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Hi, I am new to OSM editing. I am in rural France and adding missing hamlets in my local area (prompted by the extreme difficulty out here in the countryside, of being found by parcel delivery companies!), and have a question about foreign characters.

I have added one hamlet that has a circumflex over the "o" as it should have. However, if I now do a search for it with just a standard "o", it returns no results.

Does this mean that on a satnav, the person searching for this place would have to know that the "o" has a circumflex (the same for other accented characters) or do satnav devices have some in-built process for searching either option?

asked 02 Apr '22, 09:28

Cartman22's gravatar image

Cartman22
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accept rate: 0%

edited 02 Apr '22, 10:48

SK53's gravatar image

SK53 ♦
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1

I've changed the title as the names you describe appear to be genuine French names and in France they aren't "foreign".

(02 Apr '22, 10:49) SK53 ♦

I suspect you searched on www.openstreetmap.org. The search that is implemented there is rather strict, you need to know the exact spelling.

Other implementations of OSM data, like many satnavs/apps using OSM data, have different search methods implemented that allow for a more fuzzy search. I just tried it in the Android app Magic Earth and searching for cote returned many places with Côte in the name.

So it really depends on the specific satnav and not on what you have correctly mapped.

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answered 02 Apr '22, 10:29

TZorn's gravatar image

TZorn
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accept rate: 15%

Thank you for your reply. Do you know what the best way to proceed would be to obtain optimum results? i.e. leave out any diacritics or continue using them?

(02 Apr '22, 12:04) Cartman22
1

For the record, I tried with OsmAnd and OrganicMaps, and it works as well, so no worries... :-)

(02 Apr '22, 12:07) H_mlet
1

If a place name has a diacritic in real life, please add it to OSM with a diacritic too.

(02 Apr '22, 12:10) SomeoneElse ♦
1

Thank you very much to everyone, that's clear and helpful. I will continue to add them as they are written on the signs.

(02 Apr '22, 12:13) Cartman22

Please name the places as signed on the ground.

If there are different spellings, in the Cadastre or postal services, or even between different signs, you can use the tag alt_name to record those.

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answered 02 Apr '22, 12:09

H_mlet's gravatar image

H_mlet
5.4k1781
accept rate: 13%

Thank you very much, that's helpful and a good tip, I didn't know about the alt_name tag. I will continue to add them as they are written on the signs.

(02 Apr '22, 12:14) Cartman22
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question asked: 02 Apr '22, 09:28

question was seen: 852 times

last updated: 02 Apr '22, 12:14

NOTICE: help.openstreetmap.org is no longer in use from 1st March 2024. Please use the OpenStreetMap Community Forum