NBII - National Biological Information Infrastructure

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Toolkit - Metadata

NBII Metadata Activities

The NBII has been involved in metadata standards, creation, quality control, and hosting since the early 1990s. Standards such as the Federal Geographic Data Committee (FGDC) Biological Data Profile, Dublin Core, Darwin Core, and Open GIS are all used within the Program.

The NBII Metadata Program includes training sessions and workshops; metadata development tools; metadata creation services; quality control/metadata review; and an integrated FGDC-based metadata clearinghouse that provides access to over 40 distributed biological metadata clearinghouse nodes. Simultaneous access to all metadata content is provided through the NBII Search Engine .

NBII Metadata Quickfinder

NBII Image Gallery

What is metadata? - Metadata is simply data about data.

Metadata can be structured or unstructured and is often used to describe, summarize, and/or aid in the human and/or machine process of information.  

NBII uses:

FGDC Biological Data Profile - describing and documenting datasets

Dublin Core+ - describing and documenting web-sites, images, publications, and other web resources

Darwin Core - digitizing and sharing of collection information

Open GIS - in support of sharing, registering, and interoperability of geospatial data layers. 

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