Building and Managing the Meta Data Repository: A Full Lifecycle Guide

Books and materials on Meta Data have a tendency to hyperbole on theoretical aspects. Recently I set out to find a book, on Meta Data, to accompany a presentation I was making to the Insurance Industry Association.Business executives are concerned on return-on-investments for IT investments. Meta Data can be far removed from most executives mind share. In my search for Meta Data reading material - I came across David Marco's book. Finally I found an author that can write effectively on Meta Data that addresses technical issues while answering questions that business executives will have.It is very easy to get buried in theory with Meta Data - the challenge is to define an effective company-wide strategy that will increase efficiency and identify opportunities for further analytics. It is important to engage colleagues and built trust for Meta Data implementations. Mr. Marco does an excellent job of discussing real-world Meta Data implementations. The ideas and concepts he discusses will greatly help most managers embark on a Meta Data strategy.Please let me know if you have any questions or suggestions.

If you want to begin learning about metadata, this is a great place to start. It is quite difficult to find books on metadata these days. Metadata is discussed in other books on data warehousing, but nobody tells you in details how to implement a metadata repository. The author gives a good overview of metadata fundamentals, architecture solutions, current industry trends and more. He pays much attention to the issues of project management during repository construction. I liked very much the Tool Evaluation Checklist for repository tools selection. I did not like the fact though, that the author did not pay much attention to business metadata. The seven classes of metadata do not seem to cover all the types of metadata one can meet in real life. In spite of some minor drawbacks the author did a very good job. The book deserves its five stars. Thanks a lot, Mr. Marco!

Maybe it's because metadata has been somewhat of a mystery to me but I found this to be an excellent book. The beginning of the book starts out with the fundamentals and takes you through detailed architecture and implementation. Even the project plan and tool evaluation checklist are valuable. Especially appreciated is the way the book relates the various tools, technologies, procedures and standards together. The author also makes effective use of practical examples and his experience. You get the feeling that the book was written by one person, who knows what they are talking about, instead of the many contributors that so often collaborate on other books. Even though the book was written before the MDC/OMG merger, the author correctly predicts that they will merge and a single meta model will emerge. The book is also up to date enough to explain the relevance of XML to metadata.

While metadata as a concept has been around a while in academic circles, David Marco has published a very businesss-focused and practical book on using it in a commercial context. Includes thorough discussions on business case, technologies, staffing, project planning, and more. As project manager for a metadata repository at a Fortune 50 company, this was the most useful book I found.

This is the best technical book that I've read! This book walks through the fundamentals of meta data. Then it has all of the technical deliverables that you would use for a project and the sequence that you would use them in. Physical meta data models, meta data integration tool evaluation, and a project plan. The war stories that David Marco wrote are informative and fun.