Data format management

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Data format management (DFM) is the application of a systematic approach to the selection and use of the data formats used to encode information for storage on a computer.

In practical terms, data format management is the analysis of data formats and their associated technical, legal or economic attributes which can either enhance or detract from the ability of a digital asset or a given information systems to meet specified objectives.

Data format management is necessary as the amount of information and number of people creating it grows. This is especially the case as the information with which users are working is difficult to generate, store, costly to acquire, or to be shared.

Data format management as an analytic tool or approach is data format neutral.

Historically individuals, organization and businesses have been categorized by their type of computer or their operating system. Today, however, it is primarily productivity software, such as spreadsheet or word processor programs, and the way these programs store information that also defines an entity. For instance, when browsing the web it is not important which kind of computer is responsible for hosting a site, only that the information it publishes is in a format that is readable by the viewing browser. In this instance the data format of the published information has more to do with defining compatibilities than the underlying hardware or operating system.

Productivity software is application software used for producing information. Its names arose from the fact that it increases productivity, especially of individual office workers, from typists to knowledge workers, although its scope is now wider than that. Office suites, which brought word processing, spreadsheet, and relational database programs to the desktop in the 1980s, are the core example of productivity software. They revolutionized the office with the magnitude of the productivity increase they brought as compared with the pre-1980s office environments of typewriters, paper filing, and handwritten lists and ledgers. Some 78% of "middle-skill" occupations now require the use of productivity software. In the 2010s, productivity software has become even more consumerized than it already was, as computing becomes ever more integrated into daily personal life.

Several initiatives have been established to record those data formats commonly used and the software available to read them, for example the Pronom project at the UK National Archives.

See also

Data curation is the organization and integration of data collected from various sources. It involves annotation, publication and presentation of the data such that the value of the data is maintained over time, and the data remains available for reuse and preservation. Data curation includes "all the processes needed for principled and controlled data creation, maintenance, and management, together with the capacity to add value to data". In science, data curation may indicate the process of extraction of important information from scientific texts, such as research articles by experts, to be converted into an electronic format, such as an entry of a biological database.

Data preservation is the act of conserving and maintaining both the safety and integrity of data. Preservation is done through formal activities that are governed by policies, regulations and strategies directed towards protecting and prolonging the existence and authenticity of data and its metadata. Data can be described as the elements or units in which knowledge and information is created, and metadata are the summarizing subsets of the elements of data; or the data about the data. The main goal of data preservation is to protect data from being lost or destroyed and to contribute to the reuse and progression of the data.

In library and archival science, digital preservation is a formal endeavor to ensure that digital information of continuing value remains accessible and usable. It involves planning, resource allocation, and application of preservation methods and technologies, and it combines policies, strategies and actions to ensure access to reformatted and "born-digital" content, regardless of the challenges of media failure and technological change. The goal of digital preservation is the accurate rendering of authenticated content over time. The Association for Library Collections and Technical Services Preservation and Reformatting Section of the American Library Association, defined digital preservation as combination of "policies, strategies and actions that ensure access to digital content over time." According to the Harrod's Librarian Glossary, digital preservation is the method of keeping digital material alive so that they remain usable as technological advances render original hardware and software specification obsolete.

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