An observation typically has several locations associated with it - e.g. where
the world was sampled, where the instrument was (different if it is a remote
sensor, or a lab instrument), where the data was processed to generate the
result that is reported (may be different again) - all of which may be of
interest in particular use-cases.
The OGC O&M standard reconciles this by separating the *feature-of-interest*
and the *procedure* each of which may have location (e.g. a point).
If you elide this detail then your observation model will not generalize.
That may be OK within your community or domain, but will probably hamper
interoperability with other domains.
Simon
From: galeon-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:galeon-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Ron Lake
Sent: Friday, 14 March 2008 1:28 AM
To: Ben Domenico; Unidata GALEON
Subject: Re: [galeon] Fwd: CDM feature and point types docs
Hi all:
Just a quick comment. I think the idea of a "point feature" is
misguided. The items covered in the list of point feature types is
better covered as an observation feature or observation event. The
observation or observation collection then has geometric characteristics
such as where the observer was located, or where the observations are
located. I am generally opposed to the idea of defining features by
their geometry properties since this has the semantics backwards. No
instrument can make "point measurements" - so the items are observations
first and these observations then have geometric properties (like
location or estimated location).
Cheers
Ron
