What is metadata in .NET?

Question

I googled several sites to understand what metadata is in .NET and it means.

I\'m still new to C# WPF desktop application programming. Back when I was

Answer 1

Simply, Metadata is information that is stored about your program that you can examine by a number of means one, in .NET one of these methods is commonly referred to as Reflection

Metadata describes types (e.g. classes, interfaces, ...), methods and parameters (names and types) and attributes that have been applied. You can use this information in a number of ways e.g. test systems such as nunit and msstest (amongst others) use the metadata to 'discover' the tests within an assembly; other ways that metadata can be used is in databinding.

There are so many ways to use it - they even have books on it (well sections at least http://my.safaribooksonline.com/book/programming/csharp/9781449379629/reflection-and-metadata/729)