Blog Post 3: Metadata and Databases

When discussing metadata, this refers to “information used to describe data, objects, or records” (pg.53). By my understanding, metadata in digital humanities is information about a digital asset, or research that involves description and classification. There are many functions of metadata that include descriptive, administrative, and operational. Databases are to my understanding a different form of structured data that makes the shift from flat to relational. Relational databases can be understood “through the connection of one kind of information to another” (pg.71). When understanding digital humanities, these two terms can help us to grasp a better understanding of this concept because metadata helps us to understand the records that may be in the databases of some resources. For my project, I am using metadata to discover the information on the digital files on my online resources. I can also use database construction when I am entering data about my project into either files or spreadsheets for consistency and efficiency. This can also be useful in future projects because relational databases are a good way to make information easier to manage. By having more clear information, you are able to construct more insightful research and have logical ideas that are organized. Especially when dealing with very large data sets the relational database approach helps keep the database smaller and more efficient. By having information in a spreadsheet format, this can also help to make the information clear to understand and easier to navigate when researching a topic. For my project on healing Uvalde, I can use a spreadsheet to keep a report of what the childrens names are, their ages, what grade they were in, and the artist in which was assigned to their mural. By having this connected information on hand, I can conduct a more thorough presentation and analytic paper on the children of Uvalde.