AGLS Metadata Element Set Part 1: Reference Description

Transcription

1 AGLS Metadata Element Set Part 1: Reference Description Version 1.3 National Archives of Australia

2 Version 1.0 of this manual was prepared by Renato Ianella of DSTC Pty Ltd, under contract for the Office of Government Information Technology (OGIT) and the National Archives of Australia. It was published electronically on the National Archives of Australia website ( in August Version 1.1 was prepared by the National Archives of Australia and contains contributions by Dr Simon Cox of the CSIRO. This revised version of the AGLS Manual is a result of changes recommended by the AGLS Working Group meeting on 4 February Version 1.2 of this manual was prepared by the National Archives of Australia. This version contains changes to the AGLS Metadata Standard approved by meetings of the AGLS Working Group in November 1999 and July Version 1.3 was prepared by the National Archives of Australia during 2001 and 2002 with a view to it being adopted by Standards Australia as a national standard. For this purpose the AGLS Working Group was appointed as a sub-committee of Standards Australia s Committee IT/021 Records Management. An exposure draft of AS 5044 was issued for public comment by Standards Australia in January Following the receipt of these comments and consideration by the AGLS Working Group, the Standard in its current form was endorsed by Standards Australia and published by that organisation in December Version 1.3 splits the Standard into two parts, Part 1 is the Reference Description and Part 2 the Usage Guide. The Usage Guide was prepared by Andrew Wilson of the National Archives of Australia. It incorporates material from the Dublin Core Usage Guide ( edited by Diane Hillman, with permission of the Dublin Core Metadata Initiative (DCMI). With the publication of the Standard by Standards Australia it was decided to rename the standard the AGLS Metadata Element Set from the Australian Government Locator Service Manual for Users. Dropping the word government from the title reflects that, with this version of the standard, its audience is no longer limited to the public sector. This Reference Description is mirrored at This document is provided by the National Archives of Australia as the most up-to-date version of the AGLS standard. It is not an official standard of Standards Australia, but is provided free of charge to those organisations wishing to obtain the most recent version of the element set and usage guide. ISBN Copyright Commonwealth of Australia 2002 Portions of this document copyright Dublin Core Metadata Initiative 2001 ( This work is copyright. Apart from any use as permitted under the Copyright Act 1968 no part may be reproduced process without prior written permission from the National Archives of Australia. Requests and inquiries concern reproduction and rights should be directed to the Publications Manager, National Archives of Australia, PO Box 7 Canberra Business Centre ACT 2610

3 CONTENTS Foreword Introduction, Scope and Purpose Definitions Referenced Standards The Element Set Qualifiers AGLS Metadata Elements Mandatory Obligation Conditional Obligation Optional Obligation...11 Appendix A: AGLS Qualifier Summary Appendix B: Further Reading Appendix C: AGLS Maintenance Agency Attachment

4 FOREWORD The AGLS Metadata Element Set provides a set of metadata elements designed to improve the visibility, accessibility and interoperability of online information and services. The AGLS element set had its origins in the work of the Information Management Steering Committee (IMSC), an interdepartmental committee established by the then Commonwealth Office of Government Information Technology (OGIT). The IMSC was established in 1996 at the request of the then Chief Government Information Officer, Andy Mcdonald. Chaired by the then Deputy Director-General of the National Library, Eric Wainwright, the Committee released its report, The Management of Government Information as a National Strategic Resource, in August This report proposed frameworks for government information policy and the deployment of associated technology into the 21st century. Development of the AGLS element set began in December 1997 with an invitational workshop held at the National Archives of Australia. The workshop brought together representatives of federal and state/territory government agencies, other interested parties such as the Federal Libraries Information Network, and the academic research community. The work of this cross-jurisdictional and interdisciplinary working group led to the development of the 19 elements in the AGLS set. Relationship to Dublin Core The development objective of the AGLS working group was to produce a set of metadata elements which would improve the visibility, accessibility and interoperability of government information and services through the provision of standardised Web-based resource descriptions which enable users to locate the information or service that they require. The AGLS element set described here is a set of 19 descriptors that resulted from the cross-jurisdictional and interdisciplinary working group meeting in December AGLS is based on the Dublin Core Metadata Element Set (DCMES) of 15 descriptors documented on the Dublin Core Metadata Initiative (DCMI) website at: The DCMES has also been issued by the American National Standards Institute as ANSI/NISO Z on 10 September AGLS is a more complex element set than the Dublin Core Standard, containing a number of element qualifiers which enable it to describe more categories of resources and allow richer description of resources. Despite this, AGLS is entirely compatible and interoperable with the Dublin Core element set. AGLS is not intended to displace any other metadata standard. It is envisaged that AGLS can coexist with other metadata standards based on different semantics. 4

5 1 INTRODUCTION, SCOPE AND PURPOSE AS5044 the AGLS Metadata Standard, is an Australian standard for cross-domain resource description. A resource is defined by the standard and in this document to be anything that has identity; this is the definition used in Internet RFC 2396, Uniform Resource Identifiers (URI): Generic Syntax by Tim Berners-Lee et al. The AGLS metadata set is intended for use by any organisation or individual creating or managing information sources or services that are locatable via the Internet. In particular, it is intended for information about resources and services on the World Wide Web. For the purposes of AGLS metadata, a resource will typically be an online information or service resource, but may be applied more broadly to people and organisations, and information or services that are not available online. While this standard describes the AGLS element set and qualifiers, it is not its place to define the detailed criteria by which the element set and qualifiers will be implemented in specific projects and applications by individuals and organisations. This document is provided by the National Archives of Australia as the most up-todate version of the AGLS standard. It is not an official standard of Standards Australia, but is provided free of charge to those organisations wishing to obtain the most recent version of the element set and usage guide. This document has two parts: Part 1: Reference Description, which describes the elements and qualifiers; and Part 2: Usage Guide, which interprets the AGLS standard and gives advice on how to implement it. It is important to use the two parts in conjunction with each other. 2 DEFINITIONS DCMI Metadata Qualifier Resource Scheme Service Value Dublin Core Metadata Initiative, the maintenance agency for the Dublin Core. structured information that describes and/or enables finding, managing, controlling, understanding or preserving other information over time. a mechanism for refining element semantics or to provide information for understanding element values. anything that has identity (the same definition as in Internet RFC 2396). an encoding scheme used to structure AGLS values, or the name of a thesaurus or controlled vocabulary which is the source of a value. a service exists where a relationship is established between a business function of an organisation and the identified needs of an individual client or a group of clients. the content of a metadata element which provides information about a characteristic of a resource. 5

6 3 REFERENCED STANDARDS [AS ISO 15489] AS ISO Records Management Part 1: General AS ISO Records Management Part 2: Guidelines [AS 4390] AS Australian Standard: Records Management. Standards Australia, Homebush, [ISO 8601] ISO 8601 Data Elements and Interchange Formats Information Interchange Representation of Dates and Times. International Standards Organisation, 2nd edition, [ISO 3166] ISO 3166 Codes for representation of names of countries. [ISO 639] ISO Codes for the representation of names of languages, Alpha-3 code (ISO 639-2:1998). [MIME] Internet Media Types [RFC 3066] Tags for the Identification of Languages, Internet RFC [RFC 2396] Uniform Resource Identifiers (URI): Generic Syntax, Internet RFC [W3CDTF] Date and Time Formats, W3C Note. [XML] Extensible Markup Language. [Z ] ANSI/NISO Z The Dublin Core Metadata Element Set. ANSI/NISO THE ELEMENT SET The AGLS 19-element set is described below with: a unique, machine-understandable, single-word element name intended for use in the computer programming rules (syntactic use) which is intended to make the specification of elements simpler for encoding schemes; a label, which is intended to convey a common understanding of the element; a definition (the semantics or meaning of the element); an indication of whether the element must be used to comply with the AGLS standard (obligation); and a comment which further expands or refines the meaning of the element and how it may be used, and may include examples. Where qualifiers are used, they are described in much the same pattern below the element description with the addition of qualifier type (see section 5). 6

7 Five metadata elements must be present for compliance with this standard. The mandatory elements are: Creator Title Date Subject OR Function Identifier OR Availability In the case of Subject or Function, this standard specifies that at least one of those two elements must appear in a metadata description. The obligation applicable to the last element changes depending on whether the resource described is available online or offline. If the resource is available online, then Identifier is mandatory. If it is a resource only available offline, then Availability is mandatory. In addition, this standard requires the use of the Publisher element for descriptions of information resources, but not for resources which are transactional services. All other elements are optional, and all elements are repeatable. Metadata elements may appear in any order. Elements are listed in section 6 alphabetically within the obligation categories mandatory, conditional and optional. It is assumed that metadata instances based on this standard will specify the encoding scheme used for any element where this is appropriate. This standard cannot specify the use of any particular schemes with specific elements. Although some environments, such as HTML, are not case-sensitive, it is recommended best practice always to adhere to the case conventions in the element and qualifier names given below to avoid conflicts if the metadata is subsequently extracted and converted to a case-sensitive syntax, such as XML (extensible Markup Language). 5 QUALIFIERS Qualifiers are additions and extensions to the metadata elements that provide information about how the semantics (meaning) of an element have been refined, or about how the value (specific content) of an element should be interpreted. The guiding principle for using qualifiers with AGLS elements, colloquially known as the dumb-down rule, is that a client (eg a person or software) should be able to ignore any qualifier and use the description (element content) as if it were unqualified. The remaining element value without the qualifier should continue to be generally correct and useful for discovery and other management purposes. AGLS uses two types of qualifiers. Element refinements Element refinements refine the semantics (meaning) of the element by further specifying the relationship of the element value to the resource itself. A refined element shares the meaning of the unqualified element, but with a more restricted scope. For example, the element Coverage can refer to legal or administrative scope 7

8 (jurisdiction), to the geographical scope (spatial), to the period of time covered by the resource (temporal), 1 or in Australia, to a further refinement of the geographical scope using postcodes (postcode). The element refinements which may be used in AGLS are listed in the description of each element. It is expected that the element refinements will continue to change over time. The AGLS metadata set will be modified from time to time to specify the element refinements which may be used for each element. Please check the AGLS website for updates: Encoding schemes Encoding schemes indicate how the value of an element is to be interpreted if it has been chosen from a controlled vocabulary or is encoded if an externally defined standard is used. A value expressed using an encoding scheme will be either selected from a controlled vocabulary (eg a term from a classification system or set of subject headings) or a string formatted in accordance with a formal notation (eg " " as the standard expression of a date). This standard is not prescriptive about available encoding schemes for particular elements and does not attempt to specify available schemes for each element. Most elements in the AGLS element set may be qualified with an encoding scheme. 6. AGLS METADATA ELEMENTS 6.1 Mandatory Obligation Creator Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the content of the resource. Mandatory if known Examples of a Creator include a person, or an organisation. Date Date A date of an event in the lifecycle of the resource. Mandatory Typically, Date will be associated with the creation or availability of the resource. Recommended best practice for encoding the date value is defined in a profile of ISO 8601 [W3CDTF] and follows the YYYY-MM-DD format. 1 Note that this qualifier refers to the resource content, not to the date(s) for which the resource is valid or useable or available. 8

9 Qualifiers Qualifier Name: created Created Creation date of the resource. Qualifier Name: modified Modified Modification date of the resource. Qualifier Name: valid Valid A date (often a range) of validity of a resource. Typically, a date the resource becomes valid or ceases to be valid, or the date range for which the resource is valid. Qualifier Name: issued Issued A date on which the resource was made formally available in its current form. Title Title A name given to the resource. Mandatory Typically, the name by which the resource is formally known. Qualifiers Qualifier Name: alternative Alternative Any form of the title used as a substitute or alternative to the formal title of the resource This qualifier could include abbreviations and acronyms by which a resource may be known. 9

10 6.2 Conditional Obligation Availability Availability How the resource can be obtained or contact information for obtaining the resource. Mandatory for offline resources. The Availability element is primarily used for non-electronic resources to provide information on how to obtain physical access to the resource. Function Function The business function of the organisation to which the resource relates. Mandatory if no Subject element specified. Used to indicate the business role of the resource in terms of business functions and activities. Functions are the major units of activity which organisations pursue in order to meet the mission and goals of the organisation. They are defined in the Australian Records Management Standard (AS 4390) as the largest unit of business activity in an organisation. Recommended best practice is to select a value from a controlled vocabulary or formal classification scheme. Identifier Resource Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context. Mandatory for online resources. Recommended best practice is to identify the resource by means of a string or number conforming to a formal identification system. Example formal identification systems include the Uniform Resource Identifier (URI) (including the Uniform Resource Locator (URL)), the Digital Object Identifier (DOI) and the International Standard Book Number (ISBN). Publisher Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available. Mandatory for information resources. This field is often the name of the organisation that owns or controls or publishes the resource. It is not recommended that this element be used for the name of the entity which merely acts as the host for a website. 10

11 Subject Subject and Keywords A subject and/or topic of the content of the resource. Mandatory if no Function element specified. Typically, a Subject will be expressed as keywords, key phrases or classification codes that describe a topic of the resource content. Recommended best practice is to select a value from a controlled vocabulary or formal classification scheme. 6.3 Optional Obligation Audience Audience A target audience of the resource. Optional Types of audiences commonly used in this element include particular industry sectors, education levels, skill levels, occupations, and EEO categories. Recommended best practice is to select a value from a controlled vocabulary or formal classification scheme. Contributor Contributor An entity responsible for making a contribution to the content of the resource. Optional Typically, a contributor will be an entity that has played an important but secondary role in creating the content of the resource and is not specified in the creator element. Coverage Coverage The extent or scope of the content of the resource. Optional Coverage will typically include spatial location (a place name or geographic coordinates), temporal period (a period label, date, or date range) or jurisdiction (such as a named administrative entity). Recommended best practice is to select a value from a controlled vocabulary (for example, the Thesaurus of Geographic Names [TGN]) and that, where appropriate, named places or time periods be used in 11

12 preference to numeric identifiers such as sets of coordinates or date ranges. Qualifiers Qualifier Name: jurisdiction Jurisdiction The name of the political/administrative entity covered by the content of the resource. Jurisdiction is a description of the territory over which a particular government exercises its authority or a particular business transacts its operations, to which the resource content is applicable. Qualifier Name: spatial Spatial Spatial (geographic) characteristics of the intellectual content of the resource. Qualifier Name: temporal Temporal Temporal characteristics of the intellectual content of the resource. Qualifier Name: postcode Postcode Australian postcode(s) applicable to the spatial coverage of the resource content. Postcode refers to the actual Australian postcode(s) which is relevant to the spatial coverage of the resource content. This qualifier will be of particular use in describing services. Description Description An account of the content of the resource. Optional Description may include but is not limited to: an abstract, table of contents, reference to a graphical representation of content (eg a thumbnail of an image), or a free-text account of the content. 12

13 Format Format The physical or digital manifestation of the resource. Optional Typically, Format may include the media-type or dimensions of the resource. Format may be used to determine the software, hardware or other equipment needed to display or operate the resource. Examples of dimensions include size and duration. Recommended best practice is to select a value from a controlled vocabulary (for example, the list of Internet Media Types [MIME] defining computer media formats). Qualifiers Qualifier Name: extent Extent Qualifier Type: Element refinement The size or duration of the resource. The extent qualifier allows the description of the physical dimensions, file size or duration of the resource. Qualifier Name: medium Medium Qualifier Type: Element refinement The material or physical carrier of the resource. Language Language A language of the intellectual content of the resource. Optional Recommended best practice for the values of the Language element is defined by RFC 3066 [RFC 3066] which includes a two-letter Language Code (taken from the ISO 639 standard [ISO 639]), followed optionally, by a two-letter Country Code (taken from the ISO 3166 standard [ISO 3166]). For example, 'en' for English, 'fr' for French, or 'en-uk' for English used in the United Kingdom. Mandate Mandate A specific warrant which requires the resource to be created or provided. Optional The element is useful to indicate the specific legal mandate which requires the resource being described to be created or provided to the public. The content of this element will usually 13

14 be a reference to a specific Act, Regulation or Case, but may be a URI pointing to the legal instrument in question. Qualifiers Qualifier Name: act Act Qualifier Type: Element refinement A reference to a specific State or Federal Act which requires the creation or provision of the resource. Qualifier Name: regulation Regulation Qualifier Type: Element refinement A reference to a specific regulation which requires the creation or provision of the resource. Qualifier Name: case Case Law Qualifier Type: Element refinement A reference to a specific case which requires the creation or provision of the resource Relation Relation A reference to a related resource. Optional Recommended best practice is to reference the resource by means of a string or number conforming to a formal identification system. Qualifiers Qualifier Name: isversionof Is Version Of The described resource is a version, edition, or adaptation of the referenced resource. Changes in version imply substantive changes in content rather than differences in format. Qualifier Name: hasversion Has Version The described resource has a version, edition, or adaptation, namely, the referenced resource. 14

15 Qualifier Name: isreplacedby Is Replaced By The described resource is supplanted, displaced, or superseded by the referenced resource. Qualifier Name: replaces Replaces The described resource supplants, displaces, or supersedes the referenced resource. Qualifier Name: isrequiredby Is Required By The described resource is required by the referenced resource, either physically or logically. Qualifier Name: requires Requires The described resource requires the referenced resource to support its function, delivery, or coherence of content. Qualifier Name: ispartof Is Part Of The described resource is a physical or logical part of the referenced resource. Qualifier Name: haspart Has Part The described resource includes the referenced resource either physically or logically. Qualifier Name: isreferencedby Is Referenced By The described resource is referenced, cited, or otherwise pointed to by the referenced resource. 15

16 Qualifier Name: references References The described resource references, cites, or otherwise points to the referenced resource. Qualifier Name: isformatof Is Format Of The described resource is the same intellectual content of the referenced resource, but presented in another format. Qualifier Name: hasformat Has Format The described resource pre-existed the referenced resource, which is essentially the same intellectual content presented in another format. Qualifier Name: isbasisfor Is Basis For The described resource pre-existed the referenced resource, which is a performance, production, derivation, translation, or interpretation of the described resource. Qualifier Name: isbasedon Is Based On The described resource is a performance, production, derivation, translation, or interpretation of the referenced resource. Rights Rights Management Information about rights held in and over the resource. Optional Typically, the Rights element will contain a rights management statement for the resource, or refer to a service providing such information. Rights information often encompasses Intellectual Property Rights (IPR), Copyright, and various Property Rights. If the Rights element is absent, no assumptions can be made about the status of these and other rights with respect to the resource. 16

17 Source Source A reference to a resource from which the present resource is derived. Optional The present resource may be derived from the Source resource in whole or in part. Recommended best practice is to reference the source resource by means of a string or number conforming to a formal identification system. Type Resource Type The nature or genre of the content of the resource. Optional Type includes terms describing general categories, genres, or aggregation levels for content. Recommended best practice is to select a value from a controlled vocabulary (for example, the working draft list of Dublin Core Types [DCT1]). To describe the physical or digital manifestation of the resource, use the FORMAT element. Qualifiers Qualifier Name: category Category Qualifier Type: Element refinement The generic type of the resource being described. The value for this qualifier must be one of either service, document, or agency. Qualifier Name: aggregationlevel Aggregation Level Qualifier Type: Element refinement The level of aggregation of the resource being described. There are only two values possible for this qualifier, either item or collection. Qualifier Name: documenttype Document Type Qualifier Type: Element refinement The form of the resource where category = document. Document is used in its widest sense and includes such things as software sound files and images. 17

18 Qualifier Name: servicetype Service Type Qualifier Type: Element refinement The type of service being offered where category = service. 18

19 APPENDIX A: AGLS QUALIFIER SUMMARY Elements Creator Publisher Contributor Availability Title Subject Date Identifier Rights Description Source Element refinements Role of contributor should appear as an element refinement if required alternative created modified valid issued Language Relation ispartof/haspart isversionof/hasversion isformatof/hasformat references/isreferencedby isbasedon/isbasisfor isrequiredby/requires isreplacedby/replaces 19

20 Appendix A: AGLS Qualifier Summary (continued) AGLS Elements Coverage Element refinements temporal spatial jurisdiction postcode Function Type category aggregationlevel documenttype servicetype Format extent medium Audience Mandate act regulation case 20

21 APPENDIX B: FURTHER READING Further information about the AGLS metadata standard is available at: This website provides access to the most recent version of this document. It also contains information about new developments concerning AGLS, reports of new initiatives and proposed changes to the AGLS standard, and information and tools to assist implementation of AGLS metadata. 21

22 APPENDIX C: AGLS MAINTENANCE AGENCY The National Archives of Australia has been tasked by the Online Council of Ministers as the official national maintenance agency for the AGLS Metadata Standard. The National Archives convenes the AGLS Working Group in that capacity. The AGLS Working Group is responsible for the development, standardisation, and promotion of the AGLS element set. Information on the AGLS Working Group is available at: tml 22

23 ATTACHMENT Additional participants in the development of the AGLS Metadata Standard ACT Government Australia-New Zealand Land Information Council (ANZLIC) Commonwealth Department of Employment and Workplace Relations Commonwealth Department of Health Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) Distributed Systems Technology Centre (DSTC) Education AU/EdNA Environment Australia IPR Systems P/L Monash University National Archives of Australia (NAA) National Library of Australia (NLA) National Office for the Information Economy (NOIE) New Zealand Government NSW Government NT Government Queensland Government Recordkeeping Systems P/L SA Government Tasmanian Government tsa Group Victorian Government WA Government 23