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Charter of the GeoAPI 3.0 Standard Working Group of the Open Geospatial Consortium
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1. Purpose
The GeoAPI Standard Working Group (SWG) aims to create the GeoAPI 3.0 Standard which will define a
set of Java language interfaces along with an associated test suite, to provide a standardized,
programming language level realization of some core OGC specifications. These interfaces will
facilitate the creation of accurate, coherent, interoperable, and verifiable implementations of
those OGC standards.
2. Scope of Work
The GeoAPI SWG Standard will propose the candidate GeoAPI 3.0 Standard, along with the Java
language interfaces described by the standard, and an associated test suite which can be run
against any implementation of the interfaces.
The candidate GeoAPI 3.0 standard will explain the work, document the interfaces and explain the
rationale for all the deviations from the OGC Standards.
The Java interfaces described in the GeoAPI 3.0 standard will cover the following OGC standards:
* (Dependency) ISO 19103: Conceptual schema language
* OGC Abs. Topic 11 Metadata (ISO 19115: Metadata)
* OGC Abs. Topic 2 Spatial Referencing by Coordinates (ISO 19111: Spatial Referencing by Coordinates)
2.1 What is out of scope?
This work is not expected to cover all OGC standards.
A reference implementation of the interfaces will exist but will not be part of the work of this
SWG.
2.2 Specific Contribution of Existing Work as a Starting Point
Existing work by the GeoAPI project (http://geoapi.sourceforge.net), will be taken as a starting
point. Specifically, the Standard will only include the most stable interfaces of the GeoAPI
project, for which a reliable reference implementation exists and there is at least one other
implementation.
This work emerges from the earlier OGC standard OpenGIS Geographic Objects Implementation
Specification version 1.0.0 (03-064r10) by re-using the non graphical elements of that earlier
work. This earlier specification defined GeoAPI 2.0.
2.3 How it is to be Determined when the Work of the SWG has been Completed
The work of the SWG will be completed when the candidate specification has been proposed to the
working group, all comments to that specification have been addressed, and a final revision has
been accepted by the SWG and approved by the OGC technical committee.
3. Description of the Deliverables
The GeoAPI 3.0 SWG will produce a standards document, a set of Java language interfaces and a test
suite through which groups implementing the Java interfaces can test their implementation.
4. License Policy of the SWG
Since the work merely re-interprets other OGC specifications, it is not anticipated that the work
of the SWG would include any work which could be subject to trademark or patents.
The Java language interfaces and test suite will be distributed with OGC copyright under one of
the following license, to be determined by the working group:
* the current license documented at http://geoapi.sourceforge.net/license.html.
* the well known license, the GNU Lesser General Public License (LGPL) which is described at
(http://www.gnu.org/licenses/old-licenses/gpl-2.0.html). The license permits the use of the
code by anyone for any purpose but imposes only a minor restriction to those who wish to
re-distribute the code itself.
5. Anticipated Audience
The code interfaces produced by this working group should be useful to any group implementing OGC
standards using the Java language, or any users of those implementations.
It is expected that the deliberations of this working group will be followed mostly by those who
aim to create the above implementations.
6. Other informative information about the work of this RWG
6.1 Similar or applicable standards work
This work overlaps the work of the Architecture working group to the extent that this effort aims
to develop a coherent definition of all OGC standards. Any issues in harmonization which arrives
in the course of this working group's discussions will be brought to the attention of the
Architecture group for resolution.
The GeoAPI interfaces also aims to work harmoniously with the standard Java library. Where
necessary for smooth integration with the Java language, the GeoAPI interfaces favor the Java
models.
6.2 Details of the first meeting
The SWG has not yet met. There have been a series of meetings by the GeoAPI ad-hoc working group
which have prepared the work for this SWG.
6.3 Projected on-going meeting schedule
We expect two meetings per year.
6.4 Supporters of the Proposal
The following contributors (listed in alphabetical order) are interested by this proposal:
Person Organization
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Rob Atkinson CSRIO (Australia)
Adrian Custer Geomatys (France)
Martin Desruisseaux Geomatys (France)
Jérôme Gaspéri CNES (France)
Gilles Gesquiere LSIS (France)
Max Martinez ERDAS
Emmanuel Seguin IGN (France)
7. Future Work
The SWG is expected to continue meetings for expanding this work on the initial standard to
develop future revisions of the standard. A first set of expansions will lead to Java language
realizations of all the core OGC specifications such as OGC Abstract Topic 6 - Schema for coverage
geometry and functions, OGC Abstract Topic 1: Feature geometry, and OGC Abstract Topic 5: Features.
Subsequent revisions may expand this work to the OGC Web Services specifications or to other
programming languages.
