Lossless conversion of expressive metadata

A method comprising:

• receiving a request for a second system metadata;
• retrieving a first system metadata;
• generating the second system metadata in response to the request for the second system metadata and the first system metadata wherein the second system metadata includes a first subset of the first system metadata;
• generating a site metadata mapping in response to the second system metadata and the first system metadata wherein the site metadata mapping includes a second subset of the first system metadata not included in the second subset of the first system metadata;
• storing the site metadata mapping in a memory;
• and
• transmitting the second system metadata to a client application.

A method comprising:

• receiving a request for a less expressive system metadata;
• generating the less expressive system metadata in response to a more expressive system metadata;
• generating a site metadata mapping in response to a subset of the more expressive metadata not included in the less expressive system metadata;
• receiving an updated less expressive system metadata;
• generating an updated more expressive system metadata in response to the updated less expressive system metadata and the site metadata mapping;
• and
• executing a data management algorithm in response to the updated more expressive system metadata.