A. Standards are mutually agreed-upon statements that help control an action or product. Yes, they include technical standards, conventions, and guidelines. The most exacting standards, technical standards, are codified forms of common practice that yield consistent results.
Guidelines are criteria against which products, systems, or programs can be measured or evaluated.
A. Standards originate in various sectors and exist as both proprie tary and open standards. The commercial sector develops standards for such products as computer hardware. Standards are also developed in conjunction with collaborative projects such as the core record developed by Colum Hourihane for the Van Eyck projec t . A. Data standards promote the consistent recording of information a nd are fundamental to the efficient exchange of information. They provide the rules for structuring information, so that the data entered into a system can be reliably read, sorted, indexed, retrieved, communicated between systems, and shared.