Metadata%20for%20Citizens

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Metadata for Citizens Information

• Paul Miller
• Interoperability Focus
• UK Office for Library Information Networking
  (UKOLN)
• P.Miller_at_ukoln.ac.uk http//www.ukoln.ac.uk/

UKOLN is funded by the Library and Information
Commission, the Joint Information Systems
Committee (JISC) of the Higher Education Funding
Councils, as well as by project funding from the
JISC and the European Union. UKOLN also
receives support from the Universities of Bath
and Hull where staff are based.
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(No Transcript)
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The University for Industry
Connected Government
Community Information Services (CIS)
6,672 pages of UK community information.
National Electronic Library for Health
No citizen is an island
NGDF Metadata Project/ UKSGB
The Peoples Network
The National Grid for Learning
25 of Government services available
electronically by 2002
Cool Britannia
New Opportunities Fund
A Netful of Jewels
Interactive Digital TV
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Standard solutions
The nice thing about standards is that
there are so many to choose from!
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So why use standards?

• Benefit from the expertise of others
• Standards are (often!) compiled by groups of very
  knowledgeable people and you cant afford to
  employ them all yourself
• Enforce rigour in internal practices
• Standards are means of asserting control over the
  resource, allowing you to manage it more
  effectively
• Facilitate interoperability (and access)
• Community Information originates from multiple
  sources, and has many potential uses
• Considered deployment of standard solutions makes
  access to those resources feasible for many
• A virtual CIS for London?

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What do standards do?

• Help identify whats important
• GILS Access Points
• Dublin Core elements
• Mandatory fields
• Allow for consistent use of terminology
• Name Authority Files
• Thesauri
• Lookup tables
• Enable internal and external data exchange
• Reduce duplication of effort
• Minimise (hopefully!) wasted effort
• Reflect consensus.

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What types of standard are there?

• Terminology
• East Riding of Yorkshire, not North
  Humberside
• City of York Council is preferred to York City
  Council
• Format
• Miller, A.P. 1971, not Paul Miller
• Discovery/ Semantics/ DBMS
• A gross simplification, and a very big bucket
• Creator, Subject, Title, Description
• Syntax
• ltRDF xmlns http//www.w3.org/TR/WD-rdf-syntax
  gt
• Transfer
• ftp//ftp.niso.org/ .

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What is Metadata?

• meaningless jargon
• ora fashionable, and terribly misused, term for
  what weve always done
• ora means of turning data into information
• anddata about data
• andthe name of a public servant (Tony Blair)
• andthe title of legislation (the Freedom of
  Information Act).

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Metadata Standards

• Paul Miller gave a really interesting talk about
  Dublin Core at the Institute of Physics in
  London
• In London, or in Dublin?
• About Physics and about milling?
• But what was it?

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Metadata Standards
ltspeakergtPaul Millerlt/speakergt gave a ltvalue
judgementgtreally interestinglt/value judgementgt
talk about ltsubjectgtDublin Corelt/subjectgt at the
ltlocationgtInstitute of Physics in
Londonlt/locationgt.
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Challenges
Opportunities

• Many flavours of metadata
• which one do I use?
• Managing change
• new varieties, and evolution of existing forms
• Tension between functionality and simplicity,
  extensibility and interoperability

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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
• crossdisciplinary not just libraries!!
• international
• open and consensual
• flexible.

See http//purl.org/dc/
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Introducing the Dublin Core

• 15 elements of descriptive metadata
• All elements optional
• All elements repeatable
• The whole is extensible
• offers a starting point for semantically richer
  descriptions
• Interdisciplinary
• libraries, government, museums, archives
• International
• available in more than 20 languages, with more on
  the way...

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Introducing the Dublin Core

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

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

http//purl.org/dc/
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The Dublin Core and Public Sector information

• Global/Government Information Locator Service
• Richer set of Access Points, offering enhanced
  functionality within a domain
• Maps well to Dublin Core
• Next version likely to entirely adopt DC1.1
  semantics
• Integrated well with Z39.50 for distributed
  search
• Australian Government Locator Service
• Based closely upon Dublin Core
• Adds information on Audience, Availability,
  Mandate, and Function.

See http//www.gils.net/
See http//www.naa.gov.au/govserv/agls/
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Introducing Z39.50

• International Standard (ISO 23950)
• Originally librarycentric
• Permits remote searching of databases
• Access via Z client or over web
• Relies upon Profiles
• GILS Profile for government information

See http//www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue21/
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Z39.50 Challenges

• Profiles for each discipline
• Defeats interoperability?
• Bib1 bloat
• Largely invisible
• Seen as complicated
• Seen as expensive
• Seen as oldfashioned
• Surely no match for XML/RDF/whatever.

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Access to Citizens Information

• Local Museums
• Peoples Network
• Public Libraries
• Peoples Network
• The Post Office
• Schools and Colleges
• The National Grid for Learning
• Local Authority Offices
• Government.direct ?
• Citizens Advice Bureaux
• Public Information Kiosks
• The Internet
• The Internet.

CommonStandards
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Some pointers

• Interoperability Focus
• http//www.ukoln.ac.uk/interopfocus/
• Interoperability Mailing List
• http//www.mailbase.ac.uk/lists/interoperability/
• Dublin Core
• http//purl.org/dc/
• GILS
• http//www.gils.net/
• AGLS
• http//www.naa.gov.au/govserv/agls/
• and the flyer in your pack