Module 1 - Introduction to Metadata || Exercise 1 - Name That Photo
Module 2 - Metadata in the Geospatial World || Exercise 2 - The Big Blow
Metadata Tutorial Home || Metadata Home

Welcome to the NOAA Coastal Services Center's On-line Metadata Tutorial

This course is designed to help you learn how to write high-quality metadata.

The course is divided into various modules. The first module is an introductory module targeted at those who are not familiar with metadata and their importance.

In this first module, you will learn

• How to define metadata
• Basic components of good metadata
• How to write simple metadata

Subsequent modules will focus on

• Types of information metadata should capture
• How best to capture that information
• Good metadata writing techniques
• Metadata standardization

Work through this material at your leisure. Each module builds on what you have learned in the previous module, so it is a good idea to do them in sequence. Individual modules will take anywhere from 15 minutes to a couple of hours to complete. Along the way, there will be various exercises that reinforce the particular subject being discussed. You are strongly encouraged to work through these exercises. They will augment what is being taught, and will give you an opportunity to actually write metadata if you never have before. When working the exercises, we will be comparing your answers to our answers. For some items, these should be identical. For other, more subjective questions, answers may vary. If you want to keep your answers, print out the comparison page.

Let's begin...

Module 1 - Introduction to Metadata