Entiteedid

Entiteedid is a proposed universal identifier intended to uniquely identify entities—real-world objects, concepts, or data records—across heterogeneous information systems. It is designed to support entity resolution, data integration, and provenance tracking by providing a stable reference that remains meaningful across updates and reorganizations of source datasets. In practice, entiteedid would be used as a persistent identifier that can be resolved to metadata descriptions and linked to related entities in a knowledge graph or catalog.

The term blends entité (entity) with id (identifier) and follows naming patterns common in data-management contexts. It is discussed in data governance and research data-management circles as a potential complement to existing standards such as DOIs, URIs, and ARKs. As of now, entiteedid is not a formal international standard; it remains a concept under consideration and experimentation.

An entiteedid would typically be represented as a string within a standardized namespace and might be expressed as a URI or CURIE. It could encode the entity type, source, and a locally unique suffix, while the associated metadata record captures provenance, versioning, and access rights. Implementations would rely on a governance model and a registry to enable cross-system resolution.

Benefits include reduced ambiguity, easier cross-dataset linking, and improved data quality for research and knowledge graphs. Challenges include namespace fragmentation, governance requirements, privacy considerations, and ensuring long-term persistence and interoperability across communities.

In relation to other standards, entiteedid is conceptually aligned with persistent identifiers such as DOIs and Handles, and with URIs used in the Linked Data ecosystem. It is intended to complement existing entity-resolution practices by emphasizing long-term stability and cross-system interoperability.