论文首先概要介绍了目前有影响的几个地球空间数据元数据标准，然后从地球空间数据及数据集自身特征出发探讨了数据集元数据的内容，提出了地球空间数据集的层次结构，并给出了基本层和基础层元数据内容。

Dozens of Metadata standards for geographic information or geo spatial data have been found recently. The paper introduces Content Standards for Digital Geo spatial Metadata, Geographic Information-Metadata, Directory Interchange Format, and Metadata standards of ISO/TC211. Based on those Metadata standards, the authors give one metadata standard for geo spatial data application. The Metadata standard includes three level Metadata sets. The first, named Basic Metadata set, includes fundamental information of Geo spatial dataset such as content, name, format, and it is introduced to serve ordinary data users. The second level Metadata set, named Summery Metadata set, is established to serve geo spatial data managers. And the third level Metadata set, named Detail Metadata set, includes detailed information about Geo spatial data, serving data specialists to manipulate and process geo spatial data.