{"id":34237,"date":"2022-05-18T16:43:42","date_gmt":"2022-05-18T16:43:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.arimetrics.com\/glosario-digital\/metadata"},"modified":"2026-09-30T10:14:54","modified_gmt":"2026-09-30T10:14:54","slug":"metadata","status":"publish","type":"encyclopedia","link":"https:\/\/www.arimetrics.com\/en\/digital-glossary\/metadata","title":{"rendered":"Metadata"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"boxpad wp-image-34443 size-full alignright\" src=\"https:\/\/www.arimetrics.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/05\/16.jpg\" alt=\"Metadata\" width=\"300\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.arimetrics.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/05\/16.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.arimetrics.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/05\/16-150x150.jpg 150w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><strong>Definition<\/strong>:<\/p>\n<p><strong>Metadata<\/strong> is structured data that describes, identifies, contextualises or helps manage another resource. The resource may be a web page, image, document, product, dataset or even a person. Metadata is therefore often summarised as &#8220;data about data&#8221;, although its role extends beyond a simple description.<\/p>\n<p>Metadata can indicate who created a file, when it was modified, which format it uses, which rights apply to it or how it relates to other items. It may be embedded in the resource itself, stored in an external system or connected through identifiers. A <strong>shared structure<\/strong> allows people and applications to find, interpret, exchange and maintain information consistently.<\/p>\n\n<h2>Metadata classification<\/h2>\n<p>Classification depends on the context, and the same property may serve more than one purpose. The most common categories describe <strong>what information<\/strong> metadata provides and which process uses it:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Descriptive:<\/strong> Identifies and explains a resource through details such as title, creator, subject, language, summary or keywords.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Administrative:<\/strong> Helps control the creation, acquisition, access and maintenance of a resource.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Technical:<\/strong> Records characteristics needed to process it, such as format, dimensions, encoding, resolution or creation software.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Preservation:<\/strong> Documents provenance, changes, integrity checks and actions needed to keep it accessible over time.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Rights:<\/strong> Expresses ownership, licences, access restrictions and conditions for reuse.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Structural:<\/strong> Indicates how the parts of a resource are ordered or connected, such as pages in a digital book or scenes in a video.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>These categories may be organised through a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.arimetrics.com\/en\/digital-glossary\/taxonomy\">taxonomy<\/a>, controlled vocabulary or local schema. <strong>Semantic consistency<\/strong> is essential: two systems can only exchange and reuse the data reliably when they interpret the properties in compatible ways.<\/p>\n<h2>Applications of metadata<\/h2>\n<p>Metadata turns a collection of files or records into information that can be searched, filtered and managed. Its <strong>operational value<\/strong> appears in many environments:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Libraries and archives:<\/strong> Catalogues works, editions, creators, subjects and access conditions.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Content systems:<\/strong> Organises publications by date, author, category, language, status or content type.<\/li>\n<li><strong>E-commerce:<\/strong> Describes products through attributes such as brand, reference, price, availability, size or colour.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Digital assets:<\/strong> Makes images, videos and documents easier to find and reuse within an organisation.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Analytics and data:<\/strong> Documents the origin, meaning, format, owner and transformations of each field.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Metadata can also automate validation, apply permissions, distinguish versions and connect related resources. Within a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.arimetrics.com\/en\/digital-glossary\/data-strategy\">data strategy<\/a>, reliable metadata reduces ambiguity and clarifies where information came from and how it may be used.<\/p>\n<h2>Metadata on a web page<\/h2>\n<p>A website brings together several forms of metadata. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.arimetrics.com\/en\/digital-glossary\/meta-tag\">Meta tags<\/a> are HTML elements that communicate details such as a description, character encoding or certain directives, but they <strong>do not cover<\/strong> all the metadata associated with a page. The title, canonical links, HTTP headers, CMS data and other elements also provide information about the resource.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.arimetrics.com\/en\/digital-glossary\/schema-markup\">Schema markup<\/a> adds structured data using a <strong>shared vocabulary<\/strong> to describe entities and their relationships. It can be expressed through JSON-LD, Microdata or RDFa. The general concept of metadata should not be confused with a particular syntax or a specific tag.<\/p>\n<p>Search engines use some metadata alongside visible content, links and other signals to crawl, interpret and present pages. A description may contribute to the snippet displayed on a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.arimetrics.com\/en\/digital-glossary\/serp\">SERP<\/a>, while certain directives control indexing or previews. Metadata nevertheless <strong>does not guarantee<\/strong> rankings by itself and should accurately represent the content.<\/p>\n<h2>Metadata life cycle<\/h2>\n<p>Metadata needs to be maintained throughout the life cycle of its resource. <strong>Ongoing management<\/strong> usually includes these stages:<\/p>\n<ol>\n<li><strong>Definition:<\/strong> The necessary properties, vocabularies and validation rules are selected.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Creation:<\/strong> Values are entered manually, extracted from the resource or generated automatically.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Validation:<\/strong> Fields are checked for completeness, expected formatting and correspondence with the correct resource.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Updating:<\/strong> Changes in status, version, location, rights or content are reflected to prevent stale information.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Retention or removal:<\/strong> Data needed for traceability and compliance is retained, or removed when it is no longer valid and there is no duty to keep it.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p><strong>Responsibility<\/strong> for each stage should be clear. If a resource changes while its metadata remains unchanged, searches, integrations and decisions based on it may become inaccurate.<\/p>\n<h2>Metadata quality<\/h2>\n<p>Quality does not depend on accumulating fields, but on making the data <strong>accurate and useful<\/strong> for its purpose. A sound metadata set should be complete where necessary, consistent with the chosen vocabulary, understandable, current and verifiable.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Useful controls<\/strong> include assigning owners, defining required fields, restricting formats and accepted values, recording provenance and reviewing duplicates. On a website, this discipline prevents generic descriptions, conflicting directives and structured data that does not match visible content. For <a href=\"https:\/\/www.arimetrics.com\/en\/seo-agency-spain\">search engine optimisation<\/a>, the priority is for each technical metadata item to be valid, specific and consistent with its page.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Definition: Metadata is structured data that describes, identifies, contextualises or helps manage another resource. The resource may be a web page, image, document, product, dataset or even a person. Metadata is therefore often summarised as &#8220;data about data&#8221;, although its role extends beyond a simple description. Metadata can indicate who created a file, when it [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":0,"template":"","encyclopedia-tag":[1391],"class_list":["post-34237","encyclopedia","type-encyclopedia","status-publish","hentry","encyclopedia-tag-content-classification"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.arimetrics.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/encyclopedia\/34237","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.arimetrics.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/encyclopedia"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.arimetrics.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/encyclopedia"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.arimetrics.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.arimetrics.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34237"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"encyclopedia-tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.arimetrics.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/encyclopedia-tag?post=34237"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}