Is there a standard metadata schema and format other than the seemingly ad hoc stuff that MapInfo supports? I mean all that \\ stuff
It would seem to be the ideal target for some good XML utility. I know I had a look at Lars' small venture into XML for (as I recall) metadata, but I found that the XML produced did not pass XML Spy's testing. That's a small problem, the larger one is an accepted metadata schema - imho the ANZLIC (Australian) metadata schema is so lengthy and cumbersome that I would be deterred if I had to fill in all that stuff for every table, keystroke by keystroke. There are utilities for generating standard ANZLIC metadata where a project manager or agency sets up a lot of defaults. They had an Access application that did that, and I believe that Encom's Discover pushes metadata into Access storage. I'm not sure it's 2-way though: it would seem much easier to do data-intensive stuff within Access and push it back to Mapinfo's swathe of loose files (it's the TAB that has the metadata, I believe) in a single operation (MapBasic). IL Thomas
