Announcing DataCite Metadata Version 3.0
Scholarly research is producing more digital research data, and scholarly communication depends on data to verify findings, create new research, and share outcomes. Until recently, a persistent approach to access, identification, sharing, and re-use of datasets has been missing. DataCite, an international consortium of research libraries, national data centers and national libraries was founded to meet this need. California Digital Library (CDL) is a founding member of DataCite, and CDL’s EZID (http://n2t.net/ezid) service provides DataCite DOIs, as well as other identifiers.
Key new features of Version 3.0 include:
- Better support for depiction of dates by implementing the RKMS-ISO8601 standard for date ranges.
- New support for recording data collection location, with box and point coordinates, as well by using a free-text description.
- Provision of a mechanism to associate additional metadata so that discipline-specific descriptions can be added to DataCite’s more generic schema.
- And, finally, numerous improvements to the documentation, including:
- greater detail, explanatory material and definitions for controlled lists
- more and more varied XML examples on the Metadata Schema website
- and, indicators of which optional properties are most important for helping the metadata to be found, cited and linked to original research.
A full list of the changes can be found starting on page 4 of the documentation.
For EZID clients who use the application programming interface (API), these changes can be taken advantage of immediately. For information about how to submit a DataCite XML file, see (http://n2t.net/ezid/doc/apidoc.html#profile-datacite). For EZID clients who use the user interface (UI), we will be introducing a new DataCite XML entry form in the very near future conforming to the new V 3.0 schema.
For any questions or comments, please feel free to contact the EZID Team.