THE UNIVERSITY OF ZAMBIA
INSTITUTE OF DISTANCE LEARNING
SCHOOL OF EDUCATION
DEPARTMENT OF LIBRARY AND INFORMATION SCIENCE
NAME: MWANZA MUSA
LECTURER: BWALYA TUESDAY
COMPUTER NUMBER: 16057510
COURSE: ORGANISATION OF INFORMATION SCIENCE
COURSE CODE: LIS 2010
ASSIGNMENT: THREE
QUESTION: Information discovery is impossible without metadata. Discuss
Due date: July 22 by 7 PM.
Information Retrieval has been part of the world, in some form or other, since the advent of
written communications more than five thousand years ago. Information Retrieval has as its
domain the collection, representation, indexing, storage, location, and retrieval of
information-bearing objects. Traditionally these objects have been text-based documents such
as articles, reports, and books; however, as multimedia computing has progressed, the list of
information-bearing objects has grown to include such things as images, videos, maps, sound,
and music recordings. So for one to able to find and retrieve the information that one needs
he or she needs to have some knowledge as to where the information resource is and know
how to obtain that information resource so that he or she can make use of the information
they are looking for. It is for that reason that this academic writing will discuss “Information
discovery is impossible without metadata.”
Metadata is data about data. The term refers to any data used to aid the identification,
description and location of networked electronic resources. Many different metadata formats
exist, some quite simple in their description, others quite complex and rich. According to
Priscilla Caplan (1995)
“Metadata is nothing more than data about data; a
catalogue record is metadata; so is a TEI header or any other
form of description. We could call it cataloguing, but for some
people, that term carries excess baggage, like Anglo-American
Cataloguing Rules and USMARC. So to some extent, this is a
“you call it corn, we call it maize” situation, but metadata is
a good neutral term that covers all the bases”.
Metadata can be grouped into three types: Descriptive, Structural and Administrative.
Descriptive metadata refers to the intellectual content and associations of a document or
resource in such a way that facilitates search identification and collection of information. It
includes elements like title, author, date of creation or publication, abstract, keywords,
information regarding the analogue source from which a digital object is derived. Library users
or information seekers use access points such as title, authors names and much more
information, which the descriptive metadata describes it, is with this information that
information seeker will be able to find and access the information that he or she wants. In other
words, we can say that without this it is hard to find information. Besides, Dillon (2001) said,
“Resource discovery is impossible without resource description and adequate resource
description assures effective discovery.” Moreover, Metadata is particularly important in
collections containing visual, sound, and moving image materials, which are very difficult to
discover without textual description (Laursen et al., 2012). This means that without this part of
the description it would be hard to find the information that they need.
Structural Metadata describes the structure of the file, dataset or other information packages
that is being described. Also indicates how related files are bound together and how the object
can be displayed and disseminated on a variety of systems. Narrates the attributes of an object
like size, electronic format and digital capture process. Metadata bringing similar resources
together and separating dissimilar resources providing location information by doing so
information discovery becomes simple for the user because the information is in once place
which contents the same type of information. Structural Metadata helps in information
discovery by describing how a thing is organized, for illustrations if it is an electronic book
made out of examined pages, each of which is a different PC picture record. National
Information Standards Organization (2004) characterizes metadata as “Organized data that
depicts, clarifies, finds, or generally makes it less demanding to recover, utilize, or deal with a
data resource.” This means that metadata discover resources allowing resources to be found by
relevant criteria; identifying resources; bringing similar resources together; distinguishing
dissimilar resources, and giving location information and permits to sort the information
according to various forms besides according to subject content
Despite data medium or application space, it is essential to report information resources to
encourage effective capacity and administration (Gobel and Lutze, 1998). This relates to
administrative metadata which provides information to help manage a resource such as when
and how it was created, file type and other technical information, and who can access it.
Content management systems (CMS) are highly dependent on metadata for description and
management of content in a virtual system. Haynes (2004) explained, “it is the metadata
associated with digital objects that provides a common format for management and
manipulation of resources.” This means that the administrative metadata provides data to help
deal with a resource, for example, when and how it was made, document sort and other
specialized data, and who can get to it. Also, it safeguarding intellectual property right of the
information resource. Furthermore, Gilliland (2008) describes the role of metadata in
maintaining the relationships between multiple versions of the same digital object and its role
in retaining contextual information.
The above types of metadata are mostly used in the digital world but even in a physical library
is a form of metadata that is used to located and retrieve information sources in a library and
this term is called a catalogue. Traditional cataloguing of physical collections is a process to
create descriptive metadata. The library community has long been developing and using
cataloguing standards and tools, such as AACR2 (Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules, Second
Edition), MARC and LCSH (Library of Congress Subject Headings). Librarians developed
descriptive metadata and this has been instrumental for finding information. Without the
catalogue, it would be very difficult to located and find information in a library because these
libraries have a very large collection that a librarian cannot manage to master which each
collection is what the type of the collection the library hold. Miller (2011) notes, “without
metadata, the collection would be virtually useless. Users would have no way of finding and
identify the digital objects within the collection.” This does not only apply to the digital world
but it equally applies to the physical libraries and the physical collections, which enable the
user to discoveries of information.
Metadata relates to print resources because it consists of information such as author, title, year
of publication, publisher, and so forth. This information may be systematized in a card
catalogue card or its electronic iteration. Both types of records are held in the library catalogue.
which then becomes a repository of metadata about materials that are held by that particular
library. This card which is created the information said above will be used to locate for some
information material in the library.
In conclusion, it can be said that without metadata it is impossible to discover information.
Metadata said to be data about data or information about information so for one to be able to
find the information he or she needs to have some background information about the
information he or she is trying to locate or access. For example, if one needs information about
a book or a movies for them to find that information he or she should know either the title or
the authors names of that book or movie.
Reference
Caplan, P. (2004). Metadata Fundamental for all librarians. Aurora, IL USA: American
Library Association.
Dillon, M. (2001). Metadata for web resources: how metadata works on the web. Available
on https://www.loc.gov/catdir/bibcontrol/dillon_paper.html
Gilliland (2008). Introduction to Metadata, Cataloging and Classification Quarterly. Los
Angeles, Routledge.
Gobe and Lutze (1998). Geoportals and GDI Accessibility: making data discoverable and
accessible.
Haynes, D. (2004). Metadata for information management and retrieval. Facet publishing
NISO (2004). Understanding Metadata. Bethesda, MD: NISO Press, National Information
StandardsOrganization.
Available
http://www.niso.org/publications/press/UnderstandingMetadata.pdf
on