device schemas

[zven]

We once discussed to introduce structured schemas for devices. While pre-defined devices already restrict available sensors, a custom device can contain anything.

Imagine this use case: For a sensing campaign, a custom device with sensors A, B and C is handed out to participants. Those sensors measure phenomena A_phen, B_phen and C_phen. At the moment, every participant would need to create a custom device and fill out Phenomenon, Unit and Type for each sensor. This is a clear path to typos and mismatches between the same devices (think Temperature, temperature, Temperatur):

Idea: Enable users to upload named(?), pre-defined schemas that contain a fixed set of sensors. This way, the creator of a custom device can share a schema file (e.g. JSON) with participants / users of the same custom device. Such devices could automatically be tagged with the schema name.

Some more thoughts:

• versioning of schemas
• start small with the use case above: Schemas are not saved but only used for device creation (first)
• UI could adapt to schema
• share schemas on openSenseMap in some way (e.g. via public profile?)
• alternative first prototype of schema usage: implement fixed schemas for existing, fixed devices first to get an idea what they could contain? -> This way, we could also connect the sketch templater with schema files / feed schema files into the sketch templater
• use for upcoming campaign tool feature