Open-Ended Metadata

Open-ended metadata is metadata that is not limited to a set of defined values – content developers can write what they want.

To specify open-ended metadata, you first need to give it a label, or a name, in the Label box. Then you need to specify the Type. When you click on Type, a drop-down menu will appear. You’ll see that there are different options to choose from – for example, different types of text, lists, or trees.

One example of open-ended metadata are comments: you may want content developers to write a comment about the item they are creating. In this case, a good name to give as the Label might be "Comment". And as Type you would specify text. You also need to decide which text type is the most suitable, for example long or short.

Examples of what a content developer might write as a comment are: "The idea of this item is to test a student’s knowledge of how to calculate the surface area of a triangle", for example, or "This item needs to be discussed at the next assessment meeting".

Now you need to save it, so that authors or content developers creating items in this class will be prompted to declare the metadata – in this case, put in a comment about the item - before they start authoring the item.