Functions

Metadata is to geospatial information users what guidebooks are to tourists.

Imagine yourself in a foreign city, looking for something to eat. What do you do? Refer to your guidebook for a list of available restaurants. Your guidebook describes their location, specialties, price ranges and other distinguishing features. With this information, you can then find (discover) a restaurant of interest to you.

At the restaurant itself, the menu posted outside describes the food available that day. By perusing the list of dishes offered, you can decide (evaluate) if you would like to enter the restaurant.

Once you are seated inside, you can use the table menu to choose (access) the dish that most appeals to your taste and budget.

Using a guidebook (of tourist metadata) is so much easier than blindly making your way through crowds of strangers, along unknown streets, in a foreign language… and hungry!