Source : Free On-Line Dictionary of Computing

Summary Object Interchange Format
     
         (SOIF) The attribute-value pair
        record format which {Harvest Brokers} use to exchange
        {Harvest} content summaries.
     
        SOIF provides a means of bracketing collections of summary
        objects, allowing {Harvest Brokers} to retrieve SOIF content
        summaries for many objects in a single, efficient compressed
        stream.  Harvest Brokers provide support for querying SOIF
        data using structured attribute-value queries and many other
        types of queries.
     
        {(http://www.ust.hk/Harvest/brokers/soifhelp.html)}.
     
        (1996-09-16)