Sean has a good point: some of the OGC specs have been developed with relatively few members in the working group, which I think can tend to lead to inclusion of some obscure feature just because there's not a wide enough group to object.
-mpg > -----Original Message----- > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Sean Gillies > Sent: Tuesday, July 24, 2007 10:24 AM > To: OSGeo Discussions > Subject: Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] OSGEO & OGC spec development > > Michael, > > Standards bodies are a good thing if they produce good standards. > > OGC standards tend toward fussy intricacy (compare WFS-T to the Atom > Publishing Protocol) and pointless abstraction (all the so-called > distributed computing platforms that no one uses). I don't > know why, but > I suspect that it's cultural (no, I don't mean Canadian > culture). Going > public has the potential to reform the culture of the OGC. > > Regards, > Sean > > Michael P. Gerlek wrote: > > FYI, later this week at the GeoWeb conference in Vancouver > we're having a discussion on this hot topic: > > > >> Ever wonder why we need standards bodies? Can we just do > it with a Wiki? > >> We have open source, why not open source open standards? > What about intellectual > >> property protection? Can I afford to belong to a > standards body? Can I afford > >> not to? Do standards bodies impede or drive innovation? > How should neo-geo and > >> OGC work together? What are the pitfalls of "going public"? > > > > I'll be on the panel, as will Carl Reed from OGC. > > > > (Feel free to send me any comments/positions you'd like me > to put forward.) > > > > -mpg > > > > > > > > > > ________________________________ > > > > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Jeroen Ticheler > > Sent: Monday, July 16, 2007 2:12 PM > > To: OSGeo Discussions > > Subject: [OSGeo-Discuss] OSGEO & OGC spec development > > > > > > Hi all, > > Last week I attended the Open Geospatial Consortium > Technical Committee (OGC-TC) meeting in Paris. > > > > For those not to familiar with this meeting, it > consists of a series of Working Group (WG) meetings that > mostly run around the development of specifications (or > standards if you wish) dealing with geo-informatics. The most > prominent specifications coming from OGC are Web Map Service > (WMS), Web Feature Service (WFS) and Geographic Markup > Language (GML). There's a whole list of other specs available > or under development. OSGEO projects work with a substantial > number of them. See http://www.opengeospatial org for more details. > > > > With this email I would like to touch upon two issues > that I think are relevant to OSGEO. I hope bringing this up > can trigger some discussion on how OSGEO would best benefit > from the OGC spec development process: > > > > 1- Discussions related to Google's KML and Web Map Context > > 2- Discussions related to a Tiled Web Map Service specifications > > > > There was discussion on the possibility that KML > becomes an OGC specification and, more importantly, that it > could be used to replace the wining Web Map Context (WMC) > specification. A number of OSGEO projects use the Styled > Layer Descriptors (SLD (symbology)) specification and the > WMC. There's a great deal of overlap between these and KML. > It is likely in the interest of these projects to share their > experience with OGC and see some of that reflected in future > OGC specs. > > > > There was also discussion about a new Tiled WMS > specification. Such spec can have different forms, and could > be conceived as a new spec or as an extension (or application > profile) of a Web Map Service. Two approaches were presented > and two other approaches were mentioned, among which the > approach taken within the OSGEO community. > > > > Observing these discussions, my impression is that > OSGEO has an important role to play in the further > development of these OGC specs. We can obviously take the > easy route and let OGC go its way. We could than come up with > in-house, open specifications that will compete with OGC > specs still under development. The development of the specs > is likely to be quicker than going through OGC. However, I > feel that with limited effort by the community we can have a > very positive influence on the OGC spec development. We can > make sure experiences in OSGEO are reflected in the OGC > specs. The WMS-T is an obvious example of this. It was kind > of frustrating to not see that experience properly > represented at the WMS-WG. > > > > OSGEO is very young still, so frustration is not an > expression of dissatisfaction in this case :-) rather, I > think it might be time to establish a way to formally > represent OSGEO in OGC. This could be through those OSGEO > members that already hold a TC level membership to OGC (the > logical first step I would think) and later possibly through > a direct OSGEO TC Membership to OGC. Also, we could consider > a focal point in OSGEO where specification development is > discussed and coordinated. This may have the form of a > Committee for instance. I'm hesitant to propose new > Committees, but if there's enough interest to have a central > coordination point dealing with standards and specs, it may > make sense :-) > > > > Greetings from Rome, > > Jeroen > > > > _______________________ > > Jeroen Ticheler > > FAO-UN > > Tel: +39 06 57056041 > > http://www.fao.org/geonetwork > > 42.07420°N 12.34343°E > > > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > > Discuss mailing list > > [email protected] > > http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss > > > > _______________________________________________ > Discuss mailing list > [email protected] > http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss > _______________________________________________ Discuss mailing list [email protected] http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
