The addr:interpolation tag — why sometimes ignored by search function?

It seems the house numbers that I add are only partially recognised by (e.g.) the search function on the homepage of www.openstreetmap.org.

Why?

For example, if I search for Woodpecker Way, Cambourne, the arrow on the map points to “somewhere on Woodpecker Way”.

If I search for a house number which is explicitly tagged with a addr:housenumber= tag (e.g. “13 Woodpecker Way, Cambourne”), then the arrow points to that house.

If I search for a house number which is only implied by an interpolation, e.g. “11 Woodpecker Way, Cambourne”, I’m just shown “a point on Woodpecker Way” — the same point as if I search for “3000 Woodpecker Way, Cambourne”, which doesn’t exist.

However, in other places, the search does function correctly. Try, for instance, “Karlstraße 32, Karlsruhe” and “Karlstraße 42, Karlsruhe”.

Why the difference? Thanks in advance for any help.

To answer my own question, it appears that the search function only works when there is a relation linking the street with the house numbers. I’m busy adding those relations now wherever I’ve put in house numbers.

I tested other places without any relations and the default search (Nominatim) does find them, too. Don’t know what’s happening there, though.

Hi,
do you get the same result when searching direct via the nominatim page
( http://nominatim.openstreetmap.org/ ) ?

The nearby Bramble Court seems to work better (e.g. 5 Bramble Court, Cambourne)

I believe the problem is, that woodpecker way is consisting of several OSM ways, so that the start and end point of an interpolation line
belongs to different OSM-ways.

http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Nominatim/FAQ

I entered a ticket (#2667) for this.

Chris

(continuing with my own monologue…!)

It appears that my above comment (17:27:07 today) is incorrect. I have since added a relation to Crow Hill Lane, where the search function did not previously work, and it unfortunately still doesn’t work. However, it does work on other roads that don’t have a relation linking the road with the house numbers.

So, the problem remains: for some reason, Nominatim is unable to locate houses on [Woodpecker Way, Cambourne](http://nominatim.openstreetmap.org/search?q=woodpecker way, cambourne) whose number is implied by an addr:interpolate tag. For example, it finds [7 Woodpecker Way, Cambourne](http://nominatim.openstreetmap.org/search?q=7 woodpecker way, cambourne) but fails to find [5 Woodpecker Way, Cambourne](http://nominatim.openstreetmap.org/search?q=5 woodpecker way, cambourne); it finds the road, but ignores the house number.

Any idea why?

For comparison, a search for any number on the adjacent road, Bramble Court, succeeds.
[1 Bramble Court, Cambourne](http://nominatim.openstreetmap.org/search?q=1 bramble court, cambourne)
[2 Bramble Court, Cambourne](http://nominatim.openstreetmap.org/search?q=2 bramble court, cambourne)
[5 Bramble Court, Cambourne](http://nominatim.openstreetmap.org/search?q=5 bramble court, cambourne)
[8 Bramble Court, Cambourne](http://nominatim.openstreetmap.org/search?q=8 bramble court, cambourne)
[11 Bramble Court, Cambourne](http://nominatim.openstreetmap.org/search?q=11 bramble court, cambourne)

Help!

Ah, I spoke too soon — it’s a monologue no more!

Thanks for the other posts, which appeared between me starting and finishing my own post above. Thanks especially to Chris for filing a bug report for me.

This seems to be some subtle bug in how new data is added to the system by the nightly updates.

On the bright side there is nothing wrong with any of the data you have entered - leave it with me and I’ll find a solution eventually!