The NaVigation Markup Language (NVML) was presented in the public NOTE submitted by Fujitsu Limited to the W3C. The document abstract: "A variety of mobile information appliances are developed rapidly such as smart phones with capability of Internet access, PDAs (Personal Digital Assistants) equipped with GPS (Global Positioning System), and car navigation systems. A navigation service is one of the indispensable services to these mobile information appliances, but currently it is only available with car navigation systems. In order to use the navigation service not only on cars but also on trains, on buses, and on foot with various mobile information appliances, a common data format for describing navigation information such as locations of points and route information is required. The 'NVML' (NaVigation Markup Language) is a markup language for describing the navigation information satisfying the above requirement. The NVML enables us to use a navigation service at any time and anywhere, and it will also be used in other services such as a guide service for sightseeing, a travel planning service, and a publishing service for tourists."
[...] Since the contents of NVML data (e.g., Kyoto-Nara Tour) are marked up by tags (e.g., <title>), anyone can understand the data easily and computers can process and search the data quickly. Besides, NVML has a capability to describe several types of navigation information such as: (1) a route from the current point to a destination point; (2) a way to a shop from the nearest station; (3) transportation courses; (4) sightseeing courses; (5) tour schedules. The NVML enables us to use a navigation service at any time and anywhere, and it will also be used in other services such as a guide service for sightseeing, a travel planning service, and a publishing service for tourists."
[From the W3C comment:] "The NaVigation Markup Language (NVML) is a markup language for describing the navigation information for a variety of mobile information appliances, such as smart phones, PDAs equipped with GPS, and car navigation systems. It is written in XML, and has the capability to describe several types of navigation information such as a route from the current point to a destination point, a way to a shop from the nearest station, transportation courses, sightseeing courses, and tour schedules. This language is able to describe location informaton as latitude, longitude, address and various additional items. An inportant point of this language is the capablity to describe a route to the target location as a list of locations and additional explanations. As for standardization of representing geographical and navigation information, the POIX submission, and relevant works being done by the Dublin Core and the IETF should also be studied. Handling navigation information will be an interesting work item of the W3C Mobile Access Activity, as the Mobile Access IG is interested in handling position information in mobile devices."
References:
NaVigation Markup Language (NVML). W3C Note 6 Aug 1999. By Minoru Sekiguchi [minoru@flab.fujitsu.co.jp], Kuniharu Takayama [taka@iias.flab.fujitsu.co.jp], Hirohisa Naito [naitou@flab.fujitsu.co.jp], Yoshiharu Maeda [haru@iias.flab.fujitsu.co.jp], Hisayuki Horai [horai@iias.flab.fujitsu.co.jp], Masahito Toriumi [toriumi@sysrap.cs.fujitsu.co.jp] (Fujitsu Laboratories Limited). [cache]
