Media Files

To describe your product more vividly, you can supplement your product description with media files. Using audiovisual media like cover illustrations, author interviews or other marketing material as well as text files or reading samples enables you to give customers a much more extensive impression of your product. Media files are optional; however, you should at least provide a cover illustration or a picture of the product, because this is the only way for online booksellers to reflect the product’s appearance.

Metabooks stores valid media files on proprietary, continuously available high-performance servers. Media files for available as well as out-of-stock titles are thus not just available to booksellers around the clock, but also may be found for an unlimited time at the same URL. This service is part of your title notification, and thus free of charge. Access to your data is permitted only to authorised Metabooks subscribers, which prevents misuse of your media files.

The following paragraphs focus on the transfer of media files via ONIX. Alternately, those files are also available via FTP upload or Metabooks Online.

Metabooks is limited to a set of accepted types of media files. The type of media files as well as a link to them are mandatory information. Additionally, display and copyright information, file properties and information regarding publication and validity may be provided.

• Types of media files
• Link for collection
• Display information and copyright
• File Properties
• Publication, validity and most recent update

Metabooks is limited to accept and transfer to booksellers only certain types of media files. This is to ensure that you, as a publisher, are able to quickly find the content you would like to offer in product descriptions, but also gives booksellers the possibility to correctly process and display the media files. Being selective also allows Metabooks to offer effective quality assurance for your media files. Should some of your media files nevertheless be missing, please contact us.

Providing media files also demonstrates one of the biggest advantages of ONIX 3.0. Whereas ONIX 2.1 required text files to be provided in the other text composite, and all other forms of media in the media file composite, ONIX 3.0 allows all types of media files to be provided via the supporting resource composite.

Media files in ONIX 3.0 are also defined by a combination of ResourceContentType or x436 (code list 158) and ResourceMode or x437 (code list 159), wherein ResourceMode or x437 corresponds to the Metabooks classification into text, picture, audio and video.

ONIX 3.0 also requires information for ContentAudience or x427 (code list 154). By providing this information, you are able to determine that individual media files be accessible only to certain audiences.

Please find an overview of the media files accepted by Metabooks below.

To transfer media files via ONIX requires the file to be on a publicly accessible server without access limitations and to transfer a link to the media file via ONIX. Metabooks downloads the media file from the URL provided and stores it in its own asset store.

In ONIX 3.0, the link to the media file is not directly entered into the supporting resource composite, but in an embedded resource version composite. In addition to the URL, the resource version composite also requires a ResourceForm or x441 to be provided using values from code list 161. With this, you specify whether it is a linkable, downloadable, or embedded media file. The URL of the link itself is to be listed in ResourceLink bzw. x435. ONIX 3.0 also allows this input to be repeated for alternative storage sites.

Below, you will find an example for linking a table of contents and a front cover illustration. The example also shows which fields are mandatory for a media file entry. All sections following this describe optional fields.

<supportingresource>
 <x436>25</x436>
 <x427>00</x427>
 <x437>04</x437>
 <resourceversion>
 <x441>02</x441>
 <x435>http://bsp.de/Inhaltsverzeichnis.pdf</x435>
 </resourceversion>
</supportingresource>
<supportingresource>
 <x436>01</x436>
 <x427>00</x427>
 <x437>03</x437>
 <resourceversion>
 <x441>02</x441>
 <x435>http://bsp.de/Frontcover.jpg</x435>
 </resourceversion>
</supportingresource>

<SupportingResource>
 <ResourceContentType>25</ResourceContentType>
 <ContentAudience>00</ContentAudience>
 <ResourceMode>04</ResourceMode>
 <ResourceVersion>
 <ResourceForm>02</ResourceForm>
 <ResourceLink>http://bsp.de/Inhaltsverzeichnis.pdf</ResourceLink>
 </ResourceVersion>
</SupportingResource>
<SupportingResource>
 <ResourceContentType>01</ResourceContentType>
 <ContentAudience>00</ContentAudience>
 <ResourceMode>03</ResourceMode>
 <ResourceVersion>
 <ResourceForm>02</ResourceForm>
 <ResourceLink>http://bsp.de/Frontcover.jpg</ResourceLink>
 </ResourceVersion>
</SupportingResource>

For each of the entries listed subsequently, a resource feature composite is to be specified in the supporting resource composite. You define the type of entry in ResourceFeatureType or x438. Values may be found in code list 160, where it is also defined whether the entry itself is stored in FeatureValue bzw. x439 or in FeatureNote or x440.

The following table shows the entries permissible in Metabooks for ResourceFeatureType or x438 , and where to enter the associated values.

A media file published by the MVB Marketing- und Verlagsservice des Buchhandels GmbH under the licence CC BY-SA 3.0 DE is to be marked as follows.

<resourcefeature>
 <x438>03</x438>
 <x440>CC BY-SA 3.0 DE</x440>
</resourcefeature>
<resourcefeature>
 <x438>03</x438>
 <x439>MVB Marketing- und Verlagsservice des Buchhandels GmbH</x439>
</resourcefeature>

<ResourceFeature>
 <ResourceFeatureType>03</ResourceFeatureType>
 <FeatureNote>CC BY-SA 3.0 DE</FeatureNote>
</ResourceFeature>
<ResourceFeature>
 <ResourceFeatureType>03</ResourceFeatureType>
 <FeatureValue>MVB Marketing- und Verlagsservice des Buchhandels GmbH</FeatureValue>
</ResourceFeature>

In ONIX 3.0 you can as part of a resource version composite in addition to the link also file properties. For each file property, a resource version feature composite needs to be generated. Using a value from code list 162 in ResourceVersionFeatureType or x442, you are able to specify the type of file property and in FeatureValue or x439 the relevant value. The values for specifying the file format must come from code list 178.

The following table lists possible file properties.

Metabooks intends to amend file properties for all media files stored in the Metabooks asset store as part of continuing development in 2017. If e. g. your author’s picture is in the Metabooks asset store, the height and width of the picture as well as the file size can be read out of the stored file and forwarded to booksellers. Currently, Metabooks amends only the file format.

The file format of an mp3 file is to be entered as follows.

<resourceversionfeature>
 <x442>01</x442>
 <x439>A103</x439>
</resourceversionfeature>

<ResourceVersionFeature>
 <ResourceVersionFeatureType>01</ResourceVersionFeatureType>
 <FeatureValue>A103</FeatureValue>
</ResourceVersionFeature>

The file format of a PDF file is to be entered as follows.

<resourceversionfeature>
 <x442>01</x442>
 <x439>D401</x439>
</resourceversionfeature>

<ResourceVersionFeature>
 <ResourceVersionFeatureType>01</ResourceVersionFeatureType>
 <FeatureValue>D401</FeatureValue>
</ResourceVersionFeature>

• The time of publication refers to the initial publication of the media file, or of the content itself.
• Providing data on validity allows you to determine in which time frame a media file is to be displayed by booksellers. Metabooks does not evaluate the validity when generating export data; this evaluation is done by the booksellers themselves.
• The entry on the most recent update specifies whether you have changed the linked file. If data recipients already have the same date for the last update in their files, they do not have to download the file again, as there have been no changes.

You can store any of the dates in ONIX 3.0 in a content date composite. The type of date is given in ContentDateRole or x429 using values from code list 155 and the actual date in Date or b306. The date format is to be defined as an attribute of the date information using values from code list 55 .

Which time stamps are possible in Metabooks is listed in the following table.

The statement that a media file was published in 1999 is to be entered as follows.

<contentdate>
 <x429>01</x429>
 <b306 dateformat="05">1999</b306>
</contentdate>

<ContentDate>
 <ContentDateRole>01</ContentDateRole>
 <Date dateformat="05">1999</Date>
</ContentDate>