WoT 2.0 Charter Draft (cont.)

[sebastiankb]

This is a continuation of PR #1256.

[sebastiankb]

the latest commit contains a revision of the abstract, motivation and background. It also covers the comments from Ben (removing speculative AI use cases) and Ege (physical AI).

[benfrancis]

Thank you for your continued work on this @sebastiankb.

I have left some comments where I feel the proposed changes weaken the current mission statement and motivation, added suggestions for refining some of the text, and asked questions about the rationale for changes and the intended deliverables.

I understand that you want to try to streamline the work of the Working Group, which I agree is necessary. However, overall I am concerned these changes read as though the Working Group is going into maintenance mode and only exists to tweak existing documents, whilst losing sight of its original motivation, mission, and the impact it is intended to have on the world. It also re-frames the Web of Things to predominantly be about WoT Thing Description and WoT Scripting API (which is over-emphasised), with onboarding as the primary use case. This is not my understanding of what the Working Group was created to solve.

I believe the Working Group still has a lot of important work to do and I'm not sure this proposed text reflects that.

[benfrancis]

I would suggest the mission of the Working Group should (continue to) be about the real world impact it has, not the state of its documentation.

I think this change would significantly weaken the mission statement because it's quite vague and doesn't explain the desired impact which is to "counter the fragmentation of the Internet of Things (IoT)". It also removes the important text about easing integration across platforms and application domains.

[sebastiankb]

Many thanks for your feadback.

I just looked around to see what other WGs are doing and saw that they also describe what they do in a concise manner. For example:
https://www.w3.org/2026/01/json-ld-wg-charter.html
https://www.w3.org/2025/03/css-wg.html

[benfrancis]

The mission of the W3C WoT initiative has always been to counter the fragmentation of the Internet of Things.

The current mission statement of the Working Group reads:

The mission of the Web of Things Working Group is to counter the fragmentation of the Internet of Things (IoT) through the specification of building blocks that enable easy integration of IoT devices and services across IoT platforms and application domains. These building blocks complement and enhance the use of existing standards; provide a common description across different ecosystems, standards, and communities; and provide prescriptive definitions where appropriate.

On the W3C WoT homepage it says something similar:

The Web of Things (WoT) seeks to counter the fragmentation of the IoT by using and extending existing, standardized Web technologies. By providing standardized metadata and other re-usable technological building blocks, W3C WoT enables easy integration across IoT platforms and application domains.

Do you agree this is still the mission?

My concern with changing the mission statement is that it signals giving up on the decade-long goal of countering fragmentation on the Internet of Things (which I don't think can yet be argued to have been achieved), and re-focuses the Working Group around a smaller set of deliverables which just describe the Internet of Things as it already exists.

Is this your intention? If not, how can we make it clear that this is still the goal?

[benfrancis]

What is the reason for removing this text?

[benfrancis]

Again, this change focuses on the documents being produced rather than the underlying motivation for their existence. It removes the text about the fragmentation of standards and ecosystems of the Internet of Things and the additional value that could come from enabling them to interoperate. These are the very reasons the Working Group was created in the first place.

It reads as though the Working Group exists to produce documents rather than affect change in the world.

[sebastiankb]

I do not think it is necessary to repeatedly explain the motivation for WoT, as this has already been covered in previous charter descriptions. For readers new to this work, the next paragraph provides a link for additional WoT background and motivation.

[benfrancis]

I don't think that new people reading the charter are going to also go back and read previous versions of the charter to understand the motivation for the work.

The web page at the URL provided does not provide equivalent text, and is potentially subject to change. If the mission statement was also not being changed then removing this content would not be so bad.

[benfrancis]

What is the reason for removing this text?

Referencing use cases and requirements, explaining that the deliverables build on existing web technologies and enable cross-platform and cross-domain interoperability seem like important pieces of information.

[benfrancis]

I like the reference to "physical AI" here, it summarises the new area to be addressed whilst giving flexibility in exactly what will be written.

[benfrancis]

It was my understanding that the plan was to move normative assertions out of the WoT Architecture specification into other specifications and make it a non-normative document.

Will there not be a new version of the Architecture specification published as a Group Note, which reflects the changes in 2.0?

[benfrancis]

Suggested change

	<li>WoT Binding Registry: This document specify how
	protocols and payload formats should be used to allow
	integration of specific classes of IoT systems and
	ecosystems. (Protocol-specific subdocuments also?).</li>
	<li>WoT Binding Registry (Registry Report): This report will contain a registry definition defining the entry format and lifecycle for binding documents, and a registry table enumerating recommended bindings.</li>

[benfrancis]

I personally don't think this needs to be a whole new separate deliverable and could just be integrated into the WoT Architecture and WoT Thing Description specifications.

[sebastiankb]

I cover this topic now in the best practice deliverable

[benfrancis]

Suggested change

	<li>WoT [Protocol] Bindings Note (to be published as a W3C Note each): Publish specific protocol bindings such as MQTT, HTTP, Modbus, BACnet, CoAP, PROFINET, and LoRaWAN for the usage in WoT Thing Description.</li>
	<li>WoT Binding Documents (Group Notes): Each document will specify a binding between well-known WoT operations and messages in a specific protocol and/or content type (e.g. HTTP, CoAP, MQTT, OPC-UA, BACnet, Modbus and PROFINET), for use in WoT Thing Descriptions.</li>

[benfrancis]

Will there still be payload bindings as well as protocol bindings?

[sebastiankb]

In the last commit, each binding was mentioned separately

[benfrancis]

Why single out WoT Thing Description and WoT Scripting API here when the Scripting API is not even a normative deliverable? WoT Thing Description and WoT Discovery would make more sense here if you don't want to mention WoT Profiles and WoT Architecture will become a non-normative document.

I think this change also over-emphasises onboarding. I understand this is an important use cases for Siemens, but it is just one small step at the very beginning of the lifecycle of a Web Thing, which also involves discovering and communicating with devices. "IoT application development" is only mentioned in passing.

[sebastiankb]

At this point, I intended to list one REC and one Note. I can certainly add WoT Discovery and refer to the complete list of deliverables.

[benfrancis]

I continue to be concerned that the proposed changes to the charter signal (intentionally or not) giving up on the decade-long mission of the Web of Things to counter the fragmentation of the Internet of Things, instead re-framing the Web of Things as being about being describing the Internet of Things as it already exists. This is not my understanding of what this Working Group was created to achieve in 2016.

[benfrancis]

I don't think that new people reading the charter are going to also go back and read previous versions of the charter to understand the motivation for the work.

The web page at the URL provided does not provide equivalent text, and is potentially subject to change. If the mission statement was also not being changed then removing this content would not be so bad.

[benfrancis]

The mission of the W3C WoT initiative has always been to counter the fragmentation of the Internet of Things.

The current mission statement of the Working Group reads:

The mission of the Web of Things Working Group is to counter the fragmentation of the Internet of Things (IoT) through the specification of building blocks that enable easy integration of IoT devices and services across IoT platforms and application domains. These building blocks complement and enhance the use of existing standards; provide a common description across different ecosystems, standards, and communities; and provide prescriptive definitions where appropriate.

On the W3C WoT homepage it says something similar:

The Web of Things (WoT) seeks to counter the fragmentation of the IoT by using and extending existing, standardized Web technologies. By providing standardized metadata and other re-usable technological building blocks, W3C WoT enables easy integration across IoT platforms and application domains.

Do you agree this is still the mission?

My concern with changing the mission statement is that it signals giving up on the decade-long goal of countering fragmentation on the Internet of Things (which I don't think can yet be argued to have been achieved), and re-focuses the Working Group around a smaller set of deliverables which just describe the Internet of Things as it already exists.

Is this your intention? If not, how can we make it clear that this is still the goal?

[sebastiankb]

@benfrancis I'm not sure if you've already read my responses to your previous comments. I don't know where the assumption come from that orign WoT mission is not followed anymore. Still this is expressed clearly at the official WoT web page as will be linked to in the charter. The goal of the charter text is to express what is the new work what we are going to do in the next 2 years. Sure, we can blow up the charter by reusing old text and adding new topics, but that risks making it unnecessarily verbose. Like other W3C working groups, I believe it is more helpful for readers if they can see directly what we are planning to do.

[sebastiankb]

@benfrancis BTW: Tomorrow's main call plans to discuss the Web Thing protocol as part of the REC track in the new charter. Perhaps you will have the opportunity to participate in the meeting.

If the group supports this plan, the text of the charter will of course need to be updated.

[benfrancis]

Hi @sebastiankb, yes I saw your previous responses, thank you.

My assumption that you are proposing to change the mission of the WoT Working Group came from you proposing a change to the mission statement in the charter of the WoT Working Group 🙂 From your response it sounds like you see that as separate to the mission of the W3C Web of Things initiative as a whole. I am reassured that you think the mission statement on the W3C WoT homepage will at least remain the same.

I will try to join the call tomorrow to discuss the Web Thing Protocol as a potential deliverable of the WoT Working Group, and the timeline for that.

Thanks

Ben

[benfrancis]

Hi @sebastiankb, thank you very much for suggesting these as potential deliverables. We had a good conversation about this on the main call last week and I think it could be good compromise on the Profiles issue, as a more narrowly focused alternative.

I saw your comment in the agenda for the main call this week regarding naming, saying 'All deliverables starts with "WoT". A title like “WoT Web Thing Protocol” would result in the word “Web” appearing twice.'
FYI the reason I called the Community Group deliverable "Web Thing Protocol" is because names like "Web of Things (WoT) Thing Description" repeat the word "Thing".

Ideally the WoT Working Group deliverables would just be called "Web Thing Description" and "Web Thing Protocol", but given the current naming convention another alternative might be "WoT Thing Protocol".
People regularly tell me they are confused about bindings vs. profiles vs. sub-protocols and I worry that if we have a "WoT HTTP Binding" and a "WoT Sub‑Protocol for HTTP" it will continue to confuse people.

I would personally prefer there to be a single specification called "Web Thing Protocol" or "WoT Thing Protocol" which contains both the HTTP & WebSockets sub-protocols, so that we can simply say "supports the Web Thing Protocol".

To me this makes the choice more clear that developers can choose between using the dedicated Web Thing Protocol, or using a binding to bind to another existing protocol.

This naming approach has worked well for other HTTP-based application layer protocols like the Atom Publishing Protocol, AT Protocol, Model Context Protocol and Solid Protocol (many of which also make use of WebSockets).

Whilst I am using the term "HTTP sub-protocol" because it will initially use the existing subprotocol mechanism in Forms in the same way as WebSockets (where the term is natively defined), the concept of an "HTTP sub-protocol" is not widely understood and may confuse people.