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[Uzu Bash]

With a foreman, you could designate a broad general area for resource extraction, then the miners would attempt to only dig tiles to reach and remove ore and mineral veins. Depending on foreman skill, they may also avoid causing cave-ins, but this would be less certain if more than one z-level were designated.

So how would they know where the veins are? Right now if you designate a vein, the miner follows it flawlessly, without wasted time on neighboring stone. This expertise should come from specialized geological study, or acquired through experience with exposed rock surfaces. Miners would develop a 'feel' for where the goods are likely to be found. The more rock face is exposed in the entire embark area, the better a geologist or prospector will be able to predict where unexposed minerals and ores may be.

Lacking an academic expert for advise, the best foreman would be someone with well-developed prospecting senses. They'd be able to more efficiently direct miners in reaching and cleaning out the veins.

EDIT: Dig profiles. Just like workshop profiles, but for a designated excavation managed by a foreman. You can set the range of miner skill required, or restrict it to particular miners. Like temporary burrows that only include designated tiles, and only exist until the designation is complete.

[GoblinCookie]

My experience with the present system of mining automation is that it is often not a very good idea.  My fortress is now lacking 20+ dwarves as a result of it. 

[AceSV]

I actually really like the new auto-mining feature, I wouldn't change a thing. 

Prospecting would be more realistic, but I don't think I want that level of detail. 

[Uzu Bash]

The prospecting skill wouldn't make that much difference for individual dwarves, but much more for a foreman directing a mining operation. It also wouldn't have any application to any other designation; a tile explicitly designated will still be mined, channeled, ramped, etc. An broader area designated for extracting resources would rely on the foreman's ability for efficiently reaching and mining out veins, with less time lost to digging rock.

The point of this is to remove micromanagement from mining, so miners can still carry on their profession when you don't have any specific tunneling needs. If you prefer to micromanage mining over other things that require attention, then you wouldn't have a use for it. And I wouldn't advise anyone use it before knowing where the nearest cavern layers and/or magma seas are. Certainly there's opportunity for critical fuck-up due to careless application, but that's Dwarf Fortress for you.

[Dozebôm Lolumzalìs]

Umm... they follow the veins by mining out the vein.  If they can't see the vein, they can't mine it.  Accidents (mining the wrong stone) would be a horrible idea and may cause problems if you are mining for a project/around water or magma.  How would the game tell between a project and a mine?

[Uzu Bash]

Like many other tasks you could perform to horribly fuck up your fort, it's not the game's responsibility to provide common sense for the player. If you decided to start a delicate project then I hope you would bear that in mind when deciding where to prospect. If not, then you can entertain the "what's going on in your fort" with the fun you've inflicted on yourself.

EDIT: Oh, but the dwarves do provide common sense. They stop digging designated walls that are exposed as warm or wet tiles. If you really wanted to include those walls in a general excavation, then the dwarves will comply, but I can tell you ahead of time there won't be any minerals on the other side.