Metadata
Metadata is structured information that describes, explains, locates, or otherwise makes it easier to retrieve, use, or manage an information resource. Metadata is often called data about data or information about information. The term metadata is used differently in different communities. Some use it to refer to machine understandable information, while others use it only for records that describe electronic resources. In the library environment, metadata is commonly used for any formal scheme of resource description, applying to any type of object, digital or non-digital.
An important reason for creating descriptive metadata is to facilitate
discovery of relevant information. In addition to resource discovery, metadata can help organize electronic resources, facilitate interoperability and legacy resource integration, provide digital identification, and support archiving and preservation.
A very short definition is that metadata is ”data about data”, that is, some kind of second-order data; cf Froeschl (1997). Among computer scientists the meaning of metadata is often limited to formal descriptions of how data are typed and formatted. Information scientists and system developers, on the other hand, also stress the importance of metadata as descriptions of the meaning or semantical contents of data; these descriptions may be more or less structured and more or less formal; they are often free-text descriptions. Metadata descriptions go beyond the pure form and contents of data. Metadata are also used to describe adminitstrative facts about data, like who created them, and when. Such metadata may facilitate efficient searching and locating of data.
Cathryn S. Dippo, U. S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and Bo Sundgren, Statistics Sweden Cathryn Dippo, Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2 Massachusetts Avenue. (2012). The Role of Metadata in Statistics.
National Information Standards Organization. NISO Press. (2004). Understanding Metadata. P. 1