Request Open: January 23, 2025 9:00 am — February 13, 2025 11:59 pm (20 days left)
The Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) invites public comment on the proposed work item proposal to make LAZ 1.4 an OGC Community Standard. Stakeholders are encouraged to submit their comments by February 13, 2025.
LAZ 1.4 provides a lossless compression scheme for LiDAR in binary LAS format version 1.4, reducing the file sizes to just 7% to 25% of their original volume. LAZ 1.4 enables on-the-fly compression and decompression in a streaming format and includes additional support for random access to LAS point data records.
A reference implementation (LASzip) unencumbered by patents or intellectual property concerns is freely available with an Apache 2.0 license.
LAZ 1.4 complements the LAS 1.4 Community Standard. Both occupy the same space, with the LAZ implementation bringing the advantage of compression. LAZ 1.4 is dependent and built upon the binary LAS format version 1.4, with the general LAS file structure, e.g., the header format, being used for the LAZ format too.
The LAZ format is the de facto industry standard for compressed LiDAR and has been widely used in government, academia, and industry for many years. Most LiDAR software packages today already support the LAZ format, including rapidlasso’s LAStools LiDAR Processing Software, USGS’s 3DEP LidarExplorer, NOAA’s VDatum, NRCan’s LiDAR Point Clouds, Esri’s ArcGIS/ArcGIS Pro, Hexagon’s GeoCompressor, Trimble Business Center, and Bentley’s iTwin Capture Modeler. The LAZ format is used in large publicly available collections of LIDAR and Point Cloud data within government, academia, and industry, covering trillions of data points.
Support for the approval of LAZ 1.4 as an OGC Community Standard has been provided by NOAA, USGS, NRCan, Esri, Bentley, Hexagon, Trimble, and others.
The work item justification for the adoption of LAZ 1.4 as an OGC Community Standard is available for review and comment on the OGC Portal. Comments are due by February 13, 2025, and should be submitted via the method below.
To Comment:
Comments can be submitted to a dedicated email reflector for a period ending on the “Close request date” listed above. Comments received will be consolidated and reviewed by OGC members for incorporation into the document. Please submit your comments via this email address, using this Comments Template for the message body.
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