Proposal talk:New id

I think what you are saying is that this tag should be added to an object before it is deleted to point to a new object that is replacing it. So something tagged as a node gets replaced with a way, the deleted node get this tag to point to the new way. When I create a new way in an editor I don't know what its ID is until after the edit has been saved (that's how the API works). So I will need to create the new object, save it, look up the new object's ID, add the proposed tag to the old node, then save it (so the new tag gets saved) then delete the old node and save the change yet again. This is not going to work. Even a very diligent mapper is only going to try this once before they decide it is not worth the effort.

This is something that needs to be handled as part of the API? Making it work is very much 'worth the effort', and it will require additional care from mappers, but not having the information then requires a lot more work from mappers who are trying to repair the collateral damage from 'non-diligent' deletes ...

• If the API managed this it would be good, but how would that work? If objects are deleted as part of an edit and new objects are created how would the API know which new object replaced each deleted object? If the mapper needs to point out which object replaces a deleted object this could not be enforced (the deleted object might not actually be replaced by anything even though new objects might be created) so the link may not be maintained. This also increases complexity so new mappers would have an even steeper learning curve. Chillly 13:13, 12 August 2011 (BST)