issues: 273247186

This data as json

id node_id number title user state locked assignee milestone comments created_at updated_at closed_at author_association pull_request body repo type active_lock_reason performed_via_github_app reactions draft state_reason
273247186 MDU6SXNzdWUyNzMyNDcxODY= 68 Support for title/source/license metadata 9599 closed 0   2857392 4 2017-11-12T17:04:21Z 2017-12-04T04:55:43Z 2017-11-13T15:26:11Z OWNER  

I've decided this is important for launch: I want to set a precedent for people citing, licensing and documenting their datasets.

Not sure how best to go about supporting this. I'd like to allow for the following data to be optionally attached to any given database:

  • Title
  • Description, potentially in markdown?
  • Original source URL
  • License

I'd also like the ability to attach descriptions to individual tables - and maybe even to table columns?

The question then becomes: how should this information be stored. A few options:

  • In the SQLite database itself, in a specially named table. Problem here is that this means having to modify SQLite databases before publishing them.
  • In a separate SQLite database that can be published alongside the databases we are publishing.
  • In a JSON file. This is neat, but JSON files are not a great editing experience once you start including multiple lines (e.g. a markdown description).
  • In a YAML file. This is a better format for multi-line descriptions, but still isn't a great editing experience.

Whatever the format, it can be made much more usable by offering a web-based editing UI for populating it (a special mode the server can be run in).

 107914493 issue     
{
    "url": "https://api.github.com/repos/simonw/datasette/issues/68/reactions",
    "total_count": 0,
    "+1": 0,
    "-1": 0,
    "laugh": 0,
    "hooray": 0,
    "confused": 0,
    "heart": 0,
    "rocket": 0,
    "eyes": 0
}
   completed

Links from other tables