Using XML to store Descriptive Metadata Richard Murphy Rosarie O’Riordan Central Statistics Office Ireland

Background Project to build a Corporate Data Warehouse Business Process Improvement Project to document all processes Data and Metadata now known How to gather all metadata into one structure?

Proposed Solution Use XML to build a metadata repository Scaleable and Web enabled Possibility of being integrated with core metadata Integration with further developments

Tools Used HTML[Hyper Text Markup Language] XML[EXtensible Markup Language] XSL[EXtensible Stylesheet Language] ASP [Active Server Pages] –JavaScript[JavaScript is a scripting language]

XML HTML {EXtensible MarkUp Language} {Hyper Text Markup Language} XML is about describing information XML was designed to describe data, and to focus on what data is XML is a markup language much like HTML XML tags are not predefined in XML. You must define your own tags XML uses a Document Type Definition (DTD) or an XML Schema to describe the data HTML is about displaying information An HTML file is a text file containing small markup tags The Markup tags tells the Web brower how to display the page An HTML file can be created using a simple text editor HTML was designed to display data, and to focus on how data looks.

XSL {EXtensible Stylesheet Language} There must be something in addition to the XML document that describes how the document should be displayed; and that is XSL! XSL consists of three parts : –XSLT (a language for transforming XML documents) –XPath (a language for defining parts of an XML document) –XSL Formatting Objects (a vocabulary for formatting XML documents)

Critical Success Factors Infrastructural Issues Operational Issues Content Rules Official Corporate Policy

Future Developments Corporate ‘Look and Feel’ Integrate with Core Data and Metadata Other Modules –Release Calendar –Access through Theme List –Publication Catalogue –Frequently Asked Questions –Glossary of Terms/Thesaurus

Future Developments ctd Scaleable to include new fields Archiving Version Control Rules and Standards

Other points Keep it simple Functionality = Complexity Multiple access points to metadata but –Store once reference many Workable Solutions n.e. High Tech

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