Decentralized geospatial metadata management

Metadata descriptions are typically monolithic data structures and their denormalized, text-based nature yields shortcomings such as inconsistencies and heterogeneities. Moreover, fluidity of research environments, coupled with single-tenancy of metadata descriptions, impedes enforcing authority on the related datasets effectively. We propose a novel paradigm for metadata articulation, delegation, that helps solve the aforementioned issues. After elaborating on the requirements to this practice, we present two worked-out implementation examples in the domain of geospatial metadata and discuss its advantages with respect to key issues in this domain; namely, metadata consistency, interoperability, and mitigating semantic heterogeneity. The technique and the supporting software we present are equally applicable to any XML-based metadata schema and application domain.