This Web site contains information on activities of the National Geologic Map Database Project (NGMDB). The NGMDB is a collaborative effort primarily involving the USGS and the Association of American State Geologists. This Web site contains informal, generally time-sensitive material intended for project members, cooperators, and interested parties.

Background Information --
AASG/USGS Metadata
Working Group

At the August, 1996, AASG/USGS NGM Database meeting in St. Louis, Mo., a Metadata Working Group was formed. This Group was asked to provide, to Database participants, guidance on writing formal metadata. Properly written metadata will help support the use of digital geologic map information, accessed through the NGM Database, by providing helpful documentation on each map product.

Here was the Working Group's charge:

  1. Look at the "Content Standard for Digital Geospatial Metadata" for adequacy.
  2. Examine implementing metadata in a standard format for geologic maps.
  3. Establish guidelines as to what the metadata elements mean to a geologist.
  4. Determine a process for facilitating input from state geological surveys not represented at this meeting.
  5. Format a specific set of fields that must be filled out for the NGMDB map catalog.

The Working Group provides you with the following general information and links to metadata tools and Web sites. For clarification of technical details, please contact the Working Group chair, Peter Schweitzer. Please send general comments on the report, and advice on needs for additional work, to the Database project chief, Dave Soller.

This page is <URL:http://ngmdb.usgs.gov/info/standards/metadata/metaWG.html>
Maintained by Dave Soller
Last updated June 5, 1997