wms_group parameter

[Bart van den Eijnden]

Hi Stefanie,

AFAIK there are 2 options:

1) just specify GROUP (and wms_group_title in your METADATA). This will provide a 1 level deep layer nesting, e.g.:

<Layer>
  <Name>mygroup</Name>
  <Title>title of mygroup</Title>
  <Layer>
    <Name>mylayer</Name>
    <Title>title of mylayer</Title>
  </Layer>
</Layer>

These groups can also be requested, ie they have a name.

2) if you need deeper nesting (more than 1 level deep), you can use wms_layer_group instead of GROUP

"wms_layer_group"  "/Hydrography of the Netherlands/Rivers"

This will create:

<Layer>
  <Title>Hydrography of the Netherlands</Title>
  <Layer>
    <Title>Rivers</Title>
     <Layer>
       <Name>mylayer</Name>
       <Title>title of mylayer</Title>
     </Layer>
  </Layer>
</Layer>

These groups cannot be requested, ie they only have a title and are merely intended for applying a nesting/structure to your data, eg when a WMS service is added in a treeview.

See also:
http://mapserver.gis.umn.edu/bugs/show_bug.cgi?id=776

Hope this helps.

Best regards,
Bart

Bart van den Eijnden
Syncera-ITSolutions
Postbus 270
2600 AG  DELFT

tel.nr.: 015-7512436
email: BEN at Syncera-ITSolutions.nl

>>> Stefanie Weykam <sweykam at TELELINE.ES> 04/08/05 05:05pm >>>
Hi list,
I finally managed to set up a map file suitable for both, wms and wfs
GetCapability response. I upgraded to version 4.4 and replaced all wms_ and
wfs_ parameters with ows_.

Now I have some trouble with the layer groups and group titles and most of
my layers are assigned to a group (such as 'reference layer' or 'satellite
imagery').

Apparently, wfs doesn't read group titles, and simply ignores these
parameters, so no problem here.

To the contrary, wms did search for group titles before and still does, but
something must have changed. According to the HOW TO document, you can now
specifiy wms_group_title and wms_group_abstract (in the web object?) and
wms_layer_group in the layer object  - all is optional. It also says that
all group names should be preceded by a forward slash, and the group name
should not be used at the same time.
Actually, I would like to preserve the group parameter, since I am grouping
the layers according to this name...

Whatever I do, the wms GetCapability request always returns layer name and
group name of the same layer as if they were two different layer objects!
This results in error since there are parameters 'missing'.

Thanks,
Stefanie