uncategorised places

[KattyGeltmeyer]

Hi all

When I edit places, I mostly check names, streets, ... and categories. But sometimes I encounter places that have no categorisations. Sometimes it's easy to provide a convenient category, but sometimes it's not so simple. Is there a way to find uncategorised places by searching for them on maps.google.com ?  And if I might dream aloud: it would be handy if category would be available as sorting option while searching. I e.g. edited a list of public binns, but I get all the binns, thus also the ones I edited already. If I could use a filter to see only the ones with wrong category, ... this would be handy. I mostly use my pc for editing places, I find this more easy than using the smartphone.

Thanks a lot in advance for the info and help.

[ErmesT]

@KattyGeltmeyer , category is one of the mandatory elements for a listing to be in Google Maps (the other two are Name and Location) so a listing without a category is an almost impossible combination, that may have only two reasons:

• There are places where the geographic identification of the place is the same used also in some categories, like Square, Parks, or beaches. We had a lot of posts about this.
• The place was a not completely made edit, probably created with the "old" Map Maker program, that was shut down on March 31, 2017.

Are you able to share a link of the listing where the category is missing?

Just hit the share button and copy the link. This would help to give you a more detailed reply 

[KattyGeltmeyer]

Hi @ErmesT: Thanks for this info, I'll share an example of this issue when I meet a new one. The one I found this morning was edited by me and got a category.

update: I simply did a search and found one without category:

https://maps.app.goo.gl/7BPAPeRVzjtk6P248

No idea what it is or when it was added, but this poi has no category.

@Janvanhaver: no idea if this poi should be added to maps, but I simply stumbled on it by searching for the word "turn"

[ErmesT]

Thanks, @KattyGeltmeyer 

In fact the business has two approximate locations in Belgium, both not categorised.

They seem to be two Business Area Services for their Ticket distributor, and they have no category, so most probably they were added in the past with the already mentioned method.

Maybe @JanVanHaver has a better indication 

[alzzi1]

Hi good afternoon 

[JanVanHaver]

Hi @KattyGeltmeyer there are indeed quite a few POIs on Maps without a category. When we, as local guides, add a place to Maps, this is not possible without selecting a category. But most places on Maps are not added by local guides - they might e.g. have been imported from some database Google was using years ago (from public institutions like the Chambre of Commerce). And those database might not have had enough information for Google to fill a fitting category.

To my knoyledge there is no easy way to filter "places without category", but I would love to see that too. It would be extremely helpful for dedicated local guides such as yourself, because figuring out a category is often possible based on e.g. the website or photos (unfortunately not helpful in your case).

By the way, there is a good example in Belgium of data initially uploaded to Maps with less than optimal data quality: general practitioners (huisartsen). The POI name there is often in the format "Lastname / Firstname" where the appropriate name would be "Dr. Firstname Lastname". I have corrected quite a few of those already (using the data on their webpage), but there are plenty still around for you to tackle 😊

[KattyGeltmeyer]

Thanks for this tip, @JanVanHaver. I'll check these huisartsen and see what I can do. Thanks for letting me know which preys I can hunt for. Snif snif snif! And one advantage: I can hunt in the dark: no light needed. @DeniGu: searching for uncategorised places should be a handy thing, idem for using category for sorting out results when searching. I'm willing to edit such places, but now it's often a pain because you see the ones you've edited +the ones you have to edit after a search. Another issue is the fact that categories can be interpreted in several ways: what is meant by a "religious organisation"? I would think of an organisation that's involved with religion, but a kerkfabriek =fabriceria (I used both Dutch and Italian word for this institution) is involved with the buildings and finances of a region, not involved with the organisation of the religious activities of the Catholic churches of a region. So if I could find out what's meant with "religious organisation" I could dedicate if this could be the fitting category for such poi's. Thanks in advance.