As I said in my last post one of the topics of discussion at the melbourne’s Mapserver users group meeting was the uptake of OGC standards by the OSS community. Here’s an example of OSS taking lead in implementing upcoming open standards: the current CVS version has has already implemented partial support for Sensor Observation Service for enabling Sensor Webs. If you can’t wait go a head and try it. So currently its not generating an XML response to getCapabilities request but rather needs a predefined URL. This will change very soon, I’m sure.
You are right that OSS can take the lead in implementing upcoming standards. Another example is the OSS initative 52north (http://52north.org). They have already implemented the core profile of the current Sensor Observation Service specificaiton and published it as an quality assured release. 52N implements the entire set of SWE services. The SOS and the Web Notification Service (WNS) are already released, the Sensor Planning Service is currently in the 52N quality assurance process and will be published soon. The 52N Sensor Alert Service is an example how OSS initiavives can actively be involved in the desing and specification of service specifications.
OSGIS racing ahead: Sensor Observation Service