Building block metadata provides context information about the item in the building blocks register. It is based on ISO 19135, the standard for item registration of geographic information, from which it extracted its six mandatory items (flagged with *). The ISO schema is extended with other properties (in green), which account for things such as the visual representation in the register, item validation or relation with other building blocks.
Property reference
Core (ISO 19135)
| Property |
Required |
Description |
name * |
yes |
User-friendly name for this Building Block. |
abstract * |
yes |
Short description. Shown as a summary in the register. |
status * |
yes |
One of: under-development, experimental, stable, superseded, retired, invalid, reserved, submitted. |
dateTimeAddition * |
yes |
ISO 8601 date-time when this Building Block was added to the register (e.g. 2024-01-15T00:00:00Z). |
itemClass * |
yes |
Type of Building Block. See Item classes. |
version * |
yes |
Version string (e.g. 0.1, 1.0.0). |
itemIdentifier |
auto |
Unique identifier. Auto-generated from the register prefix and directory path — do not set manually. |
dateOfLastChange |
no |
ISO 8601 date of the latest change (e.g. 2024-06-01). Autodetected from git. Falls back to dateTimeAddition if omitted. |
Item classes
| Value |
Description |
schema |
JSON Schema object type / feature type |
datatype |
Simple JSON Schema data type |
path |
OpenAPI path |
parameter |
OpenAPI parameter |
header |
OpenAPI header |
cookie |
OpenAPI cookie |
response |
OpenAPI response object |
api |
Partial or full OpenAPI document |
model |
Ontology or data model |
Links and references
| Property |
Description |
sources |
Array of { title, link } objects listing specifications, papers, or other documents this Building Block is based on. |
link |
Single URL to a website or external documentation page. |
links |
Array of { title, href, rel?, notes? } link objects for richer link sets. |
tags |
Array of free-text strings for categorisation and search. |
group |
A short identifier to visually group related Building Blocks in the register. |
highlighted |
Boolean. Marks this Building Block as featured in the register’s entry page. |
Lifecycle and relationships
| Property |
Description |
predecessor |
Identifier or URI of the Building Block that this one supersedes. |
successor |
Identifier or URI of the Building Block that supersedes this one. |
dependsOn |
Array of Building Block identifiers this one has a runtime dependency on (distinct from isProfileOf). |
seeAlso |
Array of related Building Block identifiers or URIs. |
isProfileOf |
Identifier(s) of the Building Block(s) this one is a profile of — i.e. a stricter, backward-compatible specialisation. See Imports. |
Schema and API artifacts
| Property |
Description |
schema |
URL for the JSON Schema of this Building Block (auto-derived when a schema.yaml/json file is present). |
openAPIDocument |
URL or path to an OpenAPI document backing this Building Block. |
ldContext |
URL to the JSON-LD @context document. Auto-derived when context.jsonld is present. See Semantic uplift. |
extends |
Declares schema inheritance. See Extension points. |
extensionPoints |
Declares specialisations of referenced Building Blocks. See Extension points. |
Validation
| Property |
Description |
shaclShapes |
Array of SHACL files (paths or URLs) to use for RDF validation. shapes.ttl in the building block directory is picked up automatically. |
shaclClosures |
Array of RDF files or URLs merged into every test snippet as a SHACL closure. Useful for small, static vocabularies that must be present for validation to pass. See Validation. |
requirementClasses |
Array of requirement class URIs (from a ModSpec specification) that can be used to validate this Building Block. |
conformanceClasses |
Array of conformance class URIs (from a ModSpec specification) that this Building Block refers to. |
Semantic / RDF
| Property |
Description |
ontology |
Path or URL to an RDF document containing the ontology for this Building Block. ontology.ttl or ontology.owl are auto-detected. See RDF-only Building Blocks. |
concept |
Array of URIs for the RDF concept(s) this Building Block represents (skos:closeMatch). See RDF-only Building Blocks. |
rdfType |
Array of URIs for the RDF class(es) that instances of this Building Block conform to (rdfs:subClassOf). See RDF-only Building Blocks. |
External resources
| Property |
Description |
resources |
Array of external artifacts (data files, specifications, vocabularies…) associated with this Building Block. See External resources. |