wfs:DescribeFeatureType

            The DescribeFeatureType element is used to request that a Web
            Feature Service generate a document describing one or more 
            feature types.

Element information

Namespace: http://niem.gov/niem/external/ogc-wfs/1.1.0/dhs-gmo/1.0.0

Schema document: external/ogc-wfs/1.1.0/dhs-gmo/1.0.0/wfs.xsd

Type: wfs:DescribeFeatureTypeType

Properties: Global, Qualified

Content

wfs:TypeName [0..*] The TypeName element is used to enumerate the feature types to be described. If no TypeName elements are specified then all features should be described. The name must be a valid type that belongs to the feature content as defined by the GML Application Schema.

Attributes

Name	Occ	Type	Description	Notes
service	[0..1]	ows:ServiceType	The service attribute is included to support service endpoints that implement more than one OGC service. For example, a single CGI that implements WMS, WFS and WCS services. The endpoint can inspect the value of this attribute to figure out which service should process the request. The value WFS indicates that a web feature service should process the request. This parameter is somewhat redundant in the XML encoding since the request namespace can be used to determine which service should process any give request. For example, wfs:GetCapabilities and easily be distinguished from wcs:GetCapabilities using the namespaces.	Default value is "WFS". from type wfs:BaseRequestType
version	[0..1]	xsd:string	The version attribute is used to indicate the version of the WFS specification that a request conforms to. All requests in this schema conform to V1.1 of the WFS specification. For WFS implementations that support more than one version of a WFS sepcification ... if the version attribute is not specified then the service should assume that the request conforms to greatest available specification version.	Default value is "1.1.0". from type wfs:BaseRequestType
handle	[0..1]	xsd:string	The handle attribute allows a client application to assign a client-generated request identifier to a WFS request. The handle is included to facilitate error reporting. A WFS may report the handle in an exception report to identify the offending request or action. If the handle is not present, then the WFS may employ other means to localize the error (e.g. line numbers).	from type wfs:BaseRequestType
outputFormat	[0..1]	xsd:string	The outputFormat attribute is used to specify what schema description language should be used to describe features. The default value of 'text/xml; subtype=3.1.1' means that the WFS must generate a GML3 application schema that can be used to validate the GML3 output of a GetFeature request or feature instances specified in Transaction operations. For the purposes of experimentation, vendor extension, or even extensions that serve a specific community of interest, other acceptable output format values may be advertised by a WFS service in the capabilities document. The meaning of such values in not defined in the WFS specification. The only proviso is such cases is that clients may safely ignore outputFormat values that do not recognize.	Default value is "text/xml; subtype=gml/3.1.1".

Sample instance

<wfs:DescribeFeatureType>
   <wfs:TypeName>QName</wfs:TypeName>
</wfs:DescribeFeatureType>