There exists OGC standard Web Map Context (http://www.ogcnetwork.net/taxonomy/term/36/0). The present Context specification states how a specific grouping of one or more maps from one or more map servers can be described in a portable, platform-independent format for storage in a repository or for transmission between clients. Already during implementation of Czech National INSPIRE geoportal https://geoportal.gov.cz we recognized certain limitation of WMC standard. So we start developed our own extension for storing map composition supporting combination of data and services in different format (WMS, WFS, WCS, KML, GeoRSS, GML, GeoJSON and SOS.). i.e. detailed definition and metadata of each layer of the composition along with the composition itself, it can be saved as a JSON-styled text document. This JSON style document, is now used by Map Composer for creating of map composition. Map composer is providing the necessary functionality for displaying spatial data on a map and then creating a map composition (a thematic map) that can contain several data layers. Then, this document can be read and visualized by an HSLayers NG (http://ng.hslayers.org/ ) -based web application. Currently this concept is used for by SDI4Apps, Open Transport Net and FOODIE project.
For detail specification look on https://github.com/hslayers/hslayers-ng/wiki/Composition-schema. We would like share this scheme with you and we are waiting for your comments.
