What is EML?
Ecological Metadata Language (EML) is a metadata specification developed by the ecology discipline and for the ecology discipline. It is based on prior work done by the Ecological Society of America and associated efforts (Michener et al., 1997, Ecological Applications). EML is implemented as a series of XML (Extensible Markup Language) document types that can by used in a modular and extensible manner to document ecological data. Each EML module is designed to describe one logical part of the total metadata that should be included with any ecological dataset.
LTER has generated a vast number of data sets, which have the potential
to greatly enhance understanding of the complexity of the biosphere. However,
broad-scale or synthetic research is stymied because data are largely
unorganized and inaccessible as a consequence of their tremendous heterogeneity,
complexity, and spatial dispersion in many separate repositories. EML
has been adopted as the first metadata content standard for the LTER Network
and was designed specifically to facilitate integration of ecological
data. Wide adoption and use of EML will create exciting new opportunities
for data discovery, access, integration and synthesis. New IM Review Criteria
state that metadata shall be EML-compliant at level 2 (discovery).
Source: http://knb.ecoinformatics.org/software/eml/
Metadata in the SGS Information Management System vary in richness, since fifteen percent of our data sets are legacy data sets from older work conducted by the USFS and during the International Biome Program. Because of this, information required to meet the new LTER standard metadata content of EML may not be available. Metadata for more recent and current SGS data sets can be submitted directly to the RDBMS (Relational Database Management System) by students and PIs via web-based forms. We recognize the importance of maintaining robust metadata to ensure the usability of data in the future and are making efforts to conform our metadata tables in the RDBMS to EML according to the EML Best Practices document. We have a strategy to bring metadata in the RDBMS to Level 2 EML by exporting metadata content in XML and converting the XML to EML with XSLT (Extensible Stylesheet Language Transformation) conversion scripts. Experts at the LTER Network Office have contributed to our efforts by providing licenses for software tools, example code, and tools for harvesting SGS metadata to a Metacat, a remote ecological metadata catalog. The SGS has also contributed to a community model metadata management system in RDBMS that is being developed and implemented at various LTER sites by the LTER Network office. Lastly, an EML tool for spatial data in the Geographic Information System that was developed at the CAP (Central Arizona Phoenix) LTER site was tested on SGS GIS metadata to generate EML.
SGS EML can be discovered in the LTER Network Office metacat in Albuquerque (http://knb.lternet.edu:8088/query/) or the NCEAS (National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis, http://www.nceas.ucsb.edu/fmt/doc?/frames.html) metacat in Santa Barbara (knb.ecoinformatics.org). Our first EML files are complete and valid for several soils studies, and can be discovered by querying keywords, such as Kelly, Soils, and Shortgrass Steppe. This exercise serves as a proof-of-concept for generating EML from the SGS Information Management System. The IM team and PIs need to work together to supplement the quality of metadata for legacy data sets and continue to record robust metadata for new studies to participate in synthesis research, and address broader scale ecological questions in the future. We will continue to build IM tools based on the foundation of the SGS RDBMS to generate more EML.
Glossary of Terms:
RDBMS – A type of data management system that stores data in the form of related tables. Information including data, metadata, personnel, and citations for different publications are spread across different tables, and as a result, the information can be joined together to be viewed in many different ways. Source: http://www.webopedia.com/TERM/R/RDBMS.html
XML - Extensible Markup Language is a text format that is simple and flexible enough to allow designers to create their own tags, which enable the definition, transmission, validation and intepretation of data between applications and organizations. Sources: http://www.webopedia.com/TERM/X/XML.html, http://www.w3.org/XML/
XSLT – Extensible Stylesheet Language Transformations allow us
to transform our structured information into an order that meets a purpose
other then how it is created and stored. The transformation is expressed
in an XML model of elements and attributes, in our case, from the SGS-LTER
RDBMS. The transformation occurs by creating “an example”
of how data from the SGS-LTER XML model maps to the EML model. Source:
http://www.xml.com/pub/a/2000/08/holman/index.html?page=3#xsltdesc
An Example of SGS EML for the Central Plains Experimental Range Soil Survey Data Set:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<eml:eml xmlns:eml="eml://ecoinformatics.org/eml-2.0.1" xmlns:stmml="http://www.xml-cml.org/schema/stmml"
xmlns:sw="eml://ecoinformatics.org/software-2.0.1" xmlns:cit="eml://ecoinformatics.org/literature-2.0.1"
xmlns:ds="eml://ecoinformatics.org/dataset-2.0.1" xmlns:prot="eml://ecoinformatics.org/protocol-2.0.1"
xmlns:doc="eml://ecoinformatics.org/documentation-2.0.1" xmlns:res="eml://ecoinformatics.org/resource-2.0.1"
xmlns:xs="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
xsi:schemaLocation="eml://ecoinformatics.org/eml-2.0.1 C:/eml-2.0.1/eml.xsd"
system="knb" packageId="knb-lter-sgs.3.1" scope="system">
<dataset>
<alternateIdentifier>cprsurvey</alternateIdentifier>
<title>CPER Soil Survey</title>
<creator>
<individualName>
<givenName>Gene</givenName>
<surName>Kelly</surName>
</individualName>
<organizationName>Department of Soil and Crop Sciences</organizationName>
<address>
<deliveryPoint>Colorado State University</deliveryPoint>
<city>Fort Collins</city>
<administrativeArea>CO</administrativeArea>
<postalCode>80523</postalCode>
<country>USA</country>
</address>
<phone phonetype="voice">(970) 491-6881</phone>
<electronicMailAddress>eugene.kelly@colostate.edu</electronicMailAddress>
<onlineUrl>http://www.colostate.edu/Depts/SoilCrop/kelly.html</onlineUrl>
</creator>
<metadataProvider>
<organizationName>Colorado State University</organizationName>
<address>
<deliveryPoint>Department of Soil and Crop Sciences</deliveryPoint>
<deliveryPoint>College of Agricultural Sciences</deliveryPoint>
<city>Fort Collins</city>
<administrativeArea>Colorado</administrativeArea>
<postalCode>80523-1170</postalCode>
<country>USA</country>
</address>
<phone phonetype="voice">970-491-2366</phone>
<phone phonetype="fax">970-491-2156</phone>
<electronicMailAddress>sallie.sprague@colostate.edu</electronicMailAddress>
<onlineUrl>http://sgs.cnr.colostate.edu/</onlineUrl>
</metadataProvider>
<pubDate>2005</pubDate>
<abstract>
<para>
<literalLayout> Al; CEC; bulk density; available H2O; sand, silt
and clay mineralogy. Soil samples were not archived. The soil map was
digitized using GRAS software.</literalLayout>
</para>
</abstract>
<keywordSet>
<keyword keywordType="theme">Yonker</keyword>
<keyword keywordType="theme"> Kelly</keyword>
<keyword keywordType="theme"> soil survey</keyword>
<keyword keywordType="theme"> soil series</keyword>
</keywordSet>
<additionalInfo>
<section>
<para>
<literalLayout>need to query NRCS database for data - add some directions</literalLayout>
</para>
</section>
</additionalInfo>
<intellectualRights>
<section>
<para>
<emphasis> Shortgrass Steppe (SGS) LTER data sets represent years
of hard work by dedicated scientists and technicians. Please respect the
effort that went into the creation of these data sets. If you plan to
use the SGS LTER data sets, please follow the SGS LTER data acquisition
policy outlined below. Thank you for your cooperation. </emphasis>
<itemizedlist>
<listitem>
<para>
<literalLayout>1. Before downloading data: Please send or email
the SGS Data manager a short notice stating your reasons for acquiring
data and a description of your publication intent.</literalLayout>
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<literalLayout>2. Prior to Submission: Please send a copy of the
report or manuscript to the principal investigator of the data. The SGS
LTER should be adequately cited in any resulting publications.</literalLayout>
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<literalLayout> 3. Please Include Tag Line in Report or Manuscript:
Data sets were provided by the Shortgrass Steppe Long Term Ecological
Research group, a partnership between Colorado State University, United
States Department of Agriculture, Agricultural Research Service, and the
U.S. Forest Service Pawnee National Grassland. Significant funding for
these data was provided by the National Science Foundation Long Term Ecological
Research program (NSF Grant Number DEB-0217631).</literalLayout>
</para>
</listitem>
</itemizedlist>
<literalLayout>If you would like a more in-depth explanation of
the data acquisition policy, you can download the policy in it's entirety
(in Microsoft Word format) here.
SGS-LTER is currently discussing how the new LTER Network Data Access
Policy Revision applies to SGS data. The LTER Network Policy and Report
may be downloaded (pdf format) here.
If you have any questions please email the SGS Information Manager, Nicole
Kaplan at Nicole.Kaplan@colostate.edu.
</literalLayout>
</para>
</section>
</intellectualRights>
<distribution>
<online>
<url>http://ssldata.nrcs.usda.gov/querypage.asp</url>
</online>
</distribution>
<coverage>
<geographicCoverage>
<geographicDescription>
Our SGS site encompasses a large portion of the Colorado Piedmont Section
of the western Great Plains. The extent is defined as the boundaries of
the Central Plains Experimental Range (CPER), which is managed by the
Agricultural Research Service (ARS), and the Pawnee National Grassland
(PNG), which is managed by the US Forest Service.
</geographicDescription>
<boundingCoordinates>
<westBoundingCoordinate>-104.785833</westBoundingCoordinate>
<eastBoundingCoordinate>-104.730556</eastBoundingCoordinate>
<northBoundingCoordinate>40.857500</northBoundingCoordinate>
<southBoundingCoordinate>40.800278</southBoundingCoordinate>
<boundingAltitudes>
<altitudeMinimum>1645.0</altitudeMinimum>
<altitudeMaximum>1675.1</altitudeMaximum>
<altitudeUnits>meter</altitudeUnits>
</boundingAltitudes>
</boundingCoordinates>
</geographicCoverage>
<temporalCoverage>
<rangeOfDates>
<beginDate>
<calendarDate>1990</calendarDate>
</beginDate>
<endDate>
<calendarDate>1991</calendarDate>
</endDate>
</rangeOfDates>
</temporalCoverage>
</coverage>
<purpose>
<para/>
</purpose>
<contact>
<individualName>
<givenName>J</givenName>
<surName>Aber</surName>
</individualName>
<address/>
</contact>
<publisher>
<organizationName>Colorado State University</organizationName>
<address>
<deliveryPoint>Department of Soil and Crop Sciences</deliveryPoint>
<deliveryPoint>College of Agricultural Sciences</deliveryPoint>
<city>Fort Collins</city>
<administrativeArea>Colorado</administrativeArea>
<postalCode>80523-1170</postalCode>
<country>USA</country>
</address>
<phone phonetype="voice">970-491-2366</phone>
<phone phonetype="fax">970-491-2156</phone>
<electronicMailAddress>sallie.sprague@colostate.edu</electronicMailAddress>
<onlineUrl>http://sgs.cnr.colostate.edu/</onlineUrl>
</publisher>
<access scope="document" order="allowFirst" authSystem="knb">
<allow>
<principal>uid=SGS,o=lter,dc=ecoinformatics,dc=org</principal>
<permission>all</permission>
</allow>
<allow>
<principal>public</principal>
<permission>read</permission>
</allow>
</access>
</dataset>
</eml:eml>
07/06/05