[DDI-ADG] revised minutes, DDI-ADG conference call 8/2/05

[Katherine McNeill-Harman]

Following are the revised minutes from yesterday's conference call:

Revised Minutes
DDI Aggregate Data, Geography & Time Working Group
August 2, 2005, 11am-12pm U.S. EDT
Present: Sanda Ionescu, Kate McNeill-Harman (minutes), Ken Miller, Wendy 
Thomas, Mary Vardigan

Action Items:
1. Kate will forward to the SRG (addressed to Oliver Watteler, a member of 
that group and chair of the Comparative Data Group) the time method 
definitions she gathered for their use in creating the controlled 
vocabulary.  She will remind them to include time method indicators for 
stand-alone data files that might not be considered comparative data, and 
offer our group's help on this if needed.
2. Kate will try to locate an ISO (or other) standard for describing 
frequencies.
3. Mary and Sanda will review the DDI and pull out a list of elements with 
date stamps.
4. J should summarize the time decisions to date in a spreadsheet (similar 
to the one for geography), looking at the structure outlined in the 
TemporalCoverage section of the "reusable classes" sheet of the 
spreadsheet, DDI-Version3-SRG_TagNames.xls.  This should be done this week 
in order to provide time for review and comment before the next meeting.

Minutes:
The group continued the discussion of time method.  It was indicated that 
the Comparative Data Group will be developing suggested controlled 
vocabulary for time method.  Members agreed to send that group (via Oliver 
Watteler, the chair) the information gathered thus far on definitions for 
them to incorporate, emphasizing their need to include aspects of time 
method that may not refer to families of datasets.

Members then discussed the role of administrative dates and how those 
should relate to the content-related dates discussed thus far.  This 
included a discussion of the role of versions.  Wendy reported that the SRG 
will be working on this.

It was also agreed that it would be helpful to review how dates are used 
throughout the DDI.  For example, it might be helpful to have date stamps 
in multiple other elements to serve as placeholders for authors to remind 
them that they might want to indicate the date aspect of a particular 
element.   Mary and Sanda volunteered to do this.

Members agreed to have frequency as a strongly-typed variable with a 
controlled vocabulary.  Kate will try to locate an ISO (or other) standard 
for describing frequencies.  It was agreed that an "other" option should be 
provided in case the study has a frequency not provided by the given 
choices.  It was mentioned that frequency could apply to groups of studies 
(e.g. a periodic survey that is done annually), a single study (a time 
series with annual data), or a variable (a data set with annual data for 
some variables and quarterly data for others).  Therefore it was mentioned 
that frequency may be helpful as a reusable class that could be applied at 
the variable level as well.

The group agreed that next week should be the last phone conference to 
discuss time, after which (or even starting in the next meeting, if 
possible) they would move onto aggregate data.  In order to do this, J will 
need to incorporate today's and previous time discussions into a 
spreadsheet (similar to the one for geography), looking at the structure 
outlined in the TemporalCoverage section of the "reusable classes" sheet of 
the spreadsheet, DDI-Version3-SRG_TagNames.xls.  The group will then review 
this, and the date stamps, at the next meeting, and make final decisions on 
time.


___________________________________________
Katherine McNeill-Harman
Data Services Librarian
Dewey Library for Management and Social Sciences
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
77 Massachusetts Avenue, E53-100
Cambridge, MA 02139
mcneillh at mit.edu
617-253-0787