Traditional libraries manage their holdings using catalogs that contain information about every object they own. Metadata, characterized in Chapter 1 as “data about data,” is a recently coined term for this information. Metadata is information in a structured format and its purpose is to provide a description of other data objects in order to facilitate access to them. The data objects themselves (e.g., the books) generally contain unstructured information. Sometimes, as in the Humanity
Traditional librarians are in charge of storage and preservation of physical items, particularly books and periodicals. cataloging at a high level rather than one of detail
