The BFO definition of 'sosa:Observation' is: A planned process that includes acts of observation and measurement, carried out according to a procedure, for the purpose of estimating or calculating the value of an observable property of a feature of interest.
Problem: The term 'observation' caused confusion in the CM working group. Many in the group understand 'observation' to most naturally refer to the a product of an observing rather than to a process of observing.
- The most straight forward path to fixing this is to petition to have sosa change 'observation' to 'process of observation' or something similar, though I am not sure if that is feasible. There is no such confusion for cco:ActOfObservation because the 'act of' language makes it clear that the term refers to a process and not the product of an act.
- Another solution is for us to add an additional label to the term that introduces more clear language. This has the drawback that the label will have to be outside of BFO or sosa and thus introduce a third space of ontology work for us to maintain (e.g., sosa-SKS). This is not ideal.
- A final solution is to simply let the issue stand in hopes that anyone who implements the work will read the definition and understand that 'sosa:Observation' is a process.
I'm not sure if it is worth pursing (1) but perhaps (3) is a fine option.
The BFO definition of 'sosa:Observation' is: A planned process that includes acts of observation and measurement, carried out according to a procedure, for the purpose of estimating or calculating the value of an observable property of a feature of interest.
Problem: The term 'observation' caused confusion in the CM working group. Many in the group understand 'observation' to most naturally refer to the a product of an observing rather than to a process of observing.
I'm not sure if it is worth pursing (1) but perhaps (3) is a fine option.