WMS-WFS chaining (bug?)

[Barend Köbben]

Hi,

I found a strange / undocumented feature when trying to chain a Mapserver WMS service with a MapServer WFS. Both are using 4.2.2.

In the WMS map configuration, I defined the layer that was to come from the WFS as follows (following the HowTo on the website):
...
LAYER
     NAME airports
     TYPE POINT
     STATUS ON
     CONNECTIONTYPE WFS
     CONNECTION "http://geoserver.itc.nl/cgi-bin/mapserv.exe?map=D:/Inetpub/geoserver/kobben/thailand/wfs_config.map&"
     METADATA
  	"wfs_typename"          	"airportsWFS"
	"wfs_version"          	 "1.0.0"
	"wfs_request_method"    "GET"
	"wfs_connectiontimeout" "60"
    	"wfs_maxfeatures"       "100"
     END
...


But this yielded an error message that went:

<?xml version='1.0' encoding="ISO-8859-1" standalone="no" ?>
<!DOCTYPE ServiceExceptionReport SYSTEM "http://schemas.opengeospatial.net/wms/1.1.1/exception_1_1_1.dtd">
<ServiceExceptionReport version="1.1.1">
<ServiceException>
msBuildWFSLayerGetURL(): WFS connection error. Metadata wfs_service must be set in the layare
</ServiceException>
</ServiceExceptionReport>


Cryptic message, and it took me a looooong time to find that it DID work when I added SERVICE=WFS to the CONNECTION string, although the HowTo states that adding such things there is deprecated...

...
     CONNECTION "http://geoserver.itc.nl/cgi-bin/mapserv.exe?map=D:/Inetpub/geoserver/kobben/thailand/wfs_config.map&&SERVICE=WFS&"
...

You can try it out yourself at http://geoserver.itc.nl/cgi-bin/mapserv.exe?map=D:/Inetpub/geoserver/kobben/thailand/chain_config.map&&VERSION=1.1.1&REQUEST=GetMap&LAYERS=world,airports&SRS=EPSG:4326&BBOX=97,5,106,21&WIDTH=600&HEIGHT=800&FORMAT=image/png

Is this a bug, or does it mean it's time to upgrade my Mapserver, or....?

--
Barend Köbben
International Institute for Geo-information 
Sciences and Earth Observation (ITC) 
PO Box 6, 7500AA Enschede (The Netherlands)
ph: +31 (0)53 4874253; fax: +31 (0)53 4874335