Talk:Tag:surface=sett

Merge/Redirect to Key:surface

I would like to suggest turning this page back into a redirect, as all the content is already available on Key:surface. Copypasting content makes it super easy for subtle differences to creep in over the years, especially for this topic where people care strongly about seemingly minor nuances of definitions. Even now, the phrasing is already subtly different (e.g. this page can be read to suggest that paving stones are a type of cobblestone). --Tordanik 19:14, 18 November 2019 (UTC)

I would not want to do without the site. So it is much better to see that the tag cobblestone is generic and should be specified. If paving_stones does not fit here I can also delete it. If the text is not the same as in the original, I would argue for improving the original.--geozeisig (talk) 08:13, 19 November 2019 (UTC)

Ok, the paving_stones issue seems to distract from the core objection and I've made a small edit to resolve it. My main concern is that everyone editing the original table now also needs to edit this one. In the best case, this will cost them extra time and effort. In the worst case, they'll forget to also update the other copy of the content and the two pages will drift apart, leading to mappers and developers understanding the tag differently depending on which wiki page they read. There's a reason the guidelines generally discourage duplication, and I feel these arguments apply here. --Tordanik 22:34, 19 November 2019 (UTC)

Not all mapper know that cobblestone is a common tag and should be better specified. It makes a big difference to a cyclist. I wanted to draw attention to that. So the mention of Possible Tagging Mistakes is in the right place. You're right the texts might drift apart. But in this case, I could make sure that does not happen.--geozeisig (talk) 07:03, 20 November 2019 (UTC)

Sadly, your hope did not work out in reality but just half a year after your post, the German and English version of this page differ in their messages, also Tag:surface=sett differs from DE:Key:surface. To complicate stuff, the wiki pages are not in harmony with JOSM presets. As a result, I simply don't know how to tag what I saw on the street. Hence I strongly second Tordanik to merge Tag:surface=sett into Key:surface and I evenly strong I second geozeisig to raise mappers' awareness for the detailed differences & to clarify them - just doing that directly in Key:surface, so we have accurate tagging as well as less texts and thus less potential for "drifting apart". To help you emphazise why I suggest that, some of issues I experienced:

• I understood Tag:surface=sett such that a carfully crafted surface of uneven/naturally shaped stones like in https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Pflasterung_von_1905_in_der_G%C3%BCnterstalstra%C3%9Fe_in_Freiburg-Wiehre.jpg shall be tagged as "paving_stones" (despite the photos show only artificial stones), while DE:Tag:surface=sett does not allow this due to lacking even shape (e.g. like the result of mass production of concrete stones), niether does it allow "sett" because the stones have no cuboid shape, so I'd tag as "cobblestone" - exactly what geozeisig wants to be avoided by this dedicated page.
• Tag:surface=sett requires a considerable padding between single stones for "sett" and a minimal padding for "paving_stones", so this is the main distinction between "sett" and "paving_stones". In contrast, DE:Tag:surface=sett does not tell anything about the padding for "sett", so the distinction is not clear.
• Tag:surface=sett does not mention anything about smoothness of the surface created by the stones (e.g. not bike friendly due to large padding between the stones), while DE:Tag:surface=sett requires comfortable smoothened surface.
• JOSM presets offer "Gehwegplatte/Pflaster" (=paving_stones), "Beton:Platten" (=concrete:plates), "Pflastersteine" (=sett) and "Kopfsteinpflaster" (=cobblestone). The first one is the most generic as "Gehwegplatte" is perfectly matching e.g. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Gehwegplatten_Berlin.jpg which are 1m x 0.5m tall but relatively smooth, while "Pflaster" matches https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/File:Ancient_road_surface.jpg which are maybe 10cm x 10cm but very uneven, https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/File:Surface_paving_stones.jpg which are also 10cm x 10cm but very smooth and finally https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Pflasterung_von_1905_in_der_G%C3%BCnterstalstra%C3%9Fe_in_Freiburg-Wiehre.jpg which are just around 1x4cm and very smooth. In contrast, Tag:surface=sett makes me understand "cobblestone" is the generic term and the more restricted ones are "paving_stones" (requirement of smooth surface and nearly no padding, may be of artificial or natural origin) and "sett" (requirement of natural stone and significatly padding but none for smoothness), so I'd tag https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Gehwegplatten_Berlin.jpg as "sett", while JOSM would make me tag it as "paving_stones". Funny enough, if these were made of concrete like in many eastern European cities, I'd tag them as "paving_stones" according to the wiki (remember that sett requires natural stone!), but not any more based on JOSM preset, because "concrete:plates" would be more specific.

--Schoschi (talk) 01:07, 24 May 2020 (UTC)

Crazy paving

See the discussion in Talk:Tag:surface=paving stones.--Fernando Trebien (talk) 22:58, 21 March 2021 (UTC)

Example of irregular pattern

Some time ago, I asked on the forum about a special type of stone pavement called polyhedral pavement in Brazil. It is different from unhewn_cobblestone because the top and the sides are really hewn/cut, in fact the natural stone is just broken without regard to overall shape and the resulting units are not rounded, smooth, or significantly softened by erosion. The current definition of sett requires that the units have a regular shape, which leaves this type of pavement in a grey area between natural paving_stones (flat), sett (regular), unhewn_cobblestone (rounded) and rock (large). As the discussions about Portuguese pavement and crazy paving tended to distinguish setts from natural paving stones based on the smoothness of the surface, I think that the Brazilian polyhedral pavement would normally be more similar to sett. Some examples:

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  Typical polyhedral pavement in Brazil

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  In Maranhão

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  In Bahia

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  In Portugal

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  In Macau

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  Generic stone pavement

I would like to add the first image as an example of irregular pattern to the main article. What do you think? --Fernando Trebien (talk) 13:28, 25 March 2021 (UTC)

I would say that all images here are a case of sett Mateusz Konieczny (talk) 19:29, 25 March 2021 (UTC)

steps

Would https://www.flickr.com/photos/136319147@N08/51444027072/in/datetaken-public/ be considered sett? Or perhaps stepping stones? --Aharvey (talk) 00:31, 13 September 2021 (UTC)

Some people proposed to map such cases as surface=stone (neither sett, nor paving stone nor bare rock without treatment). Though I am not fan of that tag as it is easy to end using it for say paving stones made out of stone (really flat natural stone with machined surfaces) Mateusz Konieczny (talk) 06:55, 13 September 2021 (UTC)

TagInfo reports over 8k highway=steps+surface=sett but no highway=steps with surface=rock;stone;stepping_stones, so I suspect most mappers might be using surface=sett in cases like this one. Thinking about smoothness=*, the whole structure looks like surface=rock and surface=stepping_stones, but highway=steps already implies a separation between steps and a slope, so I tend to think of surface=* as referring to the surface of each step, so surface=rock seems acceptable to me (considering flatness of the top and the size of each piece of stone), and perhaps also surface=sett would be acceptable too considering each step a single piece of sett (though from the examples I would expect more pieces with gaps within each step). surface=stone is probably ok too, but it is not listed in the wiki. --Fernando Trebien (talk) 14:58, 13 September 2021 (UTC)

I'd use surface=stepping_stones (as earth is between the stones) or surface=stone because IMHO for surface=sett, the single stones are too big and it would require more than 1 piece of stone per step. --Schoschi (talk) 13:52, 11 October 2021 (UTC)