[generic-sensor] Alignment with W3C Semantic Sensor Network Ontology

Dear DAS WG

Your work on a generic sensor API has recently come to my attention.

I wonder if you are aware of related work undertaken by the Spatial Data on the Web Working Group, specifically the Semantic Sensor Network Ontology (SSN).

A recommendation was published in 2017:
https://www.w3.org/TR/vocab-ssn/

This is currently under revision - you can see an editors draft here:
https://w3c.github.io/sdw-sosa-ssn/ssn/

The ontology places 'Sensors' in a specific relationship to acts of observation, following earlier work in OGC, ISO and a W3C Incubator - see summary here:

https://w3c.github.io/sdw-sosa-ssn/ssn/#origins

From a brief look at your CR, I don't see any major challenges, but it might be worth you inspecting the SSN work to verify this.
The key sections of our document are probably

- Systems - which defines a generic superclass for Sensors, Actuators and Samplers https://w3c.github.io/sdw-sosa-ssn/ssn/#Systems-and-their-Deployment
- Sensor - the generic class for Sensors, as used in the context of acts of observation https://w3c.github.io/sdw-sosa-ssn/ssn/#SOSASensor
- System capabilities - some details on sensor description (non-normative)

https://w3c.github.io/sdw-sosa-ssn/ssn/#System-capabilities

I will also take the references to your work back into our working group so that we can reciprocate the alignment inspection.

Cheers - Simon

dr.shorthair@pm.me
+61 403 302 672

On Boonwurrung land

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