'$RCSfile: eml.xsd,v $' Copyright: 1997-2002 Regents of the University of California, University of New Mexico, and Arizona State University Sponsors: National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis and Partnership for Interdisciplinary Studies of Coastal Oceans, University of California Santa Barbara Long-Term Ecological Research Network Office, University of New Mexico Center for Environmental Studies, Arizona State University Other funding: National Science Foundation (see README for details) The David and Lucile Packard Foundation For Details: http://knb.ecoinformatics.org/ '$Author: jones $' '$Date: 2002-12-06 22:23:43 $' '$Revision: 1.45 $' This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version. This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details. You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place, Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111-1307 USA eml

The eml module is a wrapper container that allows the inclusion of any metadata content in a single EML document. The eml module is used as a container to hold structured descriptions of ecological resources. In EML, the definition of a resource comes from the The Dublin Core Metadata Initiative , which describes a general element set used to describe "networked digital resources". The top-level structure of EML has been design to be compatible with the Dublin Core syntax. In general, dataset resources, literature resources, software resources, and protocol resources comprise the list of information that may be described in EML. EML is largely designed to desrcibe digital resources, however, it may also be used to describe non-digital resources such as paper maps and other non-digital media. In EML, the definition of a "Data Package" is the combination of both the data and metadata for a resource. So, data packages are built by using the <eml> wrapper, which will include all of the metadata, and optionally the data (or references to them). All EML packages must begin with the <eml> tag and end with the </eml> tag. The eml module may be extended to describe other resources by means of it's optional sub-field, <additionalMetadata>. This field is largely reserved for the inclusion of metadata that may be highly discipline specific and not covered in this version of EML, or it may be used to internally extend fields within the EML standard.

all datasets yes eml.xsd eml-access.xsd eml-attribute.xsd eml-constraint.xsd eml-coverage.xsd eml-dataset.xsd eml-dataTable.xsd eml-entity.xsd eml-literature.xsd eml-methods.xsd eml-party.xsd eml-physical.xsd eml-project.xsd eml-protocol.xsd eml-resource.xsd eml-software.xsd eml-spatialRaster.xsd eml-spatialReference.xsd eml-spatialVector.xsd eml-storedProcedure.xsd eml-text.xsd eml-view.xsd Ecological Metadata A collection of EML metadata and additional metadata linked using the inline references. The "eml" element allows for the inclusion of of any metadata content in a single EML document. In general, dataset resources, literature resources, and software resources, or another type that extends eml-resource are described using an eml document. The eml document represents a "package" that can contain both metadata and data. It can optionally include non-EML metadata through the flexibility of the "additionalMetadata" element. Any additional metadata that is provided can provide a pointer into the EML metadata indicating what the context of the additional metadata is (ie, what it describes). For example, a spatial raster image might be described in EML, and an FGDC CSDGM metadata document could be included in the additionalMetadata element with a pointer to the EML spatialRaster element to indicate that the FGDC metadata is providing supplemental documentation about that particular image entity. There is no validity constraint that restricts what metadata may be present in additionalMetadata. Dataset Resource A resource that describes a data set, which can include one or more data entities such as data tables. A resource that describes a data set, which can include one or more data entities such as data tables and spatial images (raster and vector). If included, this represents the primary resource that is desciribed in this eml document. Literature Resource A resource that describes a literature citation that one might find in a bibliography. A resource that describes a literature citation that one might find in a bibliography. If included, this represents the primary resource that is desciribed in this eml document. Software Resource A resource that describes a software package, which can include commercial and non-commercial software as well as data processing programs. A resource that describes a software package, which can include commercial and non-commercial software as well as data processing programs. If included, this represents the primary resource that is desciribed in this eml document. Protocol Resource A resource that describes a scientific protocol, which can include one or more descriptions of methods and procedures. A resource that describes a scientific protocol, which can include one or more descriptions of methods and procedures. If included, this represents the primary resource that is desciribed in this eml document. Additional Metadata A flexible field for including any other relevant metadata that pertains to the resource being described. A flexible field for including any other relevant metadata that pertains to the resource being described. This field allows EML to be extensible in that any XML-based metadata can be included in this element, including metadata from other standards such as the FGDC CSDGM. The "describes" element of this field allows the specific part of the resource which is described by the additional metadata to be indicated formally. Describes Reference A pointer to the id attribute for the subportion of the resource that is described by this additional metadata. A pointer to the id attribute for the subportion of the resource that is described by this additional metadata. This is a formal field in that it is an error to provide a value in the "describes" element that does not correspond to the value of one of the "id" attributes in another eml module. This is designed to allow automated processors to discover the contextual relationship between the additional metadata and the resource it describes. knb.343.22 Any Metadata Any well-formed XML-formatted metadata may be inserted at this location in the EML document. If an element inserted here contains a reference to its namespace, and if there is an association between that namespace and an XML Schema that can be located by the processing application, then the processing application must validate the metadata element. If these conditions are not met, then validation need not occur. Any well-formed XML-formatted metadata may be inserted at this location in the EML document. If an element inserted here contains a reference to its namespace, and if there is an association between that namespace and an XML Schema that can be located by the processing application, then the processing application must validate the metadata element. If these conditions are not met, then validation need not occur. Package Identifer A unique identifier for this entire EML metadata document that can be used to reference it elsewhere. A unique identifier for this entire EML metadata document that can be used to reference it elsewhere. This identifier can be interpreted as the formal accession number for this EML package, and is therefore required. It must be unique within a particular data management system (see the "system" attribute). knb.343.22 Identifer Scope The scope of the identifier. The scope of the identifier. Scope is generally set to either "system", meaning that it is scoped according to the "system" attribute, or "document" if it is only to be in scope within this single document instance. In this particular use of scope, it is FIXED to be "system" because the packageId is required and always has the scope of the required "system". system