iD suggesting nonsense as first choice

[ghost]

As far as I can see, the values signal(s), crossing, pedestrian_crossing are nonsense for the key traffic_signals. These may well be the most used values according to Taginfo, but they are not documented and not self-explanatory so no-one can know what they are supposed to mean!

[bhousel]

Yes, iD fetches these suggestions from taginfo, so there is not much we can do about this. These values are suggested because they are the values that people use in OSM.

See what I wrote on #4508

The OSM community needs to take responsibility for the tags, not expect editors to build in a bunch of extra logic to know which tags are better than which other tags. If sport=football is indeed deprecated, then somebody should make a Maproulette challenge or something to clean them up. iD will stop suggesting the tag when it is no longer in widespread use.

[ghost]

not expect editors to build in a bunch of extra logic to know which tags are better than which other tags.

You already have a list of all tags and include logic to suggest useful combinations. Why wouldn't you keep a list of bad tags?

These tags are used 126,759 times. You know how the community frowns upon mechanical edits, so you know this isn't going to get fixed unless Taginfo and/or iD start blacklisting some tags or looking at the "status" on the wiki. Both you and Taginfo consider this out of scope. So we're stuck, this is an unfixable issue?

[bhousel]

These tags are used 126,759 times. You know how the community frowns upon mechanical edits, so you know this isn't going to get fixed unless Taginfo and/or iD start blacklisting some tags or looking at the "status" on the wiki.

If you're talking about the traffic signals, the values are these:
https://taginfo.openstreetmap.org/keys/traffic_signals#values

There are 1458 with the value signals which should probably be renamed to signal. This is not a very large number, and anybody who cares could just change them with overpass/JOSM/level0. Below that, the numbers are even lower, and I don't see anything that stands out as obvious "nonsense" or "bad".

Both you and Taginfo consider this out of scope. So we're stuck, this is an unfixable issue?

I don't see it that way. Last year a bunch of people cleaned up all the tags on 250,000 old multipolygons. That was a much bigger project, and the community got it done.

I think for smallish tag updates (< a few thousand, obvious misspellings) someone could just do them in one shot, and for larger projects somebody just needs to tell the community and set up a challenge.

[ghost]

There are 1458 with the value signals which should probably be renamed to signal. This is not a very large number, and anybody who cares could just change them with overpass/JOSM/level0. Below that, the numbers are even lower, and I don't see anything that stands out as obvious "nonsense" or "bad".

The main tag to map a traffic signal is highway=traffic_signal, so traffic_signals=signal is a subtag. Indeed: it is used prevalently in combination with highway=traffic_signal. But it adds no meaning, it is nonsense.

A quick sample of some points suggests all of them are added with iD, starting about 2 years ago, like in https://www.openstreetmap.org/changeset/38976653. Do you have any idea why?

[bhousel]

A quick sample of some points suggests all of them are added with iD, starting about 2 years ago, like in https://www.openstreetmap.org/changeset/38976653. Do you have any idea why?

Yes, traffic_signals=signal just means - a normal traffic signal. It was the most common value in taginfo in late 2016, and I chose it as the default because it is the default.
see #3838

But it adds no meaning, it is nonsense.

That's just, like, your opinion man.

[ghost]

That's just, like, your opinion man.

Okay if you disagree, no problem. I just wasn't expecting it.

highway=traffic_signal already establishes a node as a traffic signal, so what meaning does traffic_signal=signal add according to you? That it's a "normal traffic signal"? What would that mean? And most significantly: how are iD users supposed to figure it out? (And data users for that matter?)

[1ec5]

This discussion points out that signal and signals both refer to a “classic” signal for vehicular traffic at an intersection. Typically, a user will see this field set to signal by default when choosing the “Traffic Signals” preset, so I’d be surprised if there’s outright confusion from users about the meaning of this value.

As an alternative to a blacklist, this preset could define a fixed set of allowed values or a whitelist of preferred values in a combo box, labeled with more human-readable names than the raw tag values. (This is also great for non-English speakers: #2708.) Presenting a combo box would require being more opinionated about what’s a valid traffic_signal tag and what isn’t, so the existing combo boxes in iD were created for tags where the standard values are generally agreed upon and there’s little tag pollution.

[ghost]

Typically, a user will see this field set to signal by default when choosing the “Traffic Signals” preset, so I’d be surprised if there’s outright confusion from users about the meaning of this value.

So they just leave the default without questioning it's the right tag? Even more reason why this has to die.

[bhousel]

@M1dgard It's not going to change, and there is nothing wrong with having the field work this way.

The signal value was already the most common value back in 2016 before iD added this default.

I'm not going to try to explain to users "here's a field for you to use, but don't use it if the traffic signal is a normal kind of signal, only use it if it is a special kind of signal".