QIS-XML: A metadata specification for Quantum Information Science

Abstract

While Quantum Information Science (QIS) is still in its infancy, the ability for quantum based hardware or computers to communicate and integrate with their classical counterparts will be a major requirement towards their success. Little attention however has been paid to this aspect of QIS. To manage and exchange information between systems, today's classic Information Technology (IT) commonly uses the eXtensible Markup Language (XML) and its related tools. XML is composed of numerous specifications related to various fields of expertise. No such global specification however has been defined for quantum computers. QIS-XML is a proposed XML metadata specification for the description of fundamental components of QIS (gates & circuits) and a platform for the development of a hardware independent low level pseudo-code for quantum algorithms. This paper lays out the general characteristics of the QIS-XML specification and outlines practical applications through prototype use cases.