[LTER-im] The entity @id in EML and its use

[Corinna Gries]

Dear IMs,


We, EDI, have been discussing how best to populate the entity at id attribute field in EML and I would like to open this discussion up and get your input. Analyzing the existing EML files I see that two sites (HFR, KBS) are consistently using this attribute, while all other sites use it only occasionally or not at all.


<dataTable id="12345">

    <entityName>...</entityName>

    <...>

</dataTable>


So far, we have come up with three use cases where this id attribute would be important:


  1.  Reference an entity in a different data package. This may be used to document provenance in a derived dataset.

  2.  Documenting which entity has been accessed in a scripted workflow. The distribution/download URL would also be unique, of course, but doesn’t specify that it is an entity ID in EML. Hence, it would be cleaner documentation in EML if we populate the entity at id.

  3.  Reference an entity from within the EML document when the goal is to keep all annotations together within the <annotations> element. (Annotations may also be added directly at the entity level and no reference is needed.)

e.g.:

<annotations>

 <annotation references="12345">

  <propertyURI label="is about">http://purl.obolibrary.org/obo/IAO_0000136</propertyURI>

  <valueURI label="grassland biome">http://purl.obolibrary.org/obo/ENVO_01000177</valueURI>

 </annotation>

<annotations>


The issues we would like to discuss are:


How are you using the entity at id? Is it important in your local management system?


We think that by the time the data package is in the EDI system the entity should have an EDI identifier fully qualified for the EDI system. However, that may either enable the three use cases or cause problems with all three of them depending on how the attribute is used locally at the site.


thanks,

Corinna

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.lternet.edu/pipermail/im/attachments/20211104/4ceeb1cc/attachment.html>