metadata

Data that describes other data, serving as an informative label.

Noun

  1. Data that describes other data, serving as an informative label.
    • Most websites contain metadata to tell the computer how to lay out the content on the screen.
  2. Structured information about a file (date created, creator, software used to create, last modified, file format, file fingerprint, etc).
    • That photo's metadata suggests it was edited using Photoshop.

Origin

Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *me Proto-Indo-European *meth₂? Ancient Greek μετᾰ́ (metắ) Ancient Greek μετᾰ- (metă-)lbor. English meta- Proto-Indo-European *deh₃-redup. Proto-Indo-European *-ti Proto-Indo-European *dédeh₃ti Proto-Italic *didō Latin dō Latin datusnom. Latin datumbor. English data English metadata From meta- + data.

Related

metainformation tag

Derived

metadata registry