ve also seen some areas, where the empty alt name has a different city name. Don’t understand that purpose, but might have to be considered with creating such a tool.
At least in the US, staff ran a process that automatically put in some alt names for segments on city borders. The odd consequences is that a lot of no-name segments got alt names which were also empty but had a different city. So, at least in the US, a segment with an empty alt name is one of those, and the primary name will be empty as well but the city will be different, if none of that stuff has been edited since the process was run.
I assume this was done for future search purposes, so removing an empty alt name shouldn’t cause any problems at all – because you can’t search a no-name segment.
I run into a couple of varieties. In my opinion all useless in the Netherlands. City boundaries and street names are strict and clear through an official source.
Most of them have the primary street and city ok. Alt city is the same and alt street is empty. The actions: select segment, ctrl a, edit, delete alt name, apply and save is just a lot of work if an area had 20+ different street names.
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Then it sounds like we can all benefit 
In some cases, this would be a situation where an area has been incorporated into another city, but it is still a Census Designated Place, and though the mailing address is the main city, the original name prior to incorporation might be found on businesses and street names, and some of the old-timers may use them.
But… the Alt name should have the street name (and would if it were done manually), so I suspect what you are referring to is what Sketch referred to.
As for the tool, I like the idea, but even as an L3, I would ask that this only be available to L4+AM, or that it be only available to apply to “Street” (and PLR/Pvt), plus an individually selected segment for L3. Some of the “quality” that I’ve seen from L3 editors, and L2 being FAR too easy to reach, the availability of mass-editing tools scares me.
In one specific instance, we have a Primary that becomes a Minor and the name changes on a bridge with a set of freeway ramps.
Without the alt names, people approaching the ramps will get a “stay to the left” instruction where the name changes if the Alt name is not there to ensure BC.
Just to be sure: we are talking about segments, which do have an alt. street name, but that name is empty (i.e. “null” is displayed for alt. street name).
Other way around, we are not talking about segments which have an alt. street name which is not equal to “null”.
Correct?
If so, I see no need to restrict such a tool. A “null” alt. street name is simply nonsense to me.
Agreed.
Just scroll the last few pages for the long discussion on the simplify tool, that should be reason enough to apply similar protections to any tool which edits everything on screen.
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