This revised draft incorporates many of the comments received back on v0.1 (released on December 18, 2000) from the developer community, including Olly Betts, David McKenzie, Larry Fish, Ralph Hartley, Taco van Ieperen, Bob Thrun and Garry Petrie. Furthermore it moves away from the simple "list" format used in version 0.1 and begins to implement the "nested" or hierarchical organization inherent to a true XML data store. This version hasn't been released for general comment yet but is shared here for everyone's consideration. Comments or questions regarding this proposal should be emailed to devinkouts@yahoo.com

Apologies are offered for the inability to adequately represent the "nested" nature of an XML file on this html page. Future releases of this product will probably recreate the nested structure more easily, but likely with less commentary incorporated into the web page. Proposed data elements:

<CaveSurvey>

The outermost element declares this to be a CaveSurvey. It encloses all data elements that are part of (or subordinate to) this cave survey.

<DataFileVersion/>

DataFileVersion tags enclose data that identifies the XML Cave Survey format used in a given file. For example, this version would be identified as 0.2.

<CaveName> </CaveName>

The CaveName tags enclose the name of the cave

<Comment> </Comment>

The Comment tag can be used at any level of the CaveSurvey hierarchy, as suggested by previous developer inputs. In this instance it could contain general unstructured information pertinant to the overall cave survey.

<Survey>

The Survey tags enclose the data of this particular cave survey. Because a cave can have multiple surveys, multiple survey tags, and their subordinate data elements, are possible within the parent CaveSurvey tags.

<SurveyDate>

The SurveyDate tags enclose the date of this particular survey in the cave

<Day/>

The Day tags enclose the day on which this particular survey in the cave

<Month/>

The Month tags enclose the month of this particular survey in the cave

<Year/>

The Year tags, subordinate to SurveyDate, enclose the year of this particular survey in the cave

</SurveyDate>

The closing SurveyDate tag ends the date entry of this particular survey in the cave

<SurveyTeam> </SurveyTeam>

The SurveyTeam tags enclose the data elements that describe members of the team that conducted this particular survey in the cave. Examples of such tags inlude <Name/> , <Role/> , etc. These tags are left out of this version of the draft for brevity.

<Declination/>

The Declination tags enclose any magnetic declination information that may apply to this particular survey.

<Instruments>

The instrument tags enclose information that describes the instruments used to conduct this segment of the survey. Equipment types may eventually span several types but for this version of the draft they are limited to Compass, Clinometer and Tape.

<Compass> </Compass>

Compass tags enclose information about the Compass(es) used on the survey, subordinate tags might include <Correction> , <SerialNumber> , <Owner> , etc.

<Clinometer> </Clinomter>

Clinometer tags describe the Clinometer(s) used on the survey, subordinate tags might include <Correction> , <SerialNumber> , <Owner> , etc.

<Tape> </Tape>

Tape tags describe the Tape(s) used on the survey, subordinate tags might include <Correction> , <SerialNumber> , <Owner> , etc.

</Instruments>

The </Instruments> tag closes out the instruments branch of this survey segment

<Comment> </Comment>

Again, the generic Comment tag can be used to contain general information. The information should however pertain to the segment of the structure in which the tag is located, i.e. Survey in this instance.

<Shot>

Shot tags enclose the fundamental elements of survey data, including station labels, bearings, gradients, distances, etc.

<From>

The From tag encloses the label or id assigned to one of two survey stations that exist in a survey shot.

<Up> <Down> <Right> <Left>

Up, Down, Left and Right tags encompass data that describes passage dimensions as they related to the parent station element, in this case a Station identified by the preceeding From tag.

<GeoLocation/>

GeoLocation tags enclose coordinate data that are associated with the parent station, FromStation in this case. Datum and System elements would be necessary to describe necessary to describe the type map datum used for the GeoLocation and the coordinate system employed (e.g. LatLong or UTM).

</From>

The </From> tag end the data series associated with the From station in this shot..

<To>

The To tag encloses the label or id assigned to the second of two survey stations that exist in a survey shot.

<Up> <Down> <Right> <Left>

Up, Down, Left and Right tags encompass data that describes passage dimensions as they related to the parent station element, in this case a Station identified by the preceeding From tag.

<GeoLocation/>

GeoLocation tags enclose coordinate data that are associated with the parent station, ToStation in this case.

</To>

The </To> tag closes out the data associated with the To station of this shot.

<Length/>

The Length tag encloses the data used to describe the distance between the two stations of this survey shot. The use of a "Units" attribute is probaly appropriate in this instance. Possible values for attribute include - Meters, FeetInches, FeetDecimal, etc.

<ForwardAzimuth/>

The ForwardAzimuth tag encloses the data used to describe the bearing from the first (From) station to the second (To) station of this survey shot. Question: would the use of a "Units" element be appropriate here? Such an element would allow the specification of degrees or other units for measuring bearings.

<ReverseAzimuth/>

The ReverseAzimuth tag encloses the data used to describe the bearing from the second (To) station to the first (From) station of this survey shot.

<ForwardInclination/>

The ForwardInclination tag encloses the data used to describe the inclination from the first (From) station to the second (To) station of this survey shot. Question: would the use of a "Units" element be appropriate here? Such an element would allow the specification of degrees or other units for measuring bearings.

<ReverseInclination/>

The ReverseInclination tag encloses the data used to describe the inclination from the second (To) station to the first (From) station of this survey shot.

<FromDepth/>

FromDepth tags enclose the depth of the From survey station, as measured by depth gauge in a cave diving survey.

<ToDepth/>

ToDepth tags enclose the depth of the From survey station, as measured by depth gauge in a cave diving survey.

</Shot>

The closing shot tag encompasses and ends this instance of a survey shot.

<Shot> </Shot>

A new survey shot is begun and enclosed within Shot tags. All of the subordinate tags outlined above are available for inclusion in this, and every subsequent shot of the survey.

</Survey>

The closing Survey tag is used to denote the end of this particular survey segment within the parent CaveSurvey.

<Survey> </Survey>

A new survey and its attendant data may be created and nested within the CaveSurvey structure.

</CaveSurvey>

The outermost element, CaveSurvey is closed and the end of the data file is reached.