NOAA Data Documentation Procedural Directive Version 1.0

NOAA Administrative Order (NAO) 212‐15, Management of Environmental Data and Information, as revised in November 2010, describes the NOAA data life cycle and requires that: “Environmental data will be visible, accessible and independently understandable to users…” It also lists "Developing and maintaining metadata throughout the environmental data life cycle that comply with standards” as the second element of this life cycle. This Procedural Directive provides background information and outlines responsibilities for documenting NOAA’s environmental data and information using International Standards. The NOAA Data Documentation Procedural Directive, which was first approved by NOAA's Environmental Data Management Committee (EDMC) on October 28, 2011 and revised on November 30, 2016. VERSION NOTE: This is version 1.0 of this NOAA procedural directive. Before you proceed with implementation of this directive, we recommend that you check to be sure this is the most recent version available. You can check to see what the current version is, download any updates and access additional implementation resources at the following permanent URL: https://www.nosc.noaa.gov/EDMC/PD.DD.php