Metadata Association

Element Description

The Metadata Association element is used to identify other metadata resources that are dependent on or related to the data described by the metadata. Such metadata resources may include (but are not limited to): services, other collections, visualizations, variables, granules, documents, etc. 

Best Practices

Metadata Association is an optional element. It can be used to identify resources stored in different metadata records that are related to the data, and can also be used to define relationships between collections. For instance, a metadata association can be used to identify a parent metadata record if it exists. This usage should be reserved for instances where a group of metadata records are subsets that can be better represented by one parent metadata record, which describes the entire set. In some instances, a 'child' metadata record may point to more than one 'parent'.

The association must be made to another collection level metadata record (via the Entry Id sub-element, which should contain the related collection's Short Name) and then the Type and Description fields can be used to further explain the relationship (whether it be the to the collection itself, or to a component provided in the other collection's metadata such as a service, document, visualization, etc.).      

There are four sub-elements that comprise Metadata Association:

      Entry ID: The Short Name of the target metadata record that is associated with the collection record. The Entry ID is required and should point to another collection level metadata record that includes the related information. 

      Version: The version of the target metadata record that is associated with the collection record. Providing a version is optional, but is recommended if the associated collection has multiple available versions. 

      Type: The type of association between the collection metadata record and the target metadata record. Providing a Type is optional, but recommended. This is a controlled vocabulary field and must be select from the following options:

• SCIENCE ASSOCIATED: There is an associated science resource (such as a document or data) in the target metadata record.  
• DEPENDENT: The collection is somehow dependent on the target record.  
• INPUT: The target record is an input to the collection. For example, the target record could be a lower level data product that was input to an algorithm & processed to create the collection. 
• PARENT: The target record is a parent of the collection. This means the collection is a subset or 'child' of a larger parent collection. 
• CHILD: The target record is a child of the collection. This means the collection is a parent record with a number of associated 'child' records. 
• RELATED: The target record is somehow related to the collection. 
• LARGER CITATION WORKS: There is a document cited in the target record that is related to the collection.  

Description: Free-text description of the association between the collection and the target metadata record. Providing a description is optional, but can be important for identifying a specific related resource such as a document, citation or piece of data in the target metadata record (recommended for SCIENCE ASSOCIATED, DEPENDENT, INPUT, RELATED and LARGER CITATION WORKS association types). 

Examples:

EntryId: "AST_L1A" 

Version: "4"

Type: "INPUT"

Description: "Raw sensor counts that were converted to radiometric values found in this collection"

EntryId: "g3atb" 

Version: "4"

Type: "SCIENCE ASSOCIATED"

Description: "This is the SAGE III Level 1B solar transmission file containing 85 profiles from zero to 100 km in 0.5 km intervals that are used in inversion algorithms to extract the measured species associated with the transmission wavelengths."

Metadata Validation and QA/QC

All metadata entering the CMR goes through the below process to ensure metadata quality requirements are met. All records undergo CMR validation before entering the system. The process of QA/QC is slightly different for NASA and non-NASA data providers. Non-NASA providers include interagency and international data providers and are referred to as the International Directory Network (IDN).

Please see the expandable sections below for flowchart details.

Dialect Mappings

UMM Migration

Future Mappings

ADD EXAMPLE

MetadataAssociations: [
  - {
       Type: "INPUT",
       Description: "Raw sensor counts to be converted to radiometric values",
       EntryId: "AST_L1A"
       Version: "4"
    }
],

History

UMM Versioning

ARC Documentation