Identiferas

Identiferas is a term used to describe a class of persistent, globally unique identifiers designed to label entities across heterogeneous information systems. The concept emphasizes cross-domain interoperability, stability, and readability so that identifiers can be understood by humans yet resolved reliably by machines. In practice, identiferas sits at the intersection of metadata registries, data governance, and digital identity. It draws on ideas from established identifier families such as DOIs, URNs, and GUIDs, but is framed as a federated approach: multiple issuing authorities maintain their own namespaces, while shared registries provide cross-reference mappings and resolution services.

An identiferas token commonly begins with an authority prefix indicating the issuing body, followed by a hierarchical path or serialized component. Examples are illustrative rather than prescriptive: ident:library:fr:gallica:item-98765 or idf:schema:global:entity:123456. The essential properties are persistence, resolvability, and uniqueness within the federation, plus support for versioning and deprecation forewarnings.

Applications span digital libraries, scientific data catalogs, supply chains, and identity-management systems where stable references are critical across updates and organizational boundaries. Governance typically involves namespace registration, resolvers, and mappings to other identifier systems to enable interoperability and data integration.

Critics warn that achieving true global interoperability is challenging due to governance complexity, namespace collisions, and performance considerations. Proponents argue that a well-designed identiferas framework can reduce ambiguity, improve data quality, and enable scalable cross-system linking. See also identifiers, persistent identifiers, DOIs, URNs, GUIDs.