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Metadata
With the RDMS you have the option to enrich your files and folders with metadata. It will be easier to retrieve that specific file from about a year ago that was collected by Pietje Puk with camera number A. Or those measurements done by student assistant Marian who has left the UG. It is even possible to use metadata to set automation in motion. You can use metadata to move data to a specific spot; copy files to the HPC cluster and start computing on these files.
Metadata is “data that provides information about other data” In other words, it is “data about data.”
The RDMS is based on iRODS; an Integrated Rule-Oriented Data System. All files and folders are data objects with metadata directly attached to the data objects. This allows for many extra possibilities of data handling.
It allows you to retrieve data on the basis of metadata. This metadata will at least contain the date when it was produced, the size of the file and the owner of it. But then the possible metadata tags lie with the owner of the file or folder. The owner can decide on using metadata tags like the name of the machine that produced the data, the angle of that machine, the experiment number for which it was produced. The possibilities are endless.
Metadata also allows the automatic ingest of data to the folder structure of the RDMS and certain metadata fields can me made can be obligatory and must be filled in before uploading. Metadata can also be used to trigger actions. For instance; it can be used to copy and compute data to the High Performance Cluster.
MetaData in the WebApp
In the WebApp of the RDMS we build an easy interface to add metadata to files and folders. It is also possible to build a template for metadata you want to add. With a template adding metadata is simplified and unified for the data in that folder.