On June 22, Society members from the U. S., the U.K., and Canada met to discuss how they create, manage, maintain, and integrate metadata for multiple information systems. We asked Denise Bedford, Senior Information Officer of the World Bank Group, to describe her experiences and respond to questions. This article summarizes her presentation and the ensuing discussion.

The World Bank's metadata repository
Denise heads an indexing and taxonomy unit within the bank's IT function. Founded in 1944 to reduce global poverty, the World Bank Group consists of five closely associated organizations owned by member countries. The bank employs approximately 9,300 people, including economists, educators, environmental scientists, financial analysts, anthropologists, engineers, and many others. Employees come from about 160 different countries, and over 3,000 staff work in local offices.

Like other organizations of its size, the World Bank has implemented a variety of electronic information systems — an intranet, document management and content management systems, a library automation system, and enterprise search. But instead of allowing metadata to reside permanently in each different proprietary format, the bank stores it in an enterprise metadata repository. A combination of custom and off-the-shelf software programs extracts metadata from the bank's various information systems and stores it in a relational database, where it's accessible to applications such as search, portals, publishing, and reporting.

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Created on July 5, 2005 l Updated on July 5, 2005