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Functionality | Database

Storage

We used a relational database to store item metadata, references to items, and thumbnails associated with an item (where they occur). Based on user feedback, we determined that users want to annotate items, and access the items by author, title, description, or any other standard bibliographic field. So for internal storage and manipulation, we developed a schema based on the core Dublin Core fields, with some additional fields generally found in bibliographic records such as publication date and publisher.

In addition to saving items returned by searching, we envisioned providing capability to import local files from a file system. (This functionality will however, require that a repository be available to store the imported local objects; it is therefore marked for inclusion in a later phase of the project.) Whether items are imported or returned as the result of a search query, it is necessary to extract metadata and store it; the metadata for local files would be stored with metadata for items located by searching.

Database Design Documents