[GeoJSON] Clarification: FeatureCollection MUST NOT contain a properties member?

[Allan Doyle]

There was discussion in February, 2016 with this summary by Sean Gillies:
- A Feature or Geometry object MUST NOT contain a "features" property.
- A FeatureCollection or Geometry object MUST NOT contain a "geometry" or "properties" object.
- A FeatureCollection or Feature object MUST NOT contain a "coordinates" property.
https://mailarchive.ietf.org/arch/msg/geojson/eVZbpxrORyt5koH6P7QjdcfcRHE


Followed by some remorse by Martin Daly:
I'm feeling bad now that we've banned FeatureCollection from having a "properties" member, but not bad enough to stand in the way of progress.
https://github.com/geojson/draft-geojson/pull/142#issuecomment-185834388


In any case, based on 6.1, any foreign member would be precluded from having GeoJSON semantics. So using "properties" as a member of a FeatureCollection would not be the same as "properties" in, say, a Feature. (Of course, since there's no real semantic definition of "properties", that point is moot).

So, if you were working on something that seems to want properties on a FeatureCollection, it would be better to give it a different name.

Getting back to the RFC document, my reading of the last sentence of 7.1

   The GeoJSON "features" member defines a FeatureCollection object.
   Feature and Geometry objects, respectively, MUST NOT contain a
   "features" member.

make sit clear that the word "respectively" is not being used according to its common definition, namely

   (of two or more things, with reference to two or more things previously mentioned) referring or applying to in a parallel or sequential way
   http://www.dictionary.com/browse/respectively

and this calls into question the use of the word in the previous two paragraphs, which leads to the conclusion that the RFC is trying to say that a FeatureCollection MUST NOT contain a "properties" member.


Allan



On May 2, 2017, at 5:53 AM, Pedro Goncalves <pereira.goncalves at gmail.com<mailto:pereira.goncalves at gmail.com>> wrote:

Hi Sean and all

Regarding the section 7.1 of RFC7946 that says
 The GeoJSON "geometry" and "properties" members define a Feature
 object.  FeatureCollection and Geometry objects, respectively, MUST
 NOT contain a "geometry" or "properties" member.

My interpretation is that the "respectively “ decomposes the sentence into
* "FeatureCollection" object MUST NOT contain a "geometry" member
* "Geometry" object MUST NOT contain a "properties” member

However, I got comments that this sentence could mean that FeatureCollection MUST NOT contain a "properties” member.

Can you please confirm the right assumption?


thanks and cheers

Pedro


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