Standards are necessary for using geodetic data interoperably in heterogeneous environments. Such standards are developed and published by the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC), e.g. Web Map service (WMS) and Web Feature Service (WFS). These standards are integrated in existing GIS software. In commercial software the standards are add ons and competing with the industries own developments. In open source products, they are used in general for accessing and sharing data.

Spatial data infrastructures (SDI) are in development in many countries and regions. Their definitions are widely based on standards of ISO (International Standardization Organization) and OGC as key definitions for data interoperability. Examples are the European INSPRE directive (Infrastructure for Spatial Information in the European Community) and the Spatial Data Infrastructure Germany (GDI-DE) which cramps spatial data infrastructures of states and local administrations. The author is member of the committee for the SDI of the German state Baden-Württemberg (GDI-BW).

Working with web services shows that all the standards are necessary but not sufficient for efficient daily use. Problems still occur when data from various vendors has to be integrated into existing workflows or combined for individual purposes. This is especially the case when web services are used in desktop GIS.

The workshop will show how easy WMS and WFS can be set up and integrated in desktop GIS, but this is not its main focus. The main focus will be set on additional needs for controlling data access and data harmonization. These two factors can not be covered by general standards. They have to be worked out within a community of data providers and users.