5 FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions)

5.1 Which fields are required within an item?

At the very minimum you require the following fields:

• <title>

• <link>

• <nzgls:date.valid>

• <nzgls:identifier>

• <nzgls:type.agency>

Of course, you may add any further elements as required, and the <description> element will make your items a lot more useful!

5.2 What is the <nzgls:identifier> field used for?

This field provides each item with a unique identifier. This is used when checking for updates to a given item. It should consist of the date, followed by a sequence number and finally an abbreviated agency or unit name. These 3 parameters ensure that the identifier remains unique.

5.3 What happens to items with a future start date?

An item with a future start date in the <nzgls:date.valid> element will not get published until that date and time has been reached. Nor will the item be available in the aggregated output until that time.

5.4 Do items with an expired end date get deleted?

An item with an expired end date in the <nzgls:date.valid> element is simply not shown on the most recent list of articles. It is moved to the archive section of the aggregator. Expired items will also not appear in the aggregated output anymore.

5.5 What can I do if I need an item expired today?

You can change the expiry date of the item in your feed. When the item on the aggregator is synchronised with the item in the feed, it will immediately acquire the new expiry date.

5.6 How long should an item keep appearing within my feed?

An item should appear for at least 7 days in your feed. This so that items are never missed, even if there are service disruptions or "acts of God". A simpler solution that you may consider is to ensure that the 10 (for example) most recent items are always present in your feed.

5.7 Why are <nzgls> elements used rather than <dc> elements?

The NZGLS metadata standard is the official New Zealand Government standard for creating discovery-level metadata (see http://www.nzgls.govt.nz/). The standard is based closely on two well-established standards: the Dublin Core (DC) Metadata Element Set and the Australian Government Locator Service (AGLS). NZGLS elements should be used in preference to Dublin Core elements for government specific information.

5.8 How much content should go into a <description>?

This is up to each feed provider to decide. A basic rule of thumb is to provide sufficient information such that the item is complete in itself; the reader should be able to determine what the item is about and its main points. A description can contain the entire content, partial content or only a summary of the content.

5.9 Which encoding scheme should we use?

You should use UTF-8 encoding. This means that all characters with an ASCII value higher than 127 (0x7F) are encoded as double byte sequences or as "&#{NUMBER};". Please note that special characters like & (ampersand) should also be encoded using the "&#{NUMBER};" notation.