Robin's comments below are quite correct. The OBJID should not be interpreted
so narrowly and should contain an identifier for the METS object, not a
primary source document that a METS object represents. IDs for original
sources
should probably go in the administrative metadata sections relating to sources,
not OBJID. I take the responsibility for the bad language in there.


At 01:07 PM 8/1/2001 -0400, MacKenzie wrote:
>First, a reaction from Robin Wendler (who's having problems posting to the
>list right now)
>
>Ray Denenberg wrote:
>
> > OBJID is described as an identifier for the "original source document".
> > Maybe I don't understand what METS means by "original source document".
> > But if it means either (1) the object that the METS package pertains to,
> > or (2) something analogous to DC "source", then clearly this is not
> > appropriate as an identifier for the METS package. No?
>
>That is in fact the meaning of OBJID, but I'm not sure why.
>
>The old MOAII ArchObj OBJID had the usefully vague definition "A unique
>identifying string (presumably a URN) assigned to this MOA2 object".
>
>I wonder if the definition of the METS OBJID, as we are interpreting it,
>is too restrictive (or perhaps just wrong)? Shouldn't IDs for the
>original source document to be in descriptive and/or administrative
>metadata, rather than being an attribute of the METS element? If
>people feel strongly that an identifier for the source should be an
>attribute of METS, it should be a different attribute than the OBJID of
>the METS object itself.

Jerome McDonough
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Digital Library Development Team Leader
Elmer Holmes Bobst Library, New York University
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