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Hello, Firstly; I agree with Lorna Campbell's description of the remit of CETIS and the SIGs. There is obviously a need for us to set the survey in its context in an introductory paragraph, as Phil Barker suggested. Secondly; Thanks to Aida Slavic for clearing up the distinction between a scheme and a schema. The SCHEMAS definition will be entered into the CETIS encyclopedia when it is running properly (suitably referenced, of course!). I am personally very pleased to have such a workable definition. I had always got the impression that the two terms were used interchangeably! My own understanding on the difference between a schema and a scheme was from the Oxford English dictionary, which had given me the impression that a schema was simply a diagrammatic representation of a scheme, and I had trouble matching this to the use of the terms with regard to metadata. I also came across a recent definition of a schema as: "a set of statements, expressed in data definition language, that completely describe the structure of a document or a database." - Gilchrist, Alan (2002) "From Aristotle to the 'semantic web'", LA Record January 2001 vol 104(1). Whilst we're at it, has anyone else come across any other definitions of scheme and schema? All definitions will be entered into the CETIS encyclopedia since Lorna Campbell's recommendation that more than one definition ought to be allowed for each term, because the same terms are often used with slightly different meanings amongst different communities. (Please see Lorna's "Recommendations for CETIS encyclopedia" posting of 20 December 2001) best wishes Jenny At 17:58 11/01/02 +0000, Aida Slavic wrote: >Just little terminological contribution if you care to read... > >It is agreed in the metadata community when to use term 'schema' and when term >'scheme' >It was said that 'Schema' should be used to describe >'A set of metadata elements representing the attributes of > a resource. Each element will have a name and associated > semantics.' (From SCHEMAS project glossary) thus DC, IMS, LOM would be 'metadata >schemas' > >While vocabulary used within any of their descriptive elements that comes from some >published and well known source (thesaurus, classification) should be 'scheme'. Thus >one can use many 'schemes' in one 'metadata schema'. >What is metadata? >Survey should make clear as Phil mentioned what is meant under 'metadata' and >explain that metadata in focus here is not technical or administrative but merely >descriptive. >Definition: Metadata is structured (machine readable) description of the resource >that serves to its discovery and management. In the educational domain the resource >is educational material thus IMS is domain specific metadata...and it has to take >care about both general descriptive elements and education-specific description >(while e.g. DC, INDECS, TEI, and family of MARC formats are general descriptive >schemas) > >Also the notion of application profiles.. should be anticipated when dealing with >metadata schemas.As you can mix in one application profiles elements from several >metadata schemas... But even more importantly one can use the same metadata schema >and then use different vocabulary in it or expand it.... >"Other" can be used here for peopel who merged several schemes or built their own. > >aida >Phil Barker wrote: > >> Hello all, >> thank you to those who have sent me feedback on the IMS metadata use survey. >> >> I don't think there should be any problem incorporating the points about level >> of expertise / prior experience and management of metadata into the survey. I >> would like to follow up on Aida's second point: >> >> > 2) 'Are you using any other metadata schemes, if so which' >> > - it looks like that here mentioned question would need some clarification >> > whether 'metadata schemes' asked should not be 'learning material metadata >> > schemes' only. >> >> You're absolutely right we need clarification -- I work in a computing science >> department and for some people here "metadata" covers a lot stuff that I don't >> understand. We should probably say something in the pre-amble to the >> questionnaire about what we are interested in and why. Perhaps the best way to >> phrase the question would be "do you use any of the following metadata >> schemes:...". If that's the case we would need a list of schemes to follow e.g. >> -ADL SCORM >> -Dublin Core >> -Dublin Core Education (DC-Ed) >> -IEEE LOM >> -GEM >> -CanCore >> -Other ________ >> >> I don't really know exactly where to stop! I don't want it to be too long a >> list so are there any that could be removed from the list above? Are there any >> that should be added? >> >> Thanks again for the feedback so far. If anyone has any other points to raise >> please let me know. >> >> Phil. >> >> -- >> Phil Barker Learning Technology Advisor >> ICBL, Department of Computing and Electrical Engineering >> Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, EH14 4AS >> Tel: 0131 451 3278 Fax: 0131 451 3327 >> Web: http://www.icbl.hw.ac.uk/~philb/ > >-- >Aida Slavic >LITC >South Bank University >103 Borough Road >London SE1 0AA >tel: +44 (0)207 815 7845 >fax: +44 (0)207 815 7050 > > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Jenny Slater, LTSN Engineering, Loughborough University, Leicestershire, LE11 3TU, UK Tel. (+44) 01509 227 176 E-mail: [log in to unmask] ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~