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Electronic Scriptorium, Ltd.
AIIM Minnesota Chapter
Metadata and Taxonomy Presentation
Copyright Electronic Scriptorium, Ltd.All rights reserved, 1991 - 2008 January 2008
Electronic Scriptorium, Ltd. – Core Service Offering
Strategies for increasing ROI from digital assets by improving the enterprise-wide metadata model
Provide a full line of metadata services to world class businesses and institutions
Metadata modeling, taxonomy design, controlled vocabulary services
Descriptive cataloging for digital assets
Participant Introduction
Name
Title
Company
Reason for your interest in this session / topic?
Executive Overview - Introductions
Ed Leonard, President
www.ElectronicScriptorium.com
Electronic Scriptorium, Ltd.
Metadata Modeling Definition
Why are organizations interested in metadata modeling?
What is “metadata modeling”?
• Business units need improved digital asset find-ability on the Internet and on corporate intranets
• Knowledge management systems integrate information from multiple sources and partners
• “Information-glut” makes managing information a full-time job
• Applications need to be easier to search and maintain
The analytical process used to build and refine an organization’s business language
Tower built by man to reach heaven
Foundation and bottom layers of the tower have not been completed before the higher layers were constructed.
God observes the construction, resolves to destroy man’suniform language to prevent future efforts.
Pieter Bruegel: The Tower of Babel (1563)
Why Controlled Vocabulary?
Subtitle: The Tower of Enterprise Content Management
The Find-ability Dilemma
Why Controlled Vocabulary?
Metadata Model Components
Controlled Vocabulary
Taxonomy -
- a collection of preferred terms used to assist in more precise retrieval of content. .
a set of controlled vocabulary terms, usually hierarchical, that can help navigation and search systems.
Thesaurus - a taxonomy that includes associated and related terms. (The most complex type of controlled vocabulary sometimes used to standardizean organization's terminology.)
Metadata Schema - specific fields used to describe a digital asset
Metadata Model Goals
How will improved metadata help?
Improve search results (precision and recall)
Enable knowledge / content discovery
Improve usability and learn-ability of applications
Reduce cost of delivering services, developing products and conducting operations
Improve operational efficiencies by enabling content reuse rather than re-creation
Metadata Model – Lessons Learned
Why metadata projects sometimes fail:
- Old patterns and obsolete thinking prevail
- “Full Text Search” Panacea - a “really good search engine” will solve the problem (metadata and taxonomy will improve any search function.)
- Overly complex taxonomy - too deep, too wide (granularity vs. improved usefulness and maintain-ability)
- Lack of education and understanding related to metadata implementation
- Failure to understand user needs
- Too much time wasted on semantics and 'what ifs'
Keys to Successful Metadata Modeling:
- Define and address the relevant “business use” case(s)
- Keep initial taxonomy flat, limit to 2 – 3 levels (depth) 12-15 categories (width)
- Avoid trend to over-design ... too many fields, too many options/choices
- Get corporate buy-in on the need to apply metadata accurately (adding bad metadata will quickly erode confidence in the entire system)
- Education/enforcement of metadata governance and maintenance procedures are critically important
- Use system analytics to refine and improve
Metadata Model – Lessons Learned
Bottom-Up Design Approach
Defining Business Use Cases:
- Measures for success - how will we know that the change is accomplished?
- Describe of the business issue - what’s changing?
- Describe the issue’s importance - why do we need the to change?
- Benefits of addressing the issue – how do we benefit now? Later?
- Costs associated with the change – short term? long term?
Modeling Digital Content:
User Focus
• Taxonomy Team - diverse group of users representative of end users
• Focus on needs of end users and content owners
Simplification
• Simplify requirements and guidelines to most basic level• Recognize that “better” is “good enough” to start… improve from there
Iteration
• Set expectations for long-term process• Focus on iterative design and evolutionary improvement
Bottom-Up Design Approach
• Build from there
Principles for Metadata Success:
• Define taxonomy, metadata, and related terms consistently
• Set expectations for long and challenging process:
- Everyone will not always agree on concepts, naming and categorization
- We don’t know all user needs (and won’t throughout the process)
- Not everything we do will be intuitive to all (or even most) users
- The taxonomy will never be completely finished or completely “right”
• Define overall goals – create an “Initial Taxonomy” and initial metadata strategy to use as a starting point
Bottom-Up Design Approach
