- From: Alexander Mayrhofer <alexander.mayrhofer@nic.at>
- Date: Mon, 27 Jun 2011 10:55:36 +0200
- To: <public-poiwg@w3c.org>
Hello, I'm one of the co-authors of RFC5870 - the "geo:" URI specification [1]. Since there has been some discussion about the URI scheme on this list, i'd like to give my (obviously biased ;) view on how the POI spec could benefit from the "geo:" URI. I understand that ISSUE-37 has been raised specifically for the question whether or not geo: URIs should be used in the specs, however, other raised issues might be touched by it as well: - ISSUE-37: (obvious) - ISSUE-19: The "geo:" URI by definition does specify an identifier for a point in space (optionally "diluted" by an uncertainty parameter) - therefore, it would be a very compact, "geek-readable" and well specified way of representing a Point. Lines and Polygons, however, are obviously not supported. Note that lot of work went into making the specification as precise and umanbigious as possible (read through Section 3.4 of RFC 5870), and it was reviewed over and over by the Geospatial community as well as the IETF (internet) community. - ISSUE-21: A "geo:" URI always includes the specification of a Coordinate Reference System. A lot of work in "geo:" URI went into agreeing on a default Coordinate Reference System (WGS-84), but still allowing for a maximum of flexibility. A Registry was created at IANA which allows for the inclusion of more Reference Systems if needed [2]. - ISSUE-14: Having worked on the "geo:" URI specification for more than 3 years, i can only urge you to make use of other standards where you can. If you can't use the whole standard, then refer to bits and pieces. It saves a lot of work and pain to not re-define the semantics of individual fields. Re-use where you can from stable standards. For example, don't start doing your own definition of lat/lon when there's text that has been reviewed and approved by both the geospatial as well as the internet community (whether that's geoURI, geoJSON, PIDF-LO... it doesn't really matter - but don't re-invent the wheel). Hope that helps - i'm more than happy to discuss further details over email / chat! Alex [1]: http://tools.ietf.org/rfc/rfc5870 [2]: http://www.iana.org/assignments/geo-uri-parameters/geo-uri-parameters.xm l
Received on Monday, 27 June 2011 08:56:17 UTC