OSGeo Board, OSGeo Discuss,
I'd like to introduce you to this proposal that Ron and Reese have been
developing on the OSGeo Standards email list, which I think should fit
under the legal structure of an OSGeo Committee.
I have vague recollections that setting up a committee requires board
approval? I've found some old tips on running a committee here:
https://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Committee_Guidelines
Comments welcomed.
On 15/10/19 4:47 pm, Ronald Tse wrote:
Hi Cameron,
Thank you for the suggestions! I have updated the proposal to reflect
your comments below.
I would be honored to help with terminology management at OSGeo. Can’t
speak for Reese but with his leadership in already doing terminology
cleanup on Felicity’s sheet, he seems pretty committed already :-)
Ron
———
Recommendations for OSGeo terminology management
1. Establish a terminology management group in OSGeo.
ISO/TC 211, IEC Electropedia and OGC all have one for terminology
management. The existence of this group is crucial to the success
of the OSGeo terminology database. It will play two essential roles:
a) As the gatekeeper of terms to ensure quality checks of contributions
b) As the seat of central terminology knowledge for alignment of terms
and concepts. To facilitate the flow of terminology knowledge
to terminology authors and users.
It would be helpful to involve representation from ISO/TC 211 and OGC
in this group, in order to leverage their experience in
terminology. Such experience will be useful in situations such as
alerting on cross-organization alignment of concepts or term duplication.
An email list shall be setup for this group for internal communication.
2. Establish a terms of reference for terminology management.
For the terminology management group, a terms of reference should be
produced so that the steps for approval and data quality requirements
are clear. This should be openly shared with contributors so they are
clear on acceptance criteria.
Contributors may propose changes to the terminology database at any
time. The terminology management group shall discuss and approve or
disapprove of the proposal within a reasonable timeframe. This
practice is in-line with the open source, change-based,
rapid iteration mantra, similar to OpenSSL.
For releases, the group shall convene periodically, such as every 4-6
months, to discuss previously decided proposals, governance
or technical issues related to terminology management.
The method of submitting change requests shall also be determined and
announced so that contributors understand the necessary processes and
timeline.
3. Establish an online terminology database presence.
Terminology isn’t useful until people use them, which means people
need to first know they exist and what they mean. Geolexica is
an initiative that currently serves ISO/TC 211’s terminology
management group in making its multi-lingual geographic information
terminology available on the internet (https://www.geolexica.org). We
propose to use https://osgeo.geolexica.org/ to serve OSGeo in managing
its terminology database. Geolexica not only serves human-readable
concepts and terms, but also serves in machine-readable JSON, allowing
APIs to directly consume the content.
The structure of Geolexica is designed for efficiency with streamlined
management and operations. Terms are stored in structured data (YAML)
files, and are directly deployable to the website. The website
operates according to best practices, and is served as a static
website with dynamic search functionality. Security and performance
have always been key considerations.
For terms that originate from other authoritative terminology
databases, such as those from ISO or OGC, a linkage shall be
established from the OSGeo terminology database back to the source.
4. Use an issue tracker with source code management functionality as
an open communication platform (e.g. GitHub).
The issue tracker is used to perform two-way communication between
OSGeo members and the contributors. This requires every contributor to
at least have an account, which helps minimize spam. The source code
management functionality is used to manage terminology data in a
machine-useable way.
There are generally two types of contributors:
a) those who suggest changes via textual description, and
b) those who suggest changes but can also format the desired content
in the data format used by the terminology database.
People can easily help out with the former in formatting the changes
into a proper data structure change. This allows the
terminology management group to directly approve, merge and deploy the
proposed term modifications (and creations, deletions), all made
effective with a single click.
5. Allow easy feedback from terminology users.
To minimize friction in the feedback process, for every term offered
in the OSGeo terminology pages we can offer a “propose new term” and
“propose changes to this term" buttons. This allows user to directly
go to the issue platform (e.g. GitHub) to make the suggested changes.
A “contributors guide” document will greatly help these people make
the proper suggestions and have them formatted correctly.
6. Initial load and data cleanup.
The initial load of the terms will involve a bulk load from the
cleaned terms and definitions that Felicity has compiled. Geolexica
could easily handle the initial conversion from table format into the
desired structured data format.
The cleanup process has already been started by Reese Plews, convenor
of the TMG at ISO/TC 211.
_____________________________________
Ronald Tse
Ribose Inc.
On Oct 10, 2019, at 3:34 PM, Cameron Shorter
<cameron.shor...@gmail.com> wrote:
Hi Ron,
I really like your proposal. It looks very practical, should address
quality requirements, and should be relatively light weight to
manage. Some comments/suggestions:
* You might want to mention the approach to your first load of terms,
which probably should involve a bulk load from a derivative of the
terms that Felicity has compiled.
* I suggest we set up an email list to discuss terms. OSGeo can
provide that for us, and I can coordinate that, once we have agreed
on our approach.
* I suggest that an updating the glossary be tied to a periodic
event, at least annually. I think we should tie in with the OSGeoLive
annual build cycle for this.
* You haven't mentioned https://osgeo.geolexica.org/
<https://osgeo.geolexica.org/> in your description. I assume that
would be part of the solution? If so, I suggest mentioning it.
* Another project I'm helping start up is
https://thegooddocsproject.dev/ <https://thegooddocsproject.dev/>
(Writing templates to make good docs for open source projects). I
expect that the solution you are proposing would be valuable for a
wide variety of domains, and should be captured as best practices in
TheGoodDocsProject. At some point in the future, I'm hoping that you
might provide a generic version of your suggestions for others to
follow too.
Feel free to add your ideas below into the wiki at:
https://trac.osgeo.org/osgeolive/wiki/Glossary%20terms
(Maybe add "DRAFT" at the top, until we have the process set up.)
* Ron and Reese, I'm hoping that you both will continue to provide
the leadership and stewardship of the community as it grows? Your
advice has been great to date.
Warm regards, Cameron
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Cameron Shorter
Technology Demystifier
Open Technologies and Geospatial Consultant
M +61 (0) 419 142 254
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