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Metadata Issues

Dr. Paul Miller

Interoperability FocusUKOLN

P.Miller@ukoln.ac.uk http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/

UKOLN is funded by Resource: the Council for Museums, Archives and Libraries, the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) of the Further and Higher Education Funding Councils, as well as by project funding from JISC and the EU. UKOLN also receives support from the Universities of Bath and Hull where staff are based.

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What is Metadata?

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What is ‘Metadata’?

– meaningless jargon

– ora fashionable, and terribly misused, term for what we’ve always done

– or“a means of turning data into information”

– and“data about data”

– andthe name of a person (‘Tony Blair’)

– andthe title of a book (‘The Name of the Rose’).

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What is ‘Metadata’?

• Metadata exists for almost anything;• People• Places• Objects• Concepts• Web pages• Databases.

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What is ‘Metadata’?

• Resource Discovery Metadata fulfils three main functions;• Description of resource content

– “What is it?”

• Description of resource form– “How is it constructed?”

• Description of resource use– “Can I afford it?”.

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‘Metadata’ is

• Cataloguing made cool• But still a bit geeky?

• An important driver for the information economy ?

• A panacea in the battle against information overload ?

• Potentially useful as an affordable and cost–effective means of unlocking a wealth of resources ?.

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Metadata in the Wild

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So what has changed?

• the Internet• Information for All…

– (if they have a computer, a phone line, certain skills…)

• Delivery of resources by resource owners/creators• Rather than by intermediaries such as librarians

• Customer focus/ accountability• Open Government, etc.

• A growing belief that “I” can do anything• Cataloguing is easy, isn’t it?

• A recognition of ‘Good Enough’ rather than ‘Best’• Fitness for purpose.

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• “Mr. Gardiner: To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office what work is being undertaken to enable citizens and businesses to quickly find official information on the internet and elsewhere. [160487]

• Mr. Ian McCartney: This Government are fully aware of the need of citizens and businesses quickly to find official information on the internet, and elsewhere. It should be possible to find information without knowing any technical terms, and without knowing which Department or agency is responsible for it.

• The new e-Government Metadata Framework outlines our policy on metadata. It explains how we will use an internationally recognised standard, the Dublin Core, as the basis for our own system of tagging all information resources. This will make them easier to find and easier to manage, and make life easier for our citizens.

• The Metadata Framework is a natural addition to the e-Government Interoperability Framework, which I launched on 11 October last year. As with the Interoperability Framework, adherence to the Metadata Framework is mandated across the public sector.

House of Commons Hansard written answer for 3 May 2001

v”

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See www.govtalk.gov.uk/See www.govtalk.gov.uk/

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See www.ukonline.gov.uk/See www.ukonline.gov.uk/

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See www.ukonline.gov.uk/See www.ukonline.gov.uk/

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See ads.ahds.ac.uk/catalogue/See ads.ahds.ac.uk/catalogue/

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See ads.ahds.ac.uk/catalogue/See ads.ahds.ac.uk/catalogue/

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See ads.ahds.ac.uk/catalogue/See ads.ahds.ac.uk/catalogue/

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See www.nationalatlas.gov/See www.nationalatlas.gov/

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See www.nationalatlas.gov/See www.nationalatlas.gov/

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See www.rdn.ac.uk/See www.rdn.ac.uk/

19

See www.amazon.co.uk/See www.amazon.co.uk/

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See www.amazon.co.uk/See www.amazon.co.uk/

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Case Study: the Dublin Core

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Introducing the Dublin Core

• An attempt to improve resource discovery on the Web

– now adopted more broadly

• Building an interdisciplinary consensus about a core element set for resource discovery

– simple and intuitive– cross–disciplinary — not just libraries!!– international– open and consensual– flexible.

See www.dublincore.org/See www.dublincore.org/

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• 15 elements of descriptive metadata• All elements optional• All elements repeatable• The whole is extensible

– offers a starting point for semantically richer descriptions.

Introducing the Dublin Core

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• Title• Creator• Subject• Description• Publisher• Contributor• Date• Type

• Format• Identifier• Source• Language• Relation• Coverage• Rights

www.dublincore.org/

Introducing the Dublin Core

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So… what does Dublin Core offer us?

• A set of 15 broad ‘buckets’– Which can easily be mapped to existing data– Which are sufficiently loose, semantically, that they

are acceptable to a large number of communities– Which can act as 15 ‘windows’ into richer resources– Which allow integration — at a high level — of

databases, library catalogues, web pages, etc., without needing to catalogue them the same way.

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What is it not?

• (Necessarily) a replacement for any richer standard

– Subject Gateways, National Library of Finland

• A detailed set of cataloguing rules– AACR2

• Just about digital resources.

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Towards a Standard

• Standardising the 15 elements…• CEN Workshop Agreement• Z39.85 approved by NISO.

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Extending DC (semantic)

• Improve descriptive precision by adding sub–structure (subelements and schemes)

– Greater precision = lesser interoperability

• Should ‘dumb down’ gracefully

Creator

First Name

Surname Contact Info

Affiliation

Based on a slide by Stu Weibel

Element qualifier Value qualifier

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Extending DC (modularity)

• Modular extensibility…• Additional elements to support local needs• Complementary packages of metadata

• …but only if we get the building blocks right!

Description Spatial character

Terms & Conditions

Based on a slide by Stu Weibel

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DCMI Registry

DC and Interoperability

All Domains

DC Metadata Element Set

Education Libraries etc.

DC–Ed DC–Lib DC– …

GEM eDNA SchoolNet

S.E.P. !!!

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DC for Education

• Long–term adoption of DC in educational sector• GEM (USA)• EdNA (Australia)• SchoolNet (Europe)

• DC Education working group established 1999.

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Extending DC for Education• Common extensions…

• Audience– K–12, FE, etc.

• Duration– 23 minutes, 1 module, 1 semester…

• Standards• Quality

– Very good, of course!

• Plus some, used by < 2 projects, declared out of scope.

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Extending DC for Education• Working principles…

• Is there a need?• Can the need be met with a new value

qualifier?• Can the need be met with a new

element qualifier?• Can the need be solved by adopting

an element from elsewhere?• Only if “No”, add a new element.

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Extending DC for Education• The Solution

• Add element qualifier to Relation– conformsTo

• Adopt from IEEE LOM– Interactivity Type– Interactivity Level– Typical Learning Time

• Add new elements– Audience– Standard.

See www.dublincore.org/documents/2000/10/05/education-namespace/

See www.dublincore.org/documents/2000/10/05/education-namespace/

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Metadata: Issues

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Metadata Issues

• “Doing” Metadata is not the solution many believe it to be• There is no one size–fits all miracle cure• Many problems remain to be satisfactorily

resolved• But there is a useful place for metadata–

based implementations.

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Formats and Flavours

• MARC, DC, EAD, IEEE LOM…

• UNIMARC, MARC21, FINMARC…

• DC, DC–Ed, DC–Lib…

• Do Application Profiles offer an answer?

• Is crosswalking feasible?

• Does Dublin Core offer a useful pidgin? .

See www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue25/app-profiles/See www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue25/app-profiles/

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Tools & Guidance

• Tools are needed to ease the process of metadata creation

• Guidance is required to ensure a degree of logic and consistency.

See www.ukoln.ac.uk/metadata/dcdot/See www.ukoln.ac.uk/metadata/dcdot/

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Cost

• Creating metadata is not cheap• Create once, use many times

– Archaeology Data Service (ADS)– Amazon’s role in ONIX

• Is the cost saving of a DC record sufficient to offset the added value of a MARC record? .

See www.editeur.org/onix.htmlSee www.editeur.org/onix.html

See www.amazon.co.uk/See www.amazon.co.uk/

See ads.ahds.ac.uk/catalogue/See ads.ahds.ac.uk/catalogue/

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Update

• Metadata dates• How do we keep it

current?– Don’t create; export

– SINES v. Data Locator

– Harvest– OAI

– Automated approaches– Prompt creators, and

delete after 6 months? .

See www.openarchives.org/See www.openarchives.org/

See datalocator.askgiraffe.org.uk/See datalocator.askgiraffe.org.uk/

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Search

• How do we ensure comparability?

• Searches are rarely comparing like with like…

• Dealing with the Google Generation.

See ahds.ac.uk/See ahds.ac.uk/

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Terminology

• How do we describe resources consistently across domains?

• How do we surface these descriptions to those without training or a bookshelf full of thesauri?

• Countering the Google effect.

See www.rchme.gov.uk/thesaurus/thes_splash.htmSee www.rchme.gov.uk/thesaurus/thes_splash.htm

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Metadata Issues

• …and the rest…!

• Quality/ Authority

• Managing complexity

• Integration with ‘proper’ cataloguing

• Relationship to back–end systems.

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Conclusion

• ‘Metadata’ is a reaction to a changing world

• It bears some relation to traditional cataloguing activities but is also different• Each has a place

• There is work still to do! .