Metadata is data about data, in the sense that it gives more information about other data. Examples of metadata for a document can be the document's author, creation date, size, or its security classification. SharePoint enables the following types of metadata:

• Automatically generated metadata: When you upload a document or create a list item in SharePoint, it automatically tracks who created the document or list item and when, who modified it and when, and accordingly adds the information to the document or list item.
• Metadata that users can freely create in-place: In addition to autogenerated metadata, users can also add information to each list item or document according to the columns created for the list or library that they are working with. They can enter this information in-place using various types of fields, such as the date field type...