GBIF has always provided basic metadata for resources on its network. Data publishers first use the GBIF Registry to list their web service access point (e.g., for DiGIR/TAPIR installations). Thereafter, the DiGIR and TAPIR communication protocols are used to retrieve metadata from the publishers, and this is augmented with information derived during the dataset indexing process (see metadata elements). Such metadata is available on the data portal through the four main search routes (species, countries, datasets and occurrences).
In addition, there are three Representational state transfer (REST)-style web services for accessing metadata about resources. The currently supported response format is a simple XML structure for all three:
- Dataset metadata service – returns metadata related to the datasets accessible through the GBIF portal
- Data provider metadata service – returns metadata on the providers sharing data through the GBIF portal
- Data network metadata service – returns metadata on the data networks connected to the GBIF portal.
GBIF Metadata Catalogue
GBIF has implemented a metadata catalogue with simple and advanced search functionality. The catalogue is populated with metadata mainly derived from the GBIF cache and indexing process but also including a number of online accessible metadata catalogues.
Metadata publishing using the GBIF IPT
GBIF's Integrated Publishing Toolkit (IPT) provides a means of managing and publishing metadata to the GBIF network (IPT and Metadata). Metadata documents produced using the IPT are stored on the local network.
