2005/09/01 by Yogesh Simmhan, Yogesh L. Simmhan, Beth Plale +1 · 8 citations
Computer Science · Decision Sciences · #Distributed and Parallel Computing Systems #Research Data Management Practices #Scientific Computing and Data Management
paper · doi:10.1145/1084805.1084812
openalex publication_date 2005/09/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/26
Data management is growing in complexity as large-scale applications take advantage of the loosely coupled resources brought together by grid middleware and by abundant storage capacity. Metadata describing the data products used in and generated by these applications is essential to disambiguate the data and enable reuse. Data provenance, one kind of metadata, pertains to the derivation history of a data product starting from its original sources.In this paper we create a taxonomy of data provenance characteristics and apply it to current research efforts in e-science, focusing primarily on scientific workflow approaches. The main aspect of our taxonomy categorizes provenance systems based on why they record provenance, what they describe, how they represent and store provenance, and ways to disseminate it. The survey culminates with an identification of open research problems in the field.