Formal metadata information and software

DBFExplorer: A better tool to help document DBF files

DBFExplorer is a software tool designed to facilitate the documentation of data contained in DBF files. These data files are increasingly common because they are used to store attributes of geographic features in shapefiles used and produced by ESRI products. DBFExplorer is at this point very experimental, and needs refinement, but is ready for testing by the hardiest of metadata writers. I expect this may be more useful than dbfmeta, at least for some operations.

The Interface

When the DBFExplorer script is run, the main window appears. Choose Open from the File menu to select a DBF file. If you already have a metadata record, choose that as well. When you click OK, both files will be opened and compared. Here's what the File-Open dialog looks like. If you don't have metadata, leave that field blank and click OK anyway. It'll create metadata for you.
You may see a window titled Warnings that shows you potential problems and allows you to fix them. Here's and example of the Warnings dialog. Three different problems might be presented to you: Interface of DBFExplorer The DBFExplorer interface shows in a list the fields present in the DBF file, along with a set of tabbed windows that present the information that is known about the selected field.

Download

DBFExplorer is written in Tcl/Tk but uses mq (an extension to Tcl for handling metadata) as well as a heretofore unreleased Tcl extension for reading DBF files. You'll need several different things:
ActiveTcl ActiveState's distribution of the Tcl/Tk toolkit
dbfexplorer.tcl DBFExplorer Tcl script
mq-2.6.zip A Tcl extension for managing metadata
tcldbf A Tcl extension for reading DBF files

Installation instructions for MS Windows

1. Install Tcl/Tk by running the ActiveState installer.

   I will assume you allow it to install in C:\Tcl

2. Extract mq-2.6.zip into C:\Tcl\lib

3. Extract tcldbf into C:\Tcl\lib

4. Find the script dbfexplorer.tcl on your system and double-click it.

It also runs on Linux, of course. Contact me for instructions.

Limitations and planned improvements

Technical contact:

    Peter N. Schweitzer
    Mail Stop 954, National Center
    U.S. Geological Survey
    Reston, VA 20192

    Tel: (703) 648-6533
    FAX: (703) 648-6252
    Email: pschweitzer@usgs.gov