OASIS Mailing List ArchivesView the OASIS mailing list archive below
or browse/search using MarkMail.

 


Help: OASIS Mailing Lists Help | MarkMail Help

 


 

   Re: [xml-dev] Is an element's name metadata?

[ Lists Home | Date Index | Thread Index ]

Ok, please don't beat me about the head and shoulders if I get some history wrong but...

SGML referred to element names as Generic Identifiers; this in contrast to Specific Identifiers, such as ID type attributes. A GI is then a special case of attribute: one without an explicit name (which is not all that special a case in SGML). One might conceptually think:

<element gi="reporter">
John Smith
</element>

Incidentally, on looking over the DC site, I came across one definition:

Record: some structured metadata about a resource, comprising one or more properties and their associated values.

Under that definition both the property (name) and associated values constitute the metadata. 

Operationally, the metadata distinction may be more unhelpful than not.

Regards

- Mitch

Gustaf Liljegren wrote:

> I've heard some people say that the markup is by itself metadata, that an
> element's name is metadata, because it describes the element's content:
> 
> <reporter>    <-- This is metadata
> John Smith    <-- This is data
> </reporter>
> 
> Isn't this wrong? Comparing to what I learned from Dublin Core, metadata is
> data too. It's not just the name of a property. I'd say it's the element's
> context that decides whether <reporter> is a data or a metadata element.
> 
> <reporter>    <-- This is just the name of a property
> John Smith    <-- This may be metadata, depending on the element's context
> </reporter>
> 
> Is this the right way to think about metadata in XML?
> 
> Gustaf
> 
> 
> -----------------------------------------------------------------
> The xml-dev list is sponsored by XML.org <http://www.xml.org>, an
> initiative of OASIS <http://www.oasis-open.org>
> 
> The list archives are at http://lists.xml.org/archives/xml-dev/
> 
> To subscribe or unsubscribe from this list use the subscription
> manager: <http://lists.xml.org/ob/adm.pl>
> 
> 






 

News | XML in Industry | Calendar | XML Registry
Marketplace | Resources | MyXML.org | Sponsors | Privacy Statement

Copyright 2001 XML.org. This site is hosted by OASIS