getCurrentPosition() to getPosition()?

Hello,

I alluded quickly to that idea back in December in the workshop on
securing access to device APIs, but would like to air it again to a
larger part of the Geolocation WG.

Most of the privacy issues surrounding the geolocation API seem to arise
from the fact that the API is supposed to return the user's current
location. At least, JohnM seemed to indicate that it was so during the
workshop.

What if, instead of making that assumption, the API would be designed to
return *a* position, that might or might not be the user's current
location? (this would probably require nothing more than changing the
name of the function from getCurrentPosition() to getPosition() ?)

There are I think many use cases where in fact the user might want to
get information related to a position that isn't her current location:
discovering an area where she will be later, finding again something she
find when she was somewhere else before, getting data about someone's
address in her addressbook, etc.

The story for watchPosition is probably less simple, but I could also
imagine someone wanting to get information in a Web application based on
someone or something else movements; this would even allow to tell your
favorite Web app "Follow that car"! More seriously, I could see it used
to follow the progression of a sport event (e.g. a race), of someone
else's trip, etc.

Of course, this is only useful if there are reasonable ways for browsers
to subscribe to geolocation providers one way or another; I assume this
is out of scope for the group in its current charter, but might be worth
also a look.

Any feedback on that idea?

Dom

Received on Wednesday, 21 January 2009 08:04:24 UTC