Further work is required to either build or purchase a search engine that delivers on the promise of structured Web content. These page are important resources for faculty, current and prospective students, and many others. While designing a university Website for multiple audiences is difficult, designing a process and fostering an environment that encourages consistent, high-quality distributed Web design is considerably more challenging. Site organization and searchability are part of this challenge. Since authorship on the UNB Website is distributed and content changes frequently, control and management mechanisms need to be implemented to ensure as accurate, accessible, and up to date information as possible.
Metadata implementation is such a mechanism.
Metadata organizes descriptive and administrative information about a Web page into structured fields that are then indexed and manipulated for various purposes. Metadata that specify the responsibility for the creation and indexing of content, the mounting of pages, and the inclusion of relevant dates would greatly assist in the complex task of Website management. Resource discovery is also enhanced by searching structured or fielded metadata. Results can be ranked according to custom-assigned metadata weights. Search engines and databases can process the metadata to handle queries, to produce reports, and to begin addressing data archiving and management issues.