Which statement best defines a schema?

• A. A formal definition of a dataset's structure.
• B. A list of attributes and their values.
• C. A workflow for manipulating data types.
• D. A tool for scanning for missing data.

Answer: (A)

A schema defines how data is organized, specifying the feature types, their attributes, and the data types and constraints of those attributes. In FME, the schema describes the structure of a dataset—what features exist and what fields (and geometry) they contain—before reading or transforming the data, guiding how data is stored and exchanged between formats.

This makes the statement a formal definition of a dataset's structure, which is exactly what a schema is.

The other options point to actual data or processes, not the structure itself: a list of attributes and their values represents data instances rather than the overall schema; a workflow for manipulating data types describes a procedure, not the data’s layout; a tool for scanning for missing data is a data quality check, not a definition of structure.