I want to share a bit of experience that the New York
Botanical Garden has gained in its efforts to put
collections data on line. It's both a cautionary tale, and
one that might be a useful base upon which others might
build. I am writing about this as someone who has watched it
from the position of a fundraiser, not a botanist or
collections manager.
We have been getting our herbarium collections data
computerized in a two-step process. The first is a
modification of a program produced at the Harvard University
Herbaria called HUHpc, which we are adapting to suit our
collections management and research needs. Our adaptation,
called (cleverly) NYpc is going on-line as we speak. By the
way, it is an Advanced Revelation application, and seems to
be quite functional.
The next step that we are planning is to get this data
directly onto a client server system on a UNIX platform.
This is in the planning stages, and we are working with
several of our sister collections to choose a useful system.
Those of you familiar with natural history collections may
be aware that the NSF funded a project among several of the
largest collections to develop automation standards. The
outcome of this project, the MITRE report, is available from
Wayt Thomas here at NYBG, the PI for the project.
([log in to unmask]).
The next logical step for us, and here's where the story
becomes fraught, was to work with several other herbaria to
develop data standards. Well, forget it. Can't be done. Too
much politics, and investment in existing standards.
We then came up with a compromise, which we called NDBTS
(National Databases for Botanical Type Specimens). We
proposed (to the National Science Foundation), a framework
of common field names and shared authority files which would
allow all herbarium collections to *export* data from their
own collections databases in a common ASCII
character-delimited format. This would work no matter what
the underlying database was. These ASCII files (which would
be done first for Types specimens, and later for other
collections) would be maintained at four institutions which
would provide Gopher (or WAIS or Mosaic) searching
facilities.
This proposal ran into all kinds of trouble, and was not
funded. I still believe that it is an valid concept.
If you are with me this far, and are interested in receiving
a copy of this plan, please let me know. I think I can post
it in ASCII format here for individual users, not for the
whole list (serious bandwidth buster).
Eric Siegel
[log in to unmask]
|