WFS GetFeature Filters and character case

[Kralidis,Tom [Burlington]]

Hi,

When I query my MapServer WFS with a filter (like PropertyIsEqualTo or
PropertyIsLike), the queries must be passed as case-sensitive with what
is in the underlying repository.  For example, if I have a table with a
record with a column value named "Birds":

This works:

<Filter>
 <PropertyIsEqualTo>
  <PropertyName>title</PropertyName>
  <Literal>Birds</Literal>
 </PropertyIsEqualTo>
</Filter>

This doesn't:

<Filter>
 <PropertyIsEqualTo>
  <PropertyName>title</PropertyName>
  <Literal>birds</Literal>
 </PropertyIsEqualTo>
</Filter>

I couldn't find anything in the Filter 1.0.0 spec w.r.t. this.

I find this cumbersome, especially in the context of having a WFS as a
search server.  A WFS client with no prior knowledge may not be able to
fetch the results it's looking for due to case sensitive input.

My question is: whose problem is this?  Does the Filter spec allow for
case-insensitive filters?  If no, the spec does allow a WFS to advertise
and support user-defined functions.  Perhaps MapServer WFS can support
such a function?

While we're on this topic, some useful enhancements for WFS functions
would be:

- Min()
- Max()
- Average()

..Tom