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Supporting Documents

This page lists a series of documents being developed to assist contributors in providing data and metadata.

Limiting Access to Sensitive Data in CoRIS
Technical Guidelines for Metadata Preparation
Keywords Used in Metadata
Biological Data - Taxonomy
Metadata Examples
Basic FGDC Metadata Templates
Metadata Crosswalk
CoRIS Development

Policy Document: Limiting Access to Sensitive Data in CoRIS

This policy document outlines the process, criteria, and types of access from the Coral Reef Information System (CoRIS) for specific types of coral research data that require limited access, as defined by the Coral Reef Conservation Program. View the policy document here (pdf, 108kb).

Technical Guidelines for Metadata Preparation

Technical Guidelines for Metadata Preparation, Version 4.3. November 2009 (pdf, 148kb)

This document provides an overview of the CoRIS project and the importance of metadata to CoRIS. It outlines CoRIS required metadata elements, presents guidelines and instructions for completing metadata fields, provides sample metadata, and contains ASCII metadata templates for CoRIS as well as for the full FGDC (Federal Geographic Data Committee) standard. It also provides links to Web sites with metadata standards and tools for working with metadata.

Keywords Used in Metadata

These documents contain lists of keywords used in metadata to help describe coral reef data sets. The lists are useful in creating metadata and in searching for coral reef data and information.

Theme Keywords

CoRIS Theme Keywords (pdf, 60 kb)

Discovery Keywords

CoRIS Discovery Keywords (pdf, 44 kb)

Place Keywords

Biological Data - Taxonomy

Many data sets, and their metadata, include lists of species about which data are available. A consolidated, alphabetical list of all names found in CoRIS metadata can be viewed as a spreadsheet comma delimited file (xls, 452 kb). The list includes scientific names with their corresponding higher taxa, based on the NOAA classification standard of the Integrated Taxonomic Information System (ITIS). The taxonomy of the names included in this list can be used as a standard without going to the ITIS Web site.

The format is: Genus species - Family - Order - Class - Phylum - Kingdom. Although alphabetically listed by genus / species, users of the spread sheet file can sort the list as to suit their needs. CoRIS uses the five kingdom classification scheme: Monera, Fungi, Protista, Plantae, Animalia.

The list can be used to add species names and their higher taxa while creating metadata. It contains taxon levels required by CoRIS; however, metadata authors may also list sub-, super-, infra- and other taxonomic ranks, as they wish. For species not yet included in ITIS, CoRIS requests that a reference to the classification authority be included with the metadata description.

This species list is not conclusive and is updated periodically as "new" species are listed in the metadata records. Before creating a metadata record, users should check this site for the latest update.

Metadata Examples

Several CoRIS metadata records are presented as examples for different data types.

FGDC Content Standards for Digital Geospatial Metadata - ASCII and XML Templates

The following two, blank metadata templates are based on basic FGDC Content Standards for Digital Geospatial Metadata and are provided as an aid to persons preparing metadata for CoRIS.  Please note that the templates include only those metadata fields that NOAA's Coral Reef Conservation Program (CRCP) requires be completed by persons submitting metadata to CoRIS.  The blank metadata templates are presented in both .txt and .xml formats; however, CoRIS requests that metadata be provided in a .xml format to the project. 

Blank ASCII Metadata Record - Minimum CRCP Fields

Blank XML Metadata Record - Minimum CRCP Fields

Metadata Crosswalk

The relationship between the FGDC, MARC21, and Dublin Core metadata standards are presented in the Metadata Crosswalk (pdf, 756 kb).

CoRIS Development

The following documents provide additional background context of the early stages of CoRIS development:

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