8. Mastering mrScriptMetadata

7. Learning about weighting uses a line of mrScriptMetadata to create a numeric variable in the output data source to hold the weighting information. The mrScriptMetadata was in the Metadata section (see Metadata section), which is an optional section in a DMS file for creating new questions and variables. Typically, you would use this to create filters and other derived variables for use during analysis. However, the DMS file does not limit you in the type of metadata you can create. You define the metadata using mrScriptMetadata, which has been designed as a fast and easy way of creating metadata using a script.

If you are planning to use the Metadata section to create anything other than the simplest variables, you may find it helpful to spend some time familiarizing yourself with mrScriptMetadata outside of a DMS file. This topic provides some suggestions for how to do that.

1 Read mrScriptMetadata User's Guide. These give you an introduction to mrScriptMetadata and describe how you can open an mrScriptMetadata file in Metadata Model Explorer.

2 Read mrScript MDSC. mrScript MDSC can convert an mrScriptMetadata file into an MDM Document and an MDM Document into an mrScriptMetadata file.

3 The UNICOM Intelligence Developer Documentation Library comes with some Sample mrScriptMetadata files. Follow the instructions in the User’s Guide to open these files in MDM Explorer.

4 Creating some mrScriptMetadata files of your own and opening them in MDM Explorer. For example, you could try to recreate some of the questions in some of the sample .mdd files. For more information, see Sample data.

5 Open the sample .mdd files in MDM Explorer to see an mrScriptMetadata representation of the various metadata objects. See Working with mrScriptMetadata in MDM Explorer.