OpenActive Open Booking 1.0 Candidate Release

Hi all,

Although this is later than expected, I’m pleased to present the OpenActive
Open Booking 1.0 Candidate Release
<https://www.openactive.io/open-booking-api/EditorsDraft/>. Please note the
release notes below.

With this release we consider the design of the API to be stable and
believe we have handled all of the major concerns and issues raised by the
community.

The current design provides sufficient functionality that supports the
original requirements for the API and provides a good foundation for
further work and implementation.

Today marks the start of the formal final review period, which will run
until May 23rd. We will then formally publish the 1.0 specification on 24th
May.

This final review period is provided to allow for any final feedback on the
specification, e.g. to correct any technical inaccuracies, spelling,
grammar or mistakes in examples.

Please do take this opportunity to review the specification - it promises
to be a thoroughly gripping read - and let us know if you have any feedback
along those lines.

If you have suggestions for future functionality, then please also feel
free to share those so we can use them to build a roadmap for future work.
Please note that we are keen to drive further specification work on booking
based on implementation experience. The current 1.0 specification provides
a solid foundation that people can now implement against.

We'd also welcome positive endorsements from the community. So please also
let us know, e.g by replying to this email, if you're happy with the
current design.

We plan for our next focus to be on supporting implementers, creating
guidance, documentation, libraries, and validation tools around this
specification.

Thank you all for your valuable contributions over the last year.

Here's to unlocking innovation,

Nick

--

*Release Notes*

Executive Summary: The specification remains consistent with everything
presented at the Booking Finalisation Workshop
<https://w3c.openactive.io/meetings/2019-04-02-booking-finalisation-workshop>,
with the addition of basic support for attendee detail capture and simple
additional data capture.

   - Although the full extent of the requirements of
   https://github.com/openactive/open-booking-api/issues/107 have yet to be
   debated and are reserved for a future version of the specification as
   discussed, additions have been made to the specification where possible to
   cover additional optional attendee detail capture and simple additional
   data capture. This is to ensure that booking systems that require an intake
   form for their customers are able to to move forward with implementation.
   - We have taken onboard a range of technical feedback. This includes
   making the endpoints more modular, while retaining the same functionality,
   to aid testability and maintainability.
   - The approval flow has been broken out into a separate section, with
   increased additional clarity around the negotiation, and details to support
   the optionality of approval, negotiation, and message exchange.
   - Extension mechanisms have been clarified, with examples.
   - Cancellation has been simplified from a technical perspective.
   - orderQuantity expansion has been removed for simplicity: it was a
   premature technical optimisation.
   - DynamicPayment replaces DynamicOffer to provide a more robust
   implementation of dynamic pricing.
   - The Booking System is now able to specify payment as optional, for
   consistency with the modelling specification.
   - A middleware section has been added to make the application of
   authentication credentials clearer.
   - Additional diagrams have been added throughout to further aid
   comprehension.
   - Additional errors have been added to the model to ensure that all
   scenarios are covered.


-- 

Nick Evans

Associate & Sector Specialist

Open Data Institute <http://theodi.org/> | +447813318661