Field Descriptions for DOCUMENT, SOFTWARE, IMAGE, SOUND, VIDEO, MAILARCHIVE, USENET, DATASET and FAQ IAFA Template Types

This document is extracted from the IAFA Templates Internet Draft and is intended to provide a little online guidance on the sort of the things that should be placed in the various fields. Note that not all fields need to be filled in; which ones you use as a "minimum" set depend on your application. The templates for Documents, Datasets, Mailing List Archives, Usenet Archives, Software Packages, Images, Sounds, Videos and Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) files all contain the same fields, but have different "Template-Type" values. The standard Template-Types are:
   Type of Object                      Template-Type
   Arbitrary data set:                 DATASET
   Document:                           DOCUMENT
   Image:                              IMAGE
   Software Package:                   SOFTWARE
   Mailing List Archive:               MAILARCHIVE
   Usenet Archive:                     USENET
   Sound File:                         SOUND
   Video File:                         VIDEO
   Frequently Asked Questions File:    FAQ

Description of Field Contents

   Data Element Name        Description.

   Handle:                  Handle of object.
   Category:                Type of object. See Note <1>
   Title:                   Complete title of the object.
   URI-v*:                  Description of access to object.
   Short-Title:             Summary title (if the Title is
                            very long).
   Alternative-Title:     An alternative to
                            the Title or Short-Title
                            title fields.
   Author-(USER*):          Description/contact information
                            about the authors/creators of
                            the object.
   Admin-(USER*):           Description/contact information
                            about the
                            administrators/maintainers of
                            the object.
   Source:                  Information as to the definitive version
                            of the object.
   Requirements:            Any requirements for the use of
                            the object. A free text descrip-
                            tion of any hardware/software
                            requirements necessary to use
                            the object.
   Description:             Description (that is, "abstract"
                            in the case of documents) of the
                            object.
   Citation:                The prefered method of refering to
                            this object when used in other works.
   Publication-Status:      Current publication status of
                            object (draft, published etc.).
   Publisher-(ORGANIZATION*):Description/contact information
                            about object publisher.
   Copyright:               The copyright statement. Any
                            additional information on the
                            copying policy may be included.
   Creation-Date:           The creation date for the
                            object.
   Discussion:              Free text description of possi-
                            ble discussion forums (USENET
                            groups, mailing lists) appropri-
                            ate for this object.
   Keywords:                Appropriate keywords for this
                            object.
   Version-v*:              A version designator for the
                            object.
   Format-v*:               Formats in which the object is
                            available. (See Note <2>)
   Size-v*:                 Length of object in bytes
                            (octets).
   Language-v*:             The name of the language in
                            which the object is written. For
                            documents this would be the
                            natural language. For software
                            this would be the programming
                            language.
   Character-Set-v*:        The character set of the object.
                            This should be a well-known
                            value for example "ASCII" or
                            "ISO Latin-1".
   ISBN-v*:                 The International Standard Book
                            Number of the object.
   ISSN-v*:                 The International Standard
                            Serial Number of the object.
   Last-Revision-Date-v*:   Last date that the object was
                            revised.
   Subject-Descriptor-Scheme-v*:Name of classification
                            scheme used in the corresponding 
                            Subject-Descriptor field.
   Subject-Descriptor-v*:   A classification
                            mark for the resource.
   To-Be-Reviewed-Date:     Date on which the resource is
                            expected to require re-assessment.
   Record-Last-Verified-Email:Email address of the
                            person who last verified this 
                            template.
   Record-Last-Verified-Date:Date of the last
                            verification of this template.
   Comments:                Comments by the template
                            creator(s).
   Destination:             Records which database(s)
                            a template will go into once
                            evaluation procedures have 
                            been completed.

Notes for these templates:

<1> The intention of this field is to define the category of the object. For example, in the case of documents it could be "Technical Report", or "Conference Paper" and the name and date of the conference at which the paper was presented. It may also be something like "General Guide" or "User manual".

<2> Objects are often available in several formats. For example, documents may be in PostScript, ASCII text, DVI etc. For images this may be GIF, JPEG, TIFF etc. Format should be specified in MIME type syntax and semantics where possible (See RFC1521).


Example 1:

Example of DOCUMENT record.
   Template-Type:           DOCUMENT

   Title:                   The Function of Homeoboxes in
                            Yeast Chromosome 1
   Author-Name:             John Doe
   Author-Email:            jdoe@yeast.foobar.com
   Author-Home-Phone:       +1 898 555 1212
   Author-Name:             Jane Buck
   Author-Email:            jane@fungus.newu.edu
   Last-Revision-Date:      27 Nov 1991
   Category:                Conference paper. Yeastcon,
                            January 1992, Mushroom Rock, CA,
                            USA
   Description:             Homeoboxes have been shown to
                            have a significant impact on the
                            expressions of genes in Chromo-
                            some 1 of Bakers' Yeast.
   Citation:                J. Doe, J. Buck, The function of
                            homeoboxes in Yeast Chromosome
                            1, Conf.  proc. Yeastcon, Janu-
                            ary 1992, Mushroom Rock, pp.
                            33-50
   Publication-Status:      Published
   Publisher-Organization-Name:
                            Yeast-Hall
   Publisher-Organization-Postal:
                            1212 5th Avenue NY, NY, 12001
   Copyright:               The copyright on this document
                            is held by the authors. It may
                            be freely copied and quoted as
                            long as the contribution of the
                            authors is acknowledged
   Subject-Descriptor-Scheme-v1:
                            LCC 
   Subject-Descriptor-v1:   1701D
   Keywords:                homeobox, yeast, chromosome,
                            DNA, sequencing, yeastcon
   Format-v:                Application/PostScript
   URI-v0:                  ftp://ftp.fungus.newu.edu/pub/yeast/homeobox1.ps
   Language-v0              English
   Size-v0:                 18 pages
   Format-v1                text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
   URI-v1                   ftp://ftp.fungus.newu.edu/pub/yeast/homeobox1.txt
   Size-v1                  13 pages
   Language-v1              Russian

Example 2:

This is an example of a SOFTWARE record. Note the use of the software maintainer's "handle" instead of the explicit con- tact information.
   Template-Type:           SOFTWARE
   Title:                   Beethoven's Fifth Player
   Version:                 67
   Author-Name:             Ludwig Van Beethoven
   Author-Email:            beet@romantic.power.org
   Author-Fax:              +43 1 123 4567
   Admin-Handle:            berlioz01
   Description:             The program provides the novice
                            to Transitional Classical-
                            Romantic music a V-window inter-
                            face to the author's latest com-
                            position
   Abstract:                V-window based music player
   Requirements:            Requires the V-Window system
                            version 10 or higher
   Discussion:              USENET rec.music.classical
   Copyright:               Freely redistributable for non-
                            commercial use.  Copyright held
                            by author
   Keywords:                Classical music, V-windows
   Format:                  LZ compressed
   URI:                     gopher://power.org/00/pub/Vfifth.tar.Z