Editing Web Feature Service (section)

===Data ===
{{main|Geography Markup Language}}

Data passed between a Web Feature Server and a client is encoded with [[Geography Markup Language]] (GML), an XML dialect which can be used to model geographic features.

The 1.0.0 version of the WFS specification requires the use of GML version 2.1.2, while the 1.1.0 version of the WFS specification requires the use of GML version 3.1.1.  For both versions of the WFS specification, an arbitrary number of other encodings can also be defined, in addition to the required GML 2.1.2 or 3.1.1 format (for 1.0.0 and 1.1.0 respectively).

GML 2.1.2 contains encoding support for basic geometric 'primitives':  points, lines, polygons, etc.

GML 3.1.1 contains encoding support for more advanced geometric representations:  curves, surfaces, multi-dimensions (time, elevation, multi-band imagery).  In addition, GML 3.1.1 includes encoding support for topologically integrated datasets.