Geographic information - Place Identifier (PI) architecture

This document is the first of a family of standards. ISO 19155:2012 specifies an architecture that defines a reference model with an encoding method for an identifier of a place. The concept of _place_ within ISO 19155:2012 includes _places_ not only in the real world but also those in the virtual world. These _places_ are identified using either coordinate identifiers, geographic identifiers, or virtual world identifiers such as URI. In ISO 19155:2012, an identifier of a place is referred to as a Place Identifier (PI). The reference model defines a mechanism to match multiple Place Identifiers to the same place. In addition, a data structure and set of service interfaces are also defined in this reference model. ISO 19155:2012 is applicable to location based services, emergency management services and other application domains that require a common architecture, across specific domains, for the representation of place descriptions using coordinate, geographic, or virtual world identifiers.