Metadatakenttään

Metadatakenttään is the illative form of metadatakenttä, a Finnish term meaning “the metadata field.” The word is used in Finnish information management, libraries, and data processing to indicate the destination within a metadata record where data should be entered or mapped. In practice, it appears in instructions, user interfaces, and data-mapping templates to direct users or automated processes to place values into the correct field, for example: “Lisää tekijä metadatakenttään” (enter the author into the metadata field).

Linguistic note: metadatakenttä is a compound of metadata and kenttä (field). The illative case, expressed by the suffix -ntäin/-tään in this form, conveys direction toward something in Finnish; metadatakenttään specifically means “into the metadata field.”

Usage and context: The term is common in Finnish-language documentation accompanying metadata standards such as Dublin Core or MARC when describing mapping rules, ETL workflows, or forms used for cataloging and digital asset management in libraries and archives. It serves as a concise destination indicator, separate from the source data or the source field name.

Relation to standards: While the phrase is Finnish-specific, the underlying concept—designating a target metadata field for a value—is universal across metadata schemas. In translations, similar phrases may use “into the metadata field” or “destination field” to describe the same action.

See also: metadata field, metadata, Dublin Core, MARC, Finna.