Introduction to metadata management systems

Metadata is one of the most common methods for the organization and managementof information resources and for easy access to information, but it needs appropriatemanagement. The goal of metadata management is to provide, store and controlmetadata collections for the description, retrieval, preservation, ease of exchangeand more effective access to information. Metadata management systems determinethe effectiveness, flexibility and cost-benefits through a definite project. In the present research the importance of metadata in the organization of information resources along with different perspectives of metadata management in some fields like library and information science and information systems have been debated. Then the features, capabilities and effectiveness of the metadata management systems are discussed. Metadata management systems are derived into three categories regarding the structure of the collection: (1) Distributed metadata structure (2) Integrated metadata structure and (3) Composed metadata structure.