Universal Message Format (UMF) is an extensible XML dialect used
for structuring data source files. UMF contains standard tags that represent
key pieces of identities, relationships, and activities. Before data can be
processed by the pipelines, it must be converted into UMF and follow the UMF
specification.
UMF consists of these hierarchical components:
- UMF documents
- The collection of UMF segments that structure the data and indicate the
type of data source record.
- UMF segments
- The part of the UMF document that structures the data for the data source.
- UMF elements
- XML tags and values that define the data within a UMF segment of a UMF
document.
The UMF specification lists the specific types of UMF documents,
the UMF segments within each UMF document type, and the valid UMF elements
within each UMF segment.