Different reasons for different GUIDs

[Roderic Page]

Hmmm, I'm struggling to see how adding name-usage instances (of which
there will be an awful lot more than just names) will make this diagram
any less complex. In fact, the names in the diagram could be regarded
as name-usages (if I just tack on the literature source), omitting
subsequent usages of a name.

I take it you are limiting the mapping of Taxon Name GUIDs to be
between GUIDs for the "same" name in different databases? I say "same"
because, leaving taxon-concepts aside, the presence of homonyms between
the codes makes mapping names as strings problematic (indeed, GenBank
uses names to map between its databases an external sources, and there
are quite a few cases where this mapping is erroneous).

I should point out that the picture I attached is a particularly messy
example where the plant species Oxylobium lineare has been moved to a
new genus (Gastrolobium), but the resulting binomial (G. lineare)
already exists (although it is treated as a synonym of G.
callistachys). Consequently, a new species epithet was created,
resulting in G. ebrachteolatum. I found this out the hard way when
looking at TreeBASE names, trying to figure out how come a sequence for
Gastrolobium ebrachteolatum was listed in GenBank as being from
Oxylobium lineare. Furthermore, these are just the links represented in
MOBOT. There should be additional links (for example, Oxylobium
linearis and Callistachys linearis must be synonyms).

Rod


On 14 Sep 2005, at 07:05, Richard Pyle wrote:

> Hi Rod,
>
>> Regarding mapping between GUIDs, I suspect the mapping may get very
>> complicated, and a simple tree might not be appropriate. Attached is
>> an
>> example of relationships between names in MOBOT, based on RDF I
>> generate for LSIDs for MOBOT names.
>
> I think the diagram you sent seems complex only because it endeavors to
> create direct linkages between name objects. As far as I'm concerned,
> the
> only linkages shown on your diagram that should be treated as a direct
> NameObject-NameObject links are the "basionym" links (actually, in my
> view,
> this kind of relationship does not even need to exist at all).  All of
> the
> other links should be routed between and among Name Objects
> indirectly, via
> name-usage instances. The complexity is then passed to the network of
> name
> usages, and would not affect the mapping of Taxon Name GUIDs that Peter
> described.
>
> Aloha,
> Rich
>
>
Professor Roderic D. M. Page
Editor, Systematic Biology
DEEB, IBLS
Graham Kerr Building
University of Glasgow
Glasgow G12 8QP
United Kingdom

Phone:    +44 141 330 4778
Fax:      +44 141 330 2792
email:    r.page at bio.gla.ac.uk
web:      http://taxonomy.zoology.gla.ac.uk/rod/rod.html
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