Have two words for "Layer"

[tmcw]

• Layers are things you define in a style
• Layers are also things in a datasource

Two concepts deserve two words

[tmcw]

Given that in Painter, layers from tiles are VectorTileLayer instances, I think we should call them vectorTileLayer.

[peterqliu]

layers from tiles are VectorTileLayer instances

would this be # 1 or # 2 in your list?

[tmcw]

I'm not sure what you mean. Say more?

[peterqliu]

Just confused whether "layers from tiles" means

Layers are things you define in a style

or

Layers are also things in a datasource

[tmcw]

The second. Datasources have tiles which have layers

[peterqliu]

I get the feeling that anything long, like vectorTileLayer would get shorthanded back to "layer" over time.

How about a different word altogether? A crack at the thesaurus: source-level and source-section resonate with me.

[anandthakker]

Not that anyone asked me, but I like @peterqliu's notion of chucking "layer" altogether. And if that's gonna happen, it seems to me like the layers in a vector tile source are very close analogues to FeatureCollections, so maybe something along those lines?

[nickidlugash]

Layers are also things in a datasource

In the app we're calling these "subsets", right? I also like the idea of getting rid of "layer" altogether for these. Layers suggest groups that get stacked on top of each other (as style layers do), but data layers are more amorphous than that (at least in GL).

[tmcw]

Indeed, we always call vector-layers subsets in Studio

Question is whether mapbox-gl-style-spec, gl-js, gl-native, and so on can or should eventually use the same terminology / cc @lucaswoj

[lucaswoj]

Question is whether mapbox-gl-style-spec, gl-js, gl-native, and so on can or should eventually use the same terminology

This would be a huge cross-product change. We should discuss in mapbox/DEPRECATED-mapbox-gl#13