Guidelines for BPC Platform Metadata key elements
Objective
Metadata are one of the key element identified by the PANACeA project to be developed along the production of any relevant output of the biodiversity community to be indexed and consulted in the on-line geoportal. The ETC-UMA is directly involved in ensuring coordination for metadata creation through existing tool and in compliant with existing standards.
Implementation
At this stage the ETC-UMA has identified the ISO 19115/19139 as the best candidate to describe the spatial data (conceptual metadata report, D241.1). A template in compliance with this standard has been made available through the panacea catalogue, adding additional elements to meet specific project characteristics, as specific keywords thesaurus. In this preliminary phase, the metadata has been filled in by the ETC-UMA after receiving the information by the respective partners or retrieving information from existing publication, web pages, etc. Once the metadata has been created, before its publishing, the contact person approved the format and content.
Metadata Elements
The metadata structure suggested by the ISO 19115/19139 standard provides a detailed list of several elements to characterize and describe in a standard way the resource. In PANACeA metadata a set of basic elements has been defined has mandatory to make possible their publishing on-line in a reduced way. This brings any limitation in covering the metadata with more elements (provided by the standard template, through the defined editor).
Mandatory elements
Title
With the title is needed to specify in few clear words what the data represents, specifying, if makes sense, the time covering and location.
e.g. Floating marine macro litter > 20 cm in the Mediterranean Sea, 2013 – 2016
Abstract (purpose)
A short text, few lines, describing in an easy way the context of the data, purpose of its creation, the sources, legal references and relevance.
Lineage
Short methodology description with reference on the producer/processor, where is clear the methodology and its basic steps.
Creation date
Should indicate the date when the data has been created.
Reference date
Should indicate the date or period covered by the content of the data.
Contact point
The person responsible of the data, which will be contact in case any additional information is needed. It could be completed by full name, institution, email, telephone, physical address, etc.
Keywords (GEMET)
GEMET (General Multilingual Environmental Thesaurus) is a collection of keywords related to environmental. The list is automatically available on the on-line editor once the metadata are filled on-line or provided by the eionet web page where a detailed multilingual description for each keyword is given:
https://www.eionet.europa.eu/gemet/en/themes/
Keywords (PANACeA and KEEP)
Keywords are defined by the Interreg Med programme (KEEP), in combination with keywords defined by the PANACeA community available in the on-line editor and attached as ANNEX.
Legal constraint
Now a default text we are proposing is detailed below, but each partner could provide another version more in line with its project, if needed:
“The web portal’s contents are restricted to personal, educational, and/or non-commercial use. All content type, data, documents, images, referring to PANACeA or Other are made available to users for consulting, downloading, sharing, copying, and re-using only for personal or non-commercial use. The use of any resource must be always cited as PANACeA/Interreg MED Programme 2014-2020”.
Other metadata elements
Any other detail is like to be provided to enrich the data description/metadata. e.g. link to report. In addition to the above described mandatory elements, once the data is validated and published technical specification will be added e.g. format, boundary, projections etc.
Metadata editor
An on-line metadata editor is available through the catalogue of the platform, it can be accessed after rights request to ETC-UMA team. At the moment the interface development is on-going and is recommended only to expert users.
Outlook
For the next report is expected the finalization of the on-line platform within a user proof mechanism to allow user to create and edit their own metadata records. And Help Desk and descriptive document to guide user in metadata creation is also foreseen to be implement during next reporting period.