Gathering insight for the "linking-data" theme of the best practice

Hi-

(summary: I'm going to start a bunch of new email threads for discussing
issues pertaining to "linking data" so expect a number of emails over the
next few minutes)

At our F2F meeting [1] during the OGC TC in Nottingham, we resolved to work
on the "linking data" theme of the best practice as our first target; it
was a fairly arbitrary decision coming down to a coin-toss ... but we have
consensus!

(see list of all themes here [1a])

In preparation for yesterday's SDW call, I prepared some questions which I
think form the basis of this Best Practice theme- the challenges people
have with respect to linking (geospatial) data. These are on the wiki [2]
(along with a little discussion arising from yesterday's call [3]). I list
the questions below:

   - Where do links commonly occur (in spatial data)?What should I link to?
   (or link between)What do the links mean?How can I describe links in my
   format of choice?What else links to my subject of interest?How can I
   manage links between sets of things (so that I don't have to manage
   individual links)?How can third parties assert links and relationships
   (and should I trust their assertions?)

Linda added a note about "automatic creation of links" under the "What
should I link to?" question; this may be best as a separate topic- but for
now let's start with the questions listed above.

We agreed in yesterday's meeting that we would seek input from the WG
(that's all of you!) about the issues associated with each of these
questions- using the WG mailing list as the mechanism. We will then
(attempt to) consolidate the discussions onto the wiki.

I was tasked to set up an email thread for each of the questions (see
action-80 [4]). Please can you distill your immense knowledge on these
issues into the relevant email so we can start defining the best practices.

There are clear overlaps with other themes (not least of which are
"assignment of identifiers" and "publishing data with clear semantics")-
try to keep on topic for "linking-data" but don't worry about creating a
side-bar discussion for another theme. We'll filter as we go.

Finally, if you think there are _more_ questions to be asked about "linking
data" please respond to _this_ email thread & we can review those
suggestions.

Many thanks in advance for your input!

Jeremy


[1]: http://www.w3.org/2015/09/16-sdw-minutes
[1a]: https://www.w3.org/2015/spatial/wiki/BP_Consolidated_Narratives
[2]: https://www.w3.org/2015/spatial/wiki/Linking_Data
[3]: http://www.w3.org/2015/09/23-sdw-minutes
[4]: http://www.w3.org/2015/spatial/track/actions/80