[June 2003] "XDF is a common scientific data format based on XML and general mathematical principles that can be used throughout the scientific disciplines. It includes these key features: hierarchical data structures, any dimensional arrays merged with coordinate information, high dimensional tables merged with field information, variable resolution, easy wrapping of existing data, user specified coordinate systems, searchable ASCII meta-data, and extensibility to new features/data formats. [As of 2003-06] the XDF project supported two versions of XDF: a 'stable' and 'development' version..."
"An XDF document contains N-dimensional arrays of data with associated spatial information. It is designed to be both an interchange format for scientific data and to be of archival quality. Multidimensional tables and scalar or vector fields are represented in a consistent way and become thoroughly self describing. Axial information is well described so that the space in which each part of the data structure resides is fully described. This means that XDF provides a consistent way to hold spectra with their wavelength scales, images with coordinate axes, vector fields with unitDirection, data cubes in complicated spaces, tables with column headers, and series of tables with each table having a unique name."
References:
- XDF Home Page
- eXtensible Data Format XML DTD. Experimental/development DTD. Version 0.18. June 28, 2002. [source]
- eXtensible Data Format XML DTD. Version 0.17. July 2, 2001. [source]
- Experimental XDF XML Schema. Version 0.19. June 12, 2002.
- XML Group at NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center
Older references:
Contact: Dr. Edward J. Shaya or Dr. Cynthia Cheung. Email: help@adc.gsfc.nasa.gov
"XDF: the eXtensible Data Format for Scientific Data." White paper. By Dr. Edward J. Shaya. "This document describes an XML mark-up language for documents containing major classes of scientific data. This allows the essential and common data components to be represented in a consistent manner independent of the scientific specialty involved. The language makes use of object models encompassed by modern programming languages. Such data representations would benefit from the widespread acceptance that XML has, and could bring about greater interdisciplinary information transfer. It is reasonable to expect that this approach would lead to a greater amount of clear public dissemination of scientific and technical explorations." [cache]
