Standardlys

Standardlys is the name given to a family of interoperable metadata schemas designed to describe digital objects and their provenance across repositories and disciplines. The Standardlys aim to provide a common vocabulary and data model that supports discovery, preservation, and exchange, while emphasizing modularity. They describe core descriptive data alongside technical, rights, and provenance information, and they are designed to map to other standard frameworks to enable cross-system interoperability.

History and development have roots in the early 2010s, with the first Specification released in 2015 by an international standards forum. A major revision, known as Standardlys 2.0, appeared in 2019 and broadened domain coverage to areas such as science data, cultural heritage, and scholarly publications. A community-maintained registry offers profile configurations and implementation guides to help practitioners adopt and tailor the standard to local needs.

Structure and features center on a core set of fields that are generally mandatory, such as title, creator, date, and identifier, plus optional fields for subject, language, and description. The schemas use URI-based references and support serialization in formats like JSON-LD, XML, and RDF. Domain-specific profiles extend the core with specialized fields, and crosswalks align Standardlys with other widely used standards such as Dublin Core, PREMIS, and MARC, facilitating linkage across systems and disciplines.

Governance and adoption are coordinated by the Standardly Coalition, an open, multi-stakeholder body that develops specifications through public drafts and community input. Adoption is strongest in national libraries, university repositories, and data catalogs; smaller institutions often adopt simplified profiles or alternative schemas due to resource considerations.

Criticism and alternatives include concerns about complexity, maintenance overhead, and governance transparency, as well as debates about the balance between standardization and local flexibility. Proponents argue that Standardlys improve interoperability and long-term preservation. Related standards include Dublin Core, METS, and PREMIS.