[OSGeo-Discuss] multi-lingual WMS-legends

[Peter Hopfgartner]

--------Adrian Custer <acuster at gmail.com> wrote--------
Subject: Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] multi-lingual WMS-legends
Date: 25.05.2011 01:03

>Hey Cameron, all,
>
Hi Adrian,

>On 05/25/2011 12:12 AM, Cameron Shorter wrote:
>> OGC standards people,
>> Have there been any discussions at the OGC level about specifying
>> language support within OGC standards?
>
>Yes, we have had discussions; no we have not yet found solutions.
>
>As part of our work cleaning up the "WMS mess" for 2.0, I have looked at 
>the language rules given by 'OWS Common' (the proposed base layer for 
>all OGC Web Services). Those rules seem both restrictive and broken (due 
>to mutually incompatible requirements). The broken can be fixed, however 
>the fundamental approach itself is problematic for WMS.
>
>The approach of OWS Common forces any OGC web service that wishes to 
>advertise that it supports a particular language to offer *all* its text 
>strings in all of its resources in that language. The bar is therefore 
>exceedingly high---it seems to argue that if any layer of labels on the 
>service cannot be obtained with all its labels in a particular language, 
>that language cannot be said to be supported by the service. For WMS 
>labels of, say, place names, this all or nothing approach seems 
>needlessly restrictive; it is hard enough to get labels of any kind for 
>a country or continent without trying to get them all in a single 
>language (let alone several). I suspect the current approach sets an 
>impossibly high requirement. Regardless, it seems like it would be 
>useful to have some language mechanism, presumably using an additional 
>but complimentary approach, based on a best effort contract. (Note that 
>INSPIRE too seems to use the 'everything must be fully translated' 
>approach, if I remember correctly.)

I had a look at the current "Technical Guidance for the implementation of INSPIRE View Services", v 3.0. In 4.3.1, they say, that for a GetCapabilities mandate:

"""
If a client request specifies a supported language the following fields  of the GetCapabilties-Response
are affected:
 * Titles
 *Abstracts
"""

In 4.3.1.1 they handle the GetMap-Operation:

"""
Neither the INSPIRE Network Services [INS NS] Regulation or the Regulation as regards
interoperability of spatial data sets and services [INS DS] require that text rendered on the map has to
be in a specific language.
"""

Anyway, some recommendations are given in 4.3.2, which I would quote here. So INSPIRE seems to have a "best efford" approach to multilinguism.

In 4.3.3 then:

"""
4.3.3 Further Perspectives
With the ongoing development of OWS Common it is expected that future versions of OGC Standards
will include language support.
"""


(...)
>
>   ~adrian
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Regards,

Peter
 
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