S-101: Electronic Navigational Chart data
Learn what S-101 is, why it exists, and why edition, feature catalogue, portrayal catalogue, and dataset identity travel together.
Why this matters
An Electronic Navigational Chart is safety-relevant data. Treating S-101 as a generic collection of feature names would lose the rules that make those features meaningful and interoperable.
Learn it
S-101 is the IHO S-100-based Product Specification for Electronic Navigational Charts. It defines how real-world navigational information is modelled for ENC use, together with supporting resources such as a feature catalogue, portrayal catalogue, encoding guidance, and validation checks. Exact feature and attribute handling is edition-specific. A mapping workflow should therefore record the S-101 edition and the catalogue resources used rather than silently translating names from memory.
Work through an example
A useful import record does not only say 'source=S-101'. It records the applicable edition, source dataset identity, feature catalogue context, and any transformation applied in the destination.
Product: S-101 Electronic Navigational Chart
Edition: keep with the dataset
Feature catalogue: keep/reference
Portrayal catalogue: keep/reference
Source identity + mapping provenance: preservePractice
- 1Start with the product identity and edition—not a feature name.
- 2Separate source feature meaning from how the feature is portrayed on a chart.
- 3Design a provenance note that would let another person reproduce your mapping later.
What to watch for
Never fabricate an S-101 feature/attribute mapping because a name looks familiar. Generate mappings from the product specification and catalogue actually used by the source.
Where this takes you
This is the preparation needed for honest S-101 inspection, mapping, preservation, validation, and migration between geospatial environments.