XSD Guidelines - Implementation

Ed-Fi bulk data exchange designs typically follow specific patterns and practices.

This section covers the following topics in detail:

📄️ XML Schema - Standard Data Exchange Schema

Different use cases and different periodicities of data exchange require different interchange schema.

📄️ XML Schema - Extended Reference Types

Extended reference types provide the mechanism for denoting associations in Ed-Fi XML interchange data. The reference may be to an entity in the same interchange file, an entity in a separate interchange file, or an entity presumed to exist in the system receiving the bulk data. For example, assessment results generally need to reference student records (which are often already in the data store) and assessment metadata (which may be in a separate interchange file traveling with the results, or in the case of statewide tests, may already be in the data store).

📄️ XML Schema - Ed-Fi Descriptors

Ed-Fi Descriptors provide a malleable alternative to structured value lists that are typically expressed via enumerations in XSD. Descriptors are an expanded feature — first introduced in Ed-Fi Data Standard v1.1 — that are vital to accommodate the ways in which users of the Ed-Fi Data Standard need to refer to enumerated collections of values.

📄️ XML Schema - Extensions Framework

Customizations to the Ed-Fi data model – and concrete specifications such as the Ed-Fi data exchange XSD – are explicitly supported for implementation-specific or other purposes using the set of conformant extensions described in this section, known as the Ed-Fi Extension Framework. The Extension Framework documentation provides detail on extension patterns that are supported throughout Ed-Fi technology.

📄️ XML Schema - Custom Data Exchange Schema

The Ed-Fi Alliance publishes bulk data exchange standards for XML that cover many data exchange scenarios. However, custom data exchange schema can easily be created by anyone familiar with XML Schema.