ICSM ISO19115-1 Metadata Best Practice Guide

Resource Edition ★★★★

For resources that change over time, it is important to users and resource managers that the edition changes be tracked in the metadata. This informs the user if they have the particular edition they need for their purpose.

   
Element Name edition
Parent MD_Metadata.identificationInfo>MD_Identificationcitation>CI_Citation
Class/Type characterString
Governance Common ICSM, Agency, Domain
Purpose Discovery, Identification
Audience machine resource - ⭑ ⭑ ⭑
  general - ⭑ ⭑ ⭑ ⭑ ⭑
  resource manager - ⭑ ⭑ ⭑ ⭑
  specialist - ⭑ ⭑ ⭑
Metadata type descriptive, administrative
ICSM Level of Agreement ⭑⭑⭑⭑

Definition

Version of the cited resource.

ISO Obligation

Discussion

The [0..1] cardinality of edition and editionDate means that release of a new edition of a resource requires the creation of a new metadata record. When such is the case, these two elements should be populated. The population of the edition element mandates the population of the editionDate element.

This element should be used wherever there’s a usable edition/version as it is invaluable to know where this resource fits into a sequence. As “version” is often synonymous with “edition”, it is advised that this field also be used for new tracked versions of resources.

ICSM Best Practice Recommendations

Therefore - when a new edition of a resource is created, a new metadata record needs to be created. This new metadata record needs the resource edition element populated with the edition name or identifier. When such is the case, the sibling CI_Citation.editionDate field should also be populated.

The edition element should be populated with the edition name.

This element should be updated in a consistent yet to be agreed upon manner within an agency.

Also Consider

Outstanding Issues

Updates vs. Editions As discussed, new editions require a new metadata record. Updates to an existing resource do not. Do we need some guidance on when some change warrants a new edition rather than an update? Or should this be at the discretion of the agency or domain?

Crosswalk considerations

DCAT

Maps to dct:confirmsTo

RIF-CS

Maps to Version

Examples

XML

</mdb:MD_Metadata>
....
  <mdb:identificationInfo>
   <mri:MD_DataIdentification>
     <mri:citation>
      <cit:CI_Citation>
      ....
       <cit:edition>
         <gco:CharacterString>2nd new and improved edition
         </gco:CharacterString>
        </cit:edition>
        <cit:editionDate>
         <gco:Date>2019-06-11</gco:Date>
        </cit:editionDate>
        ....
      </cit:CI_Citation>
     </mri:citation>
     ....
   </mri:MD_DataIdentification>
  </mdb:identificationInfo>
....
</mdb:MD_Metadata>

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UML diagrams

Recommended elements highlighted in yellow

edition

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