Recently I discovered some changes to the Norwegian border:
http://www.openstreetmap.org/browse/changeset/16402003
Here someone created a new relation for Norway, containing the previously existing relations for Norway and Svalbard, which is under Norwegian administration. He also changed the English name of the old Norway to “Norway - Continental” and moved the ISO3166-1 code to the new Norway relation. I encountered some problems with these nested relations and so my first thought was just to add all members of the old Norway and Svalbard relations to the new one, instead of using nested relations, so that Norway would have a proper boundary again.
However, after some research I figured out that this is not at all correct. In fact the ISO3166-1 code “no” applies only to continental Norway, while the islands Svalbard and Jay Mayen together have the ISO3166-1 code “sj” - and actually Jan Mayen is also under Norwegian administration, just as Svalbard, but has its own border relation.
Any ideas how to tag this correctly? I guess there should be one relation with ISO3166-1 code “no” for continental Norway and one with “sj” for Svalbard and Jan Mayen, since these are the territories to which these codes apply. But which one should be the border of Norway and how should it be tagged - the one with continental Norway or a new one including also Svalbard and Jan Mayen? What about further tagging (place=country, boundary=administrative, admin_level=2) - which of these relations should get which tags?
Actually the situation seems to be even more complicated for France and New Caledonia, which also has its own ISO3166-1 code “nc”, but is under French administration:
http://www.openstreetmap.org/browse/changeset/16347727
Also here any ideas or suggestions are highly appreciated.
I placed the discussion here since this is probably a matter of international interest.