Traceable material property data is maintained in a database and provided
to users upon demand. Cohesive and logical definitions of material
property datasets are provided that capture the different industry
standard facets of a material property. Traceability information includes
the manufacturer of the material, the source of the material, the
property measuring authority, points of responsibility, facets and
constraints of the measurement process. Attributes for dataset ownership
and dataset access cost are maintained and only the dataset owner is
allowed to update those attributes. The ability to control access to the
dataset is provided to the data owner. A dataset's measuring authority is
permitted to review and re-grade data. The ability to define groups of
users is provided with a designated user having the ability to control
group membership and set the group's policies with respect to access of
datasets owned by any member of the group. The ability to transfer or
trade ownership of data is permitted.