Placename visibility at small scale/zoom level (islands)

harlock974 · 2019-10-04T06:31:15.000Z

Hello,
At small scale, island names which are not countries are not displayed.
It’s annoying when browsing archipelagoes : you need to zoom in/zoom out on each island to see its name.
An example here :
https://www.openstreetmap.org/#map=7/-20.273/59.205
The name of the island in the middle (Mauritius) is shown because it is also a country name. The name of the other islands are not displayed : Réunion (French) to the left and Rodrigues (Mauritian) to the right.
How it is possible to add a name which display at the same zoom level than a country name ?

PHerison · 2019-10-04T06:46:46.000Z

Hi and welcome to OSM and the forum

Placing names on “the map” is part of the render software, not OSM. The render decides when and where to put a name of an object.

Since you link to the standard map on OSM.org you should post your request here.

SomeoneElse · 2019-10-05T22:13:09.000Z

harlock974:

The name of the island in the middle (Mauritius) is shown because it is also a country name. The name of the other islands are not displayed : Réunion (French) to the left and Rodrigues (Mauritian) to the right.

To add to what has already been said, both island names are actually shown on the standard map if you zoom in a bit - see e.g. https://www.openstreetmap.org/#map=10/-19.8075/63.0183 .

harlock974 · 2019-10-14T09:19:16.000Z

SomeoneElse:

To add to what has already been said, both island names are actually shown on the standard map if you zoom in a bit - see e.g. https://www.openstreetmap.org/#map=10/-19.8075/63.0183 .

Yes, it’s exactly the problem : to have to constantly zoom in/zoom out in archipelagoes.
Is there an attribute to make an island name visible at the same zoom level than a country name (in the standard map) ?

I thought at first to use place=country instead of place=island, but from a database perspective, it doesn’t seem appropriate to add false countries to the map.

More generaly, is there a table of visibility versus scale for each tag in standard map ?

PHerison · 2019-10-14T09:40:53.000Z

harlock974:

Is there an attribute to make an island name visible at the same zoom level than a country name (in the standard map) ?

No. The map on OSM.org is “static”. Names are prerendered and can’t be changed on the fly.

harlock974:

I thought at first to use place=country instead of place=island, but from a database perspective, it doesn’t seem appropriate to add false countries to the map.

You’re absolutely right, adding false information to the database to force one specific map-program to render a name is an no-go!
Either you find a map provider fulfilling your needs or you have to create your own map.

harlock974:

More generaly, is there a table of visibility versus scale for each tag in standard map ?

I haven’t found anything…

SomeoneElse · 2019-10-14T12:50:05.000Z

PHerison:

harlock974:

More generaly, is there a table of visibility versus scale for each tag in standard map ?

I haven’t found anything…

I don’t know of anything either. Various people have thought about “automatic legend generation” (GitHub - gravitystorm/mapnik-legendary: A legend generator for Mapnik stylesheets is one example), but generating a legend for an OSM Carto style automatically is difficult because “what appears at what zoom level” is determined by a number of factors:

o What’s in the “project.mml” or similar file (it includes a bunch of SQL select statements)

o What’s in the .mss file for each layer (includes zoom level tests among others)

o What’s in the lua style file that might map certain features to certain others or exclude them