TPAC update and accessibility of spatial data

Hi all, 

It's already a month ago but I still owe you all a report on this year's W3C TPAC meeting. It took place from 6-10 november in Burlingame, California. As you know this group didn't have a face to face meeting there, but I'd like to note a few things that might be of interest. 

But first, I'll tell you what happened at the breakout session where we promoted this group's work. Wednesday was plenary day at TPAC and as usual a lot of parallel sessions were held in an Unconference fashion. Francois and I held a breakout session on the SDWIG, but unfortunately there was very little attendance. Next time we have to try to make sure the session does not end up in parallel with others that interest the same group of people. In this case, there was a parallel session on data on the web, among other things. I did get to briefly speak about our IG at the plenary wrap-up. 

Francois and I briefly discussed the topic of accessibility of maps and spatial data with Michael Cooper (W3C Staff Contact for the ARIA Working Group [1]). We think it would be interesting to explore this topic within the IG, since web map applications and spatial data should be available on the web in a way that is accessible to people with disabilities. At Geonovum we did a report on map accessibility a while ago - this could be input to the discussion (if I manage to translate it into English). But we should also consider the WAI-ARIA specification since spatial data often features in rich Internet applications and these should be accessible as well. I would first like to ask if there are people in this group who think it worthwhile to pursue this topic? Let's have some discussion on the mailing list, and we'll put it on the agenda for the next plenary call (which will be January 3, 2018, 20:00 UTC). 

Other things of interest at TPAC:
- The Web of Things group [2] had a plugfest. Among other things they are now working on W3C spec for Thing Description, which is a very lightweight vocabulary but can easily be extended, so it's easy to use in combination with SOSA/SSN. They told me they're happy with SOSA.
- Web Assembly [3] seems interesting for us geospatial people; this is just something I heard but basically it's about compression on the Web and it might be usable for spatial data, especially 3D. I understood it's already being used in Google Earth. Again, this is just what I caught from conversations; if anyone knows more or can correct me please do. 
- DCAT 1.1 work has started within the Dataset Exchange Working Group [4]. They just published the FPWD of their UCR document [5]. There's a few spatial use cases and requirements in there, so I encourage review from members of this group. 
- W3C and OGC have a new collaboration: a joint pilot about Virtual/Augmented Reality [6, 7].

Linda

[1]: https://www.w3.org/WAI/ARIA/ 
[2]: https://www.w3.org/WoT/WG/
[3]: https://www.w3.org/wasm/ 
[4]: https://www.w3.org/2017/dxwg/wiki/Main_Page 
[5]: https://www.w3.org/TR/dcat-ucr/ 
[6]: https://www.w3.org/blog/2017/12/w3c-and-ogc-augmented-reality-pilot-an-exciting-adventure-for-w3c/ 
[7]: http://www.opengeospatial.org/pressroom/pressreleases/2697

Received on Wednesday, 13 December 2017 15:33:46 UTC