[Board] [OSGeo-Standards] glossary discussion on osgeo-standards ....

Angelos Tzotsos gcpp.kalxas at gmail.com
Tue Oct 29 08:30:12 PDT 2019


Hi Cameron,

The formation of the lexicon committee was discussed during the board 
meeting yesterday.
One question that came up is: what is the reason this work cannot be 
done under the standards committee, since this involves members from 
OSGeo, OGC and ISO?

Regards,
Angelos

On 10/24/19 12:16 AM, Cameron Shorter wrote:
> Angelos,
>
> We haven't discussed selecting a chair of the committee yet, but I 
> will be suggesting Reese and/or Ron as we bootstrap this committee. 
> They both have been been very active in setting up this initiative and 
> come with lots of experience.
>
> On 22/10/19 10:47 pm, Victoria Rautenbach wrote:
>> Dear All
>>
>> This is a great initiative, thank you Cameron and Reese. I fully
>> support this initiative and working with the ISO/TC 211 TMG on their
>> mature terminology database.
>>
>> Reese, will be great to work with you again!
>>
>> Regards
>> Victoria
>>
>> On Tue, Oct 22, 2019 at 9:52 AM Angelos Tzotsos 
>> <gcpp.kalxas at gmail.com> wrote:
>>> Hi Cameron,
>>>
>>> Have you decided on a committee chair?
>>> Who will be the point of contact for the board?
>>>
>>> Cheers,
>>> Angelos
>>>
>>> On 10/21/19 8:32 PM, Cameron Shorter wrote:
>>>
>>> OSGeo Board,
>>>
>>> On behalf of Ron, Reese and myself, I've added an item to the board 
>>> agenda requested the board's approval for the setting up of an OSGeo 
>>> Lexicon Committee. Unfortunately none of us will be awake during 
>>> this meeting so will not be in a position to discuss the proposal in 
>>> person. Hopefully if you have any questions you can raise them 
>>> before hand in this email thread.
>>>
>>> We have started a wiki page for the committee here: 
>>> https://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Lexicon_Committee
>>>
>>> Thanks in advance, Cameron
>>>
>>> On 19/10/19 4:15 am, Cameron Shorter wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>> Angelos, the other end of the day would probably be easier. I think 
>>> this link shows board locations along with Ron (Hong Kong) and Reese 
>>> (Tokyo).
>>>
>>> https://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/meetingtime.html?year=2019&month=10&day=20&p1=240&p2=248&p3=102&p4=269&p5=250&p6=26&p7=37&p8=286&p9=734 
>>> <https://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/meetingtime.html?year=2019&month=10&day=19&p1=240&p2=248&p3=102&p4=269&p5=250&p6=26&p7=37&p8=286&p9=734> 
>>>
>>>
>>> Does anyone else from the OSGeo board have an opinion on this 
>>> proposal and wish to share it? We could make the meeting 
>>> coordination easier if we narrow participation to only those with an 
>>> interest and an opinion.
>>>
>>> On 18/10/19 8:16 pm, Angelos Tzotsos wrote:
>>>
>>> Hi,
>>>
>>> In that case we should probably arrange a specific call for this topic.
>>> I think the only working timeslot would be around 20:00-22:00 UTC
>>>
>>> On 10/17/19 9:24 PM, Cameron Shorter wrote:
>>>
>>> Angelos, the board meeting is 3am for me. The 3 of us involved are 
>>> in this Asian/Australia timezone.
>>>
>>> Reese, we can get you set up with IRC (Internet Chat Relay) quite 
>>> easily. It is text based only. Quickest way to get started is with 
>>> the web client: https://webchat.freenode.net/
>>>
>>> On 17/10/19 10:19 pm, rplews at tc211tmg.org wrote:
>>>
>>> hello Angelos, thank you for the invitation, two issues for me, 
>>> local time is 1am and i have never done Internet Relay Chat. i can 
>>> do skype or zoom. if you have another time/date let me know.  sorry 
>>> about this time.
>>> reese
>>>
>>>
>>>      ----- Original Message -----
>>>      From:
>>>      "Angelos Tzotsos" <gcpp.kalxas at gmail.com>
>>>
>>>      To:
>>>      "Cameron Shorter" <cameron.shorter at gmail.com>,
>>> <standards at lists.osgeo.org>, "board at lists.osgeo.org"
>>> <board at lists.osgeo.org>, "OSGeo Discussions" <discuss at lists.osgeo.org>
>>>      Cc:
>>>      "Reese Plews" <rplews at gmail.com>
>>>      Sent:
>>>      Thu, 17 Oct 2019 12:14:37 +0300
>>>      Subject:
>>>      Re: [OSGeo-Standards] [Board] glossary discussion on
>>>      osgeo-standards ....
>>>
>>>
>>>      Hi all,
>>>
>>>      Would someone be available to join our next board meeting to
>>>      discuss this issue?
>>> https://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Board_Meeting_2019-10-28
>>>
>>>      Regards,
>>>      Angelos
>>>
>>>      On 10/15/19 9:52 PM, Cameron Shorter wrote:
>>>
>>>          OSGeo Board, OSGeo Discuss,
>>>
>>>          I'd like to introduce you to this proposal that Ron and Reese
>>>          have been developing on the OSGeo Standards email list, which
>>>          I think should fit under the legal structure of an OSGeo
>>>          Committee.
>>>
>>>          I have vague recollections that setting up a committee
>>>          requires board approval? I've found some old tips on running a
>>>          committee here: 
>>> https://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Committee_Guidelines
>>>
>>>          Comments welcomed.
>>>
>>>          On 15/10/19 4:47 pm, Ronald Tse wrote:
>>>
>>>              Hi Cameron,
>>>
>>>              Thank you for the suggestions! I have updated the proposal
>>>              to reflect your comments below.
>>>
>>>              I would be honored to help with terminology management at
>>>              OSGeo. Can’t speak for Reese but with his leadership in
>>>              already doing terminology cleanup on Felicity’s sheet, he
>>>              seems pretty committed already :-)
>>>
>>>              Ron
>>>
>>>              ———
>>>
>>>              Recommendations for OSGeo terminology management
>>>
>>>              1. Establish a terminology management group in OSGeo.
>>>
>>>              ISO/TC 211, IEC Electropedia and OGC all have one for
>>>              terminology management. The existence of this group is
>>>              crucial to the success of the OSGeo terminology database.
>>>              It will play two essential roles:
>>>
>>>              a) As the gatekeeper of terms to ensure quality checks of
>>>              contributions
>>>              b) As the seat of central terminology knowledge for
>>>              alignment of terms and concepts. To facilitate the flow of
>>>              terminology knowledge to terminology authors and users.
>>>
>>>              It would be helpful to involve representation from ISO/TC
>>>              211 and OGC in this group, in order to leverage their
>>>              experience in terminology. Such experience will be useful
>>>              in situations such as alerting on cross-organization
>>>              alignment of concepts or term duplication.
>>>
>>>              An email list shall be setup for this group for internal
>>>              communication.
>>>
>>>
>>>              2. Establish a terms of reference for terminology 
>>> management.
>>>
>>>              For the terminology management group, a terms of reference
>>>              should be produced so that the steps for approval and data
>>>              quality requirements are clear. This should be openly
>>>              shared with contributors so they are clear on acceptance
>>>              criteria.
>>>
>>>              Contributors may propose changes to the terminology
>>>              database at any time. The terminology management group
>>>              shall discuss and approve or disapprove of the proposal
>>>              within a reasonable timeframe. This practice is in-line
>>>              with the open source, change-based, rapid iteration
>>>              mantra, similar to OpenSSL.
>>>
>>>              For releases, the group shall convene periodically, such
>>>              as every 4-6 months, to discuss previously decided
>>>              proposals, governance or technical issues related to
>>>              terminology management.
>>>
>>>              The method of submitting change requests shall also be
>>>              determined and announced so that contributors understand
>>>              the necessary processes and timeline.
>>>
>>>
>>>              3. Establish an online terminology database presence.
>>>
>>>              Terminology isn’t useful until people use them, which
>>>              means people need to first know they exist and what they
>>>              mean. Geolexica is an initiative that currently serves
>>>              ISO/TC 211’s terminology management group in making its
>>>              multi-lingual geographic information terminology available
>>>              on the internet (https://www.geolexica.org). We propose to
>>>              use https://osgeo.geolexica.org/ to serve OSGeo in
>>>              managing its terminology database. Geolexica not only
>>>              serves human-readable concepts and terms, but also serves
>>>              in machine-readable JSON, allowing APIs to directly
>>>              consume the content.
>>>
>>>              The structure of Geolexica is designed for efficiency with
>>>              streamlined management and operations. Terms are stored in
>>>              structured data (YAML) files, and are directly deployable
>>>              to the website. The website operates according to best
>>>              practices, and is served as a static website with dynamic
>>>              search functionality. Security and performance have always
>>>              been key considerations.
>>>
>>>              For terms that originate from other authoritative
>>>              terminology databases, such as those from ISO or OGC, a
>>>              linkage shall be established from the OSGeo terminology
>>>              database back to the source.
>>>
>>>
>>>              4. Use an issue tracker with source code management
>>>              functionality as an open communication platform (e.g.
>>>              GitHub).
>>>
>>>              The issue tracker is used to perform two-way communication
>>>              between OSGeo members and the contributors. This requires
>>>              every contributor to at least have an account, which helps
>>>              minimize spam. The source code management functionality is
>>>              used to manage terminology data in a machine-useable way.
>>>
>>>              There are generally two types of contributors:
>>>
>>>              a) those who suggest changes via textual description, and
>>>              b) those who suggest changes but can also format the
>>>              desired content in the data format used by the terminology
>>>              database.
>>>
>>>              People can easily help out with the former in formatting
>>>              the changes into a proper data structure change. This
>>>              allows the terminology management group to directly
>>>              approve, merge and deploy the proposed term modifications
>>>              (and creations, deletions), all made effective with a
>>>              single click.
>>>
>>>
>>>              5. Allow easy feedback from terminology users.
>>>
>>>              To minimize friction in the feedback process, for every
>>>              term offered in the OSGeo terminology pages we can offer a
>>>              “propose new term” and “propose changes to this term"
>>>              buttons. This allows user to directly go to the issue
>>>              platform (e.g. GitHub) to make the suggested changes.
>>>
>>>              A “contributors guide” document will greatly help these
>>>              people make the proper suggestions and have them formatted
>>>              correctly.
>>>
>>>
>>>              6. Initial load and data cleanup.
>>>
>>>              The initial load of the terms will involve a bulk load
>>>              from the cleaned terms and definitions that Felicity has
>>>              compiled. Geolexica could easily handle the initial
>>>              conversion from table format into the desired structured
>>>              data format.
>>>
>>>              The cleanup process has already been started by Reese
>>>              Plews, convenor of the TMG at ISO/TC 211.
>>>
>>>
>>>              _____________________________________
>>>
>>>              Ronald Tse
>>>              Ribose Inc.
>>>
>>>                  On Oct 10, 2019, at 3:34 PM, Cameron Shorter
>>> <cameron.shorter at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>                  Hi Ron,
>>>
>>>                  I really like your proposal. It looks very practical,
>>>                  should address quality requirements, and should be
>>>                  relatively light weight to manage. Some
>>>                  comments/suggestions:
>>>
>>>                  * You might want to mention the approach to your first
>>>                  load of terms, which probably should involve a bulk
>>>                  load from a derivative of the terms that Felicity has
>>>                  compiled.
>>>
>>>                  * I suggest we set up an email list to discuss terms.
>>>                  OSGeo can provide that for us, and I can coordinate
>>>                  that, once we have agreed on our approach.
>>>
>>>                  * I suggest that an updating the glossary be tied to a
>>>                  periodic event, at least annually. I think we should
>>>                  tie in with the OSGeoLive annual build cycle for this.
>>>
>>>                  * You haven't mentioned https://osgeo.geolexica.org/
>>> <https://osgeo.geolexica.org/> in your description. I
>>>                  assume that would be part of the solution? If so, I
>>>                  suggest mentioning it.
>>>
>>>                  * Another project I'm helping start up is
>>> https://thegooddocsproject.dev/
>>> <https://thegooddocsproject.dev/> (Writing templates
>>>                  to make good docs for open source projects). I expect
>>>                  that the solution you are proposing would be valuable
>>>                  for a wide variety of domains, and should be captured
>>>                  as best practices in TheGoodDocsProject. At some point
>>>                  in the future, I'm hoping that you might provide a
>>>                  generic version of your suggestions for others to
>>>                  follow too.
>>>
>>>                  Feel free to add your ideas below into the wiki at:
>>> https://trac.osgeo.org/osgeolive/wiki/Glossary%20terms
>>>
>>>                  (Maybe add "DRAFT" at the top, until we have the
>>>                  process set up.)
>>>
>>>                  * Ron and Reese, I'm hoping that you both will
>>>                  continue to provide the leadership and stewardship of
>>>                  the community as it grows? Your advice has been great
>>>                  to date.
>>>
>>>                  Warm regards, Cameron
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>              _______________________________________________
>>>              Standards mailing list
>>> Standards at lists.osgeo.org
>>> https://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/standards
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>          _______________________________________________
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>          Board mailing list
>>> Board at lists.osgeo.org
>>> https://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/board
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>      --
>>>
>>>
>>>      Angelos Tzotsos, PhD
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>      Charter Member
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>      Open Source Geospatial Foundation
>>> http://users.ntua.gr/tzotsos
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> -- 
>>> Cameron Shorter
>>> Technology Demystifier
>>> Open Technologies and Geospatial Consultant
>>>
>>> M +61 (0) 419 142 254
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> Board mailing list
>>> Board at lists.osgeo.org
>>> https://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/board
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> -- 
>>> Angelos Tzotsos, PhD
>>> Charter Member
>>> Open Source Geospatial Foundation
>>> http://users.ntua.gr/tzotsos
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> Board mailing list
>>> Board at lists.osgeo.org
>>> https://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/board
>


-- 
Angelos Tzotsos, PhD
Charter Member
Open Source Geospatial Foundation
http://users.ntua.gr/tzotsos




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