[mapserver-dev] PropertyName discrepancies - MapServer or Spec

[Eichner, Andreas - SID-NLKM]

Hello guys,

one of our customers had issues with GetFeature requests when using
MapServer as a WFS. It's client software sent something like 
...&PROPERTYNAME=ms:LayerName/ms:ColumnName&...
I modified the mapwfs.c to simply strip anything in front of ColumnName.
Now I wanted to create a ticket and attach the patch. So I studied the
WFS 1.1 spec again and now I am completely confused:

The chapter about the GetFeature operation states on page 36:
"The value of each <wfs:PropertyName> element is a namespace-qualified
name (XML
Schema type QName, e.g. myns:address) whose value must match the name of
one of the
property elements in the GML representation of the relevant feature."
So IMHO this means what MapServer implements: the textual content of a
PropertyName should be <namespace prefix>:<local-name>. This basically
means our customers request is invalid and I can drop my patch on the
floor.

But on the other hand the WFS 1.1 XML schema defines PropertyName as
type xsd:string and section 7.4.1 states
"A WFS must use XPath [8] expressions, as defined in this document, for
referencing the properties and
components of the value of properties of a feature encoded as XML
elements or attributes." and I strongly believe that the PropertyName
within a GetFeature actually is such a reference. And last but not least
in GetFeature example 9 the following fragment is used:
  <wfs:PropertyName>myns:Person/myns:lastName</wfs:PropertyName>

How are you about this? Any ideas how to handle this?

Crazy regards...