Validating item metadata against a schema

You can use the Metadata check to validate your item's metadata information against multiple federal and international metadata standards. A single Metadata check can be configured to validate the entire contents of your geodatabase or shapefile workspace and requires only that you know which metadata style you are using in ArcCatalog when authoring your metadata content.

Once you have defined the criteria for the check, you can configure the notes and a severity rating. The notes allow you to provide a more specific description for the feature that has been written to the Reviewer table and are copied to the Notes field in the Reviewer table. The severity rating allows you to indicate how important the results from a check are in terms of your quality assurance/quality control processes. The lower the number, the greater the priority the check's results have.

Steps:

1. Start ArcMap.
2. On the main menu, click Customize > Toolbars > Data Reviewer.
3. Create a batch job and add the Metadata Check from the Advanced Checks category.

   The Metadata Check Properties dialog box appears.

   
4. If necessary, type a unique name for the check in the Check Title text box.
   Note:

   The check title can be used to describe the type, metadata standard, and conditions you are evaluating with the check. This is useful when you have a combination of mandatory and optional metadata elements and resources to be evaluated.

5. In the Metadata Location Type area, click the Workspace option.
6. Click the Workspace drop-down arrow and choose the data workspace that contains the item metadata resources you want to validate.
   Note:

   Only one workspace (geodatabase or shapefile) can be evaluated per check. To evaluate multiple data workspaces, you need to configure a Metadata check for each workspace.

   
7. In the tree view in the Metadata Sources area, check the check box next to each workspace item you want to validate.
   Tip:

   You can click Select All or Clear All to select or unselect all workspace items at once.

8. Click the Metadata Standard drop-down arrow and choose the metadata standard you want to validate your item metadata against.

   The standard you select should match the Metadata Style setting you configured in ArcCatalog when authoring item metadata.

   Note:

   The ESRI Metadata standard cannot be used to validate workspace item metadata since schema management and validation is done automatically for you when you author metadata in ArcCatalog.

9. In the Check Options area, check the Validate Metadata Standard check box.
10. If necessary, type descriptive text for the check results in the Notes text box in the Reviewer Remarks area.
11. If necessary, click the Severity drop-down arrow and choose a value that indicates the priority of the check's results in the Reviewer Remarks area.
12. Click OK.
    Note:

    When validating metadata schema, there is potential for duplicate error results to be generated for those repeating metadata elements that fail validation. To ensure that all schema validation errors are captured in the Reviewer table, choose the Do not check for duplicates option on the Reviewer Methods tab on the Reviewer Session Properties dialog box.

13. Click OK.
14. Save the batch job.
15. Click OK.