[OSGeo-Discuss] [OSGeo-Standards] "Geoservices REST API" story is being discussed on slashdot

[Seven (aka Arnulf)]

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Mike,
thanks for your opinion. I agree that there were technical reasons to
not go forward with the spec as it was.

Regarding the second issue I think there are some wrong ideas about
how the OGC functions. Even OGC members get this wrong all the time.
OGC would be well advised to make sure that these wrong views are
corrected.

In a nutshell: Once a candidate has gone through the OGC and been
approved as a standard no single vendor can prevent it from evolving.
Backwards compatibility is not a blocker either. Once a new full
version comes around it can break everything it has done before. A
standard cannot be "bought" in or from the OGC. OGC members are grown
up and diverse enough to prevent really stupid and dangerous things
from happening + the public review period to prevent really messy
things from happening, Q.E.D.: GeoServices REST API

These things are core and key to all the OGC Policies and Procedures.
This is also the reason why I still believe that from a strategic
point of view it would have been beneficial for the broader community
to nail this thing down as an OGC standard. It would certainly have
given esri an initial edge on the marketing front - but don't they
have this already anyway? At the same time esri would have to admit
that OGC standards actually do work - which some of their marketeers
deny to this day - and their software proves by not implementing it
stringently. So in the long run it would have been a strategically and
sustainable way of getting a grip on interoperability and bridging gaps.

But hey, please don't get me wrong: This is not the end of the world
and I certainly agree that the OSGeo letter was important and we are
doing just great. But I am also getting a bit tired of "defending" an
organization which did not do anything "wrong" but instead just proved
to function perfectly like it should and which is core to
interoperability and educating die-hard proprietary vendor-lock-in
experts to be more open. This is not hard to appreciate, is it? Sigh. :-)


Mike,
most of this was not an answer to your comment but more directed at
the broader readership. Maybe I should roll this out in a more
appropriate medium like a blog.


Thanks,
Arnulf

PS:
I hope you are happily preparing the benchmarking exercise - or are we
still waiting for something?

On 06.06.2013 19:01, Smith, Michael ERDC-CRREL-NH wrote:
> Arnulf,
> 
> The issue as I see it was more than technical, it would not have
> been an OGC standard, it would have been an ESRI standard with a
> OGC stamp. Would OGC have control over the spec and be able to
> change it as needed? Not from what I read, ESRI would still have
> control over that and did not allow changes that OGC requested.
> 
> In my mind these kinds of issues prevent this from becoming an OGC
> spec aside from the technical issues.
> 
> Mike
> 


- -- 
Exploring Space, Time and Mind
http://arnulf.us
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