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[tdwg-ncd] FW: NCD toolkit
by Neil Thomson 23 Apr '07

23 Apr '07

Hi Ruud, I'm forwarding this message to the list to maintain the sequence, otherwise my response will be meaningless to the others. It would be great if you would join the list at the URL provided by Ricardo, then we can all share in these exciting developments. With thanks, Neil -----Original Message----- From: Ruud Altenburg [mailto:ruud@eti.uva.nl] Sent: 20 April 2007 15:19 To: Neil Thomson Cc: tdwg-ncd(a)lists.tdwg.org Subject: Re: NCD toolkit Hallo Neil, I don't think I'm on the list your cc'ed, so if this bounces could you please forward my reply? I have combined both of your answers of today into one mail. But before I get to that I have an important announcement: I have made our NLBIF metadatabase maintenance site available on a public server, so you and other NCD participants can have a look. Please note that my first concern has been the functionality, not its looks! This should easily be improved with style sheets but frankly I never heard complaints from our ETI people about its 'Spartan look' ; ) The system is available at http://www.nlbif.nl/ncd-preview/ It currently contains no data, but anyone can have a try at adding/ updating/deleting records. The login is test/test. A final note: I would not play too much with the "Send mailing" option, as this may seriously annoy people you have entered as test persons! :) Then the Q&A revisited. I only reply to issues that have remained open or that I feel need some more discussion. > ----------- > 3. The contract mentions import from NoDIT databases as a requirement > (plus the EAD standard which I'm not familiar with). To cater for > this we have added several fields to the metadatabase, otherwise we > would not have been able to migrate all data. However, strictly > speaking the metadatabase therefore does not match the NCD standard > one-on-one. How do we deal with this? > > ## NHT: Would you be able to let me have a list of the elements that > do not match, please? Then we can evaluate whether they should be > added to NCD or whether it does not matter. Since NCD was derived > from the schema that underlies NoDIT they should be very similar. > Markus may be able to advise on this, since he built NoDIT for > BioCASE. These are elements such as PercentageDatabased. We could maintain them in the database (so they are not lost) but omit them from the web service. > ------------ > 4. Which fields in the NCD standard are required and which are not? I > assume ones which have a closed box in XML Spy, but this may be too > loose for a database setup. In the NLBIF metadatabase, a collection > must be connected to either a person or an organisation, otherwise it > would be orphaned. If I interpret the NCD schema well, information > about a collection can be entered without providing information about > the organisation or person to which/whom it belongs. > > ## NHT: Your are right in your interpretation of the schema. We have > tried to keep the number of required elements to a minimum to > encourage data entry - there are currently only 8 required elements > and 5 of these are about who created the entry and when. The > <FamilyName> of a person is required if a person is entered. It > would > be easy enough (and makes sense) to make an institution required and > should not be any hardship for data entry folk since for a > session, at > least, the instutition details will be the same and so entered just > once. This IMO needs further discussion. A collection can also be related to a person, not exclusively to an organisation (private collections!). Also, please keep in mind that information on collections by themselves may be virtually useless if there is no information stored about where the collection is stored (for access) and whom to address for further information. The virtue of a database is that you can search for information, but if only an extremely limited set of data is required, this will seriously impede its use. Please have a look at the setup of the metadatabase maintenance site. It's easy to add collections to existing organisations or persons, which only have to be created once. > ----------- > 5. We have copied some value lists from the NoDIT database to our > database, e.g. keywords describing collections. However, the NCD > standard has a broader scope than the NoDIT database and the NLBIF > metadatabase. In the interface, I assume that many values too should > be selected from popups menus, to guarantee a uniform database -- > e.g. AgentRole, CollectionPurpose, UnitOfMeasure, DigitalFileFormats > to name but a few. To create such lists, we need to have these values > stored in the database, so somehow these lists should be compiled. If > multiple languages should be supported, we may need to have these > values in other languages but English as well. > > ## NHT: These terminology lists and their association with the TDWG > ontology > are the subject of a separate development being undertaken at the > Smithsonian Institution by Carol Butler in association with Roger > Hyam and Markus. They will result in sets of terms that can be used > as pick-lists for those elements that should have just a few > terms or > for which consistency is important. > We should see the first draft of these at the NCD Workshop, if not > before. It would be good for anyone interested to make > suggestions for > such terms and their definition through this list to help Carol to > compile them. This is good news! I could start with the basic set we have compiled for NLBIF and replace these with the NCD entries once these have been determined. I assume these lists will be in English and will not be translated to other languages? > ---------- > 2. More or less the same applies to Agents. My idea is that this is > filled in once when setting up the database and that this is returned > only when the database is accessed externally. But as apparently more > than one agent with one or more roles can be responsible for a single > record, so possibly this solution is incomplete. However, many > changes have to be made to the current database to implement agents > to a record level. E.g. consider that a collection is appended to an > organisation that has previously been created by another agent. > > ## NHT: You are right that someone entering new records should only > need to record their details once for the session. The agents > section of the NCD Header (which is based on the METS header) is > intended to record metadata about the record itself, rather than > the collection that the record describes. The date of record > creation should default to "today" and be fixed. However, an > agent can come along later and amend the record, maybe adding to > it or correcting it. In this case the role of the person is > "editor". > Appending a collection to an existing organisation record should not > affect the organisation record, since the relationship is > established simply by recording the organisation ID in the > collection > record. Nothing is added to or changed in the organisation record. Thanks for the explanation. The system tracks which records (organisations, collections and persons) have been updated by whom (by Users). The Agent information e.g. is fixed for each site proving a web service on their local database. This could be entered once when setting up the database. Correct me if I'm wrong! > ---------- > 3. Shouldn't PostalAddressText and PhysicalAddressText each have an > independent zipcode and town? In reverse, is it necessary to use > language attributes to towns and regions? We have stored this data in > a non-language-dependent field. > > ## NHT: Not sure about this one - are there cases where an > organisation > has a postal address in a different town from the organisation? This > may be solved, as the annotation text suggests, by having the > complete > address text in the postal element. The ZIP code and town are > intended > for your wizzy Google Maps link and for folk to determine what > collections > they may visit in a particular area. So if we are agreed that > only one > of these is required, the documentation will need to make it clear > that the ZIP code and Town refer the to actual organisation, rather > than its postbox. > While we are on the topic, does anyone have a preference for > "organisation" > over "institution", or does it not matter? Well, normally both towns are the same, but not always. From a database point of view, it not desirable to enter data that ideally should be stored in separate fields into one field. E.g. it would probably make Google Maps queries much more complicated if not impossible, as addresses can be entered in various forms. Best regards, Ruud

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[tdwg-ncd] RE: NCD toolkit
by Neil Thomson 20 Apr '07

20 Apr '07

Hi Ruud, Thank you for your mailing - I have interspersed my responses to your questions below. As mentioned, I am also copying this out to the NCD mail-list so that folk can be informed of developments and can offer additional advice, or correct my responses where I am talking nonsense. The toolkit is highly anticipated, with several institutions already looking to make use of it - including my own - so it is important that we get things right as early as possible. The first step is to agree on a stable version of NCD that we can all work with. A new version is required anyway, since the current v0.50 has had some of its elements "un-typed" by XMLSpy and I'm grateful to Markus for pointing this out. So, on with the Q&A session, number 1 ... -----Original Message----- From: Ruud Altenburg [mailto:ruud@eti.uva.nl] Sent: 18 April 2007 12:24 To: Neil Thomson Subject: NCD toolkit Hallo Neil, this is Ruud Altenburg from ETI. My forthcoming project is to participate in the creation of the NCD toolkit. As you know, ETI has prepared a "metadatabase" for NLBIF which was based on the NCD 0.3 standard and added some fields from the NoDIT database which we considered essential (we had to migrate the data from NoDIT to the new database). I have sent you the scheme of the metadatabase some time ago. According to Wouter (Addink, ETI), the toolkit should be based on v0.5 of the NCD scheme. I have compared that to our metadatabase schema and noticed some changes. This implies that we need to update our database schema, which will boil down to the addition of several new fields. This of course should be fairly easy to implement. However, there are some points we need to address before I can really start with this project. ## NHT: Version v0.50 was developed in response to the schema that you sent to me and the presentation that Wouter gave to TDWG at the end of last year. We will need to bear in mind that there will be differences between the NCD data standard, which is intended as a data aggregation and interchange standard, and the implementation of it as a database. We have noted before that there are database fields that are required to make the database work that are not required for the interchange of data. This should not be a problem, though. ----------- 1. The contract states that the NCD toolkit should be multi-lingual. Does this refer to the web interface (the entry tool), the contents of the database, or both? I propose to have the interface in English and only to store the data in several languages. ## NHT: This refers primarily to the contents of the database. Most, if not all, text-oriented elements are now repeatable and have a language attribute so that entries may be made both in the local language and in a second language, such as english. The exception is the <CollectionUniformName> which is expected to be in english. ----------- 2. About the contents: how many languages should the interface cater for? Currently our metadatabase caters for the entry of two languages (English and Dutch). Data have to be entered in two languages at once. The reason for this is that you need to avoid that all organisations and collections are described in English but only half of them in Dutch. So in our setup, when someone enters new data, he or she is forced to do this in two languages at once. I propose a similar strategy for the NCD toolkit, i.e. to restrict the contents to English plus a native language if the user is not from an English speaking territory. ## NHT: This sounds like a good strategy. I'm not sure that we can enforce english except where it is useful for sorting and searching, but restricting input to two languages should be ok. I would expect (but I may be wrong here) that providing local versions of the interface would only involve re-labelling the input form and report form elements? In which case, provided guidance is given, it would be reasonable to expect that those implementing the toolkit in a different language could do that. ----------- 3. The contract mentions import from NoDIT databases as a requirement (plus the EAD standard which I'm not familiar with). To cater for this we have added several fields to the metadatabase, otherwise we would not have been able to migrate all data. However, strictly speaking the metadatabase therefore does not match the NCD standard one-on-one. How do we deal with this? ## NHT: Would you be able to let me have a list of the elements that do not match, please? Then we can evaluate whether they should be added to NCD or whether it does not matter. Since NCD was derived from the schema that underlies NoDIT they should be very similar. Markus may be able to advise on this, since he built NoDIT for BioCASE. ------------ 4. Which fields in the NCD standard are required and which are not? I assume ones which have a closed box in XML Spy, but this may be too loose for a database setup. In the NLBIF metadatabase, a collection must be connected to either a person or an organisation, otherwise it would be orphaned. If I interpret the NCD schema well, information about a collection can be entered without providing information about the organisation or person to which/whom it belongs. ## NHT: Your are right in your interpretation of the schema. We have tried to keep the number of required elements to a minimum to encourage data entry - there are currently only 8 required elements and 5 of these are about who created the entry and when. The <FamilyName> of a person is required if a person is entered. It would be easy enough (and makes sense) to make an institution required and should not be any hardship for data entry folk since for a session, at least, the instutition details will be the same and so entered just once. ----------- 5. We have copied some value lists from the NoDIT database to our database, e.g. keywords describing collections. However, the NCD standard has a broader scope than the NoDIT database and the NLBIF metadatabase. In the interface, I assume that many values too should be selected from popups menus, to guarantee a uniform database -- e.g. AgentRole, CollectionPurpose, UnitOfMeasure, DigitalFileFormats to name but a few. To create such lists, we need to have these values stored in the database, so somehow these lists should be compiled. If multiple languages should be supported, we may need to have these values in other languages but English as well. ## NHT: These terminology lists and their association with the TDWG ontology are the subject of a separate development being undertaken at the Smithsonian Institution by Carol Butler in association with Roger Hyam and Markus. They will result in sets of terms that can be used as pick-lists for those elements that should have just a few terms or for which consistency is important. We should see the first draft of these at the NCD Workshop, if not before. It would be good for anyone interested to make suggestions for such terms and their definition through this list to help Carol to compile them. ----------- I hope you have the time to discuss these items, and probably a few more that will popup when I dive deeper into the subject! ## NHT: Sure thing - I see that there is another one awaiting attention and will get on to that very soon. Thank you very much for your work on this and please do not hesitate to ask any further questions of me or anyone on what is now the TDWG Collections Description Interest Group. All best wishes, Neil Best regards, Ruud

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[tdwg-ncd] RE: More questions and remarks on NCD
by Neil Thomson 20 Apr '07

20 Apr '07

Hi again Ruud, Answers below, which I hope will help ... With thanks, Neil -----Original Message----- From: Ruud Altenburg [mailto:ruud@eti.uva.nl] Sent: 19 April 2007 09:43 To: Neil Thomson Subject: More questions and remarks on NCD Hallo Neil, here are some remarks on the NCD standard, some with respect to the current NLBIF database: 1. RecordType: this item is non-relevant for a database I assume, as it is always "actual". Possibly it is actual when returning XML from a query on the database through a wrapper. Should this be included in the database? ## NHT: I would say that it should be included in the database, but defaulted to "actual". This allows the possibility that records generated as the result of a database query can be added to the database, but flagged as "derived". This was felt to be important to prevent an over-inflated estimation of the number of collections in an organisation. ---------- 2. More or less the same applies to Agents. My idea is that this is filled in once when setting up the database and that this is returned only when the database is accessed externally. But as apparently more than one agent with one or more roles can be responsible for a single record, so possibly this solution is incomplete. However, many changes have to be made to the current database to implement agents to a record level. E.g. consider that a collection is appended to an organisation that has previously been created by another agent. ## NHT: You are right that someone entering new records should only need to record their details once for the session. The agents section of the NCD Header (which is based on the METS header) is intended to record metadata about the record itself, rather than the collection that the record describes. The date of record creation should default to "today" and be fixed. However, an agent can come along later and amend the record, maybe adding to it or correcting it. In this case the role of the person is "editor". Appending a collection to an existing organisation record should not affect the organisation record, since the relationship is established simply by recording the organisation ID in the collection record. Nothing is added to or changed in the organisation record. ---------- 3. Shouldn't PostalAddressText and PhysicalAddressText each have an independent zipcode and town? In reverse, is it necessary to use language attributes to towns and regions? We have stored this data in a non-language-dependent field. ## NHT: Not sure about this one - are there cases where an organisation has a postal address in a different town from the organisation? This may be solved, as the annotation text suggests, by having the complete address text in the postal element. The ZIP code and town are intended for your wizzy Google Maps link and for folk to determine what collections they may visit in a particular area. So if we are agreed that only one of these is required, the documentation will need to make it clear that the ZIP code and Town refer the to actual organisation, rather than its postbox. While we are on the topic, does anyone have a preference for "organisation" over "institution", or does it not matter? ---------- 4. For the metadatabase I have used a slightly different schema that should be compatible with how things are implemented in the NCD. This is -- if I understand correctly what Source and IDinSource mean. I suppose these are 'links' to a different 'table' in which to look up the keyword? Some keywords can be entered by typing, others will need to be selected from a popup list I assume. We have taken those lists from the NoDIT database and I have translated the terms into Dutch for specific use for the NLBIF metadatabase. This is something to consider when setting up the NCD database. Also what exactly does the Strength attribute for most keywords stand for? ## NHT: These are intended to allow folk to enter terms from a published source, such as a thesaurus and to then be able to find the exact term in that source. So the attributes will point to external resources. An example would be the term "Amsterdam" for geoegraphical coverage. Someone could enter this as an Alexandria Digital Library Gazetteer (ADLG) reference as Source=ADLG IDinSOurce=adlgaz-1-3081051-64. Anyone could then later find out which Amsterdam (plus lots of details) from the ADLG by entering the that number into the "identification code" box at: http://webclient.alexandria.ucsb.edu/client/gaz/adl/index.jsp The strength attribute is simply a flag that can be attached to a specific keyword (or keywords) to indicate that the collection is particularly strong in that aspect. For example a collection of butterflies from all over "Africa" (no flag), but particularly from Zaire (flag). ----------- 5. The following fields also require a Language attribute I think? CollectionFocus, CollectionPurpose, SubUnitName. ## NHT: Oops, yes - one for the next version. Hope this helps, Neil Regards, Ruud

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[tdwg-ncd] Collections Descriptions Interest Group Charter
by Neil Thomson 12 Apr '07

12 Apr '07

Dear NCD'ers, I am submitting the attached document as the "Collections Descriptions Interest Group Charter" to be reviewed by the TDWG Executive so that the Group can officially exist. It has been approved by the Group Mentor - Adrian Rissoné - and so I would now like to pass it to you guys for any final comments before submission. It is largely a re-organisation of the existing "NCD Task Group Charter" to reflect our upgraded status to an Interest Group and so there should be no great surprises. Please let me have any comments as soon as poss. All best wishes, Neil <<Collections_Descriptions_Interest_Group_Charter.doc>> ------- Neil Thomson Head of Data & Digital Systems The Natural History Museum, Cromwell Road, London SW7 5BD Tel: +44 (0)20 7942 5294, Fax: +44 (0)20 7942 5559, Email: n.thomson(a)nhm.ac.uk http://www.nhm.ac.uk

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[Biogeosdi] Things we did not finish in Brasil
by Javier de la Torre 11 Apr '07

11 Apr '07

Hey guys, I hope you are all fine back in your countries, except Bart that is still in the great country that is Brasil! I just wanted to let you know that I updated the page with the daily milestones with the things we did not have time to complete, so if someone feels like... I hope to start this weekend finishing things. Hey Tim, did you ask about the server at CRIA? Cheers.

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[Biogeosdi] Engines are starting!
by Javier de la Torre 30 Mar '07

30 Mar '07

Hi all, Cheers from Campinas! I arrived yesterday and had already my first swim at the hotel swimming pool :) Here is HOT, really HOT. I saw yesterday at 14:00 a thermometer claiming it was 35 celsius degrees, so be prepare. Apart of this I have to say that the food is wonderful, people is nice, the hotel is fine and with internet and CRIA is a nice office where I am sure we will have fun. But I haven't been just eating and swimming today! Jeje. I have been all day working with Tim to prepare stuff and I have to say we have been quite productive, hopefully we will continue the same tomorrow. Tim has prepared a development server for us with Ubuntu where we have installed things like Geoserver for WMS,WCS and WFS. He also have set up the basic project layout for svn (using the one provided by Dave). Meanwhile I have started mocking up the interface of the web app that we discussed we want to build, and we have gone quite far already :) You can take a look at the screenshots we took at: http://wiki.tdwg.org/twiki/bin/view/Geospatial/MockupScreenShots All the source code is already in subversion if you wanna take a look (trac has an svn browser). Tomorrow we will probably start making them more real than they are today by getting already some data via web services. Maybe we are done before you come and we can all go on holidays on Monday :D Not really, there is a lot of nice ideas floating in our minds for merging more and more standards into the prototype. Ah! and because there has not been any suggestions we are starting to use Acacias as the test data (please bring more ideas!). I hope you are all fine and we are waiting for you to be around here. Cheers, Javier. PD: By the way! I took the suggested bus and I have to say is more comfortable than a taxi! The bus is fully air conditioned, with big seats (really big), the people are very quit... I really really recommend you to pick up the bus.

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[Biogeosdi] Fwd: [tdwg-tag] BioGUID
by Javier de la Torre 28 Mar '07

28 Mar '07

I think this could be interesting for the GUID part of the meeting. Cheers. Begin forwarded message: > From: Roderic Page <r.page(a)bio.gla.ac.uk> > Date: 20 de marzo de 2007 15:14:43 GMT+01:00 > To: tdwg-tag(a)lists.tdwg.org, tdwg-guid(a)lists.tdwg.org > Cc: Simon Rycroft <simon(a)rycroft.name>, Vince Smith > <vincent.smith(a)nhm.ac.uk>, David Remsen <dremsen(a)gbif.org>, Donat > Agosti <agosti(a)amnh.org>, William Piel <william.piel(a)yale.edu> > Subject: [tdwg-tag] BioGUID > > Dear All, > > I've put together a web site called http://bioguid.info which, > rather grandly, is an attempt to bootstrap the biodiversity > Semantic Web by providing resolvable URIs for biological objects, > such as publications, taxonomic names, nucleotide sequences, and > specimens. > > These URIs (or "GUIDs") can be resolved by a web browser to display > HTML, but under the hood are resolved to RDF (which you can see by > viewing the source of the web page you get for a URI). > > The web interface is really window dressing, I just wanted a way to > display RDF that wouldn't frighten people (me included). For some > URIs all I do is grab XML and reformat it (e.g., DOIs). For GenBank > records, all manner of agony is involved in trying to extract > specimen and publication links. > > A good place to get a sense of what bioguid.info is about is to > start with this Pubmed record: http://bioguid.info/pmid:17079492 > > From this, you can get a list of sequences. If you click on one of > those, you'll see a link to a specimen, which you can then look at > (you'll need Firefox 1.5, Camino, Webkkit, or a browser with a SVG > plugin for the full effect). > > What I'm hoping to do is start doing things like taking a TreeBASE > record, getting the linked sequences, running these through > bioguid.info to extract georeferenced specimen links, so with > minimal effort we get a map (and eventually a Google Earth tree a > la Bill Piel). > > The glue to make this happen comprises HTTP URIs that are > dereferenceable to RDF. This is my mantra for the day. > > Regards > > Rod > > > > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > ------------------------------------------ > 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(a)bio.gla.ac.uk > web: http://taxonomy.zoology.gla.ac.uk/rod/rod.html > iChat: aim://rodpage1962 > reprints: http://taxonomy.zoology.gla.ac.uk/rod/pubs.html > > Subscribe to Systematic Biology through the Society of Systematic > Biologists Website: http://systematicbiology.org > Search for taxon names: http://darwin.zoology.gla.ac.uk/~rpage/portal/ > Find out what we know about a species: http://ispecies.org > Rod's rants on phyloinformatics: http://iphylo.blogspot.com > Rod's rants on ants: http://semant.blogspot.com > > _______________________________________________ > tdwg-tag mailing list > tdwg-tag(a)lists.tdwg.org > http://lists.tdwg.org/mailman/listinfo/tdwg-tag

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[Biogeosdi] Re: [tdwg_geoplayground] some PHP snippets for Catalogue of Life
by Tim Sutton 27 Mar '07

27 Mar '07

Hi Bart Cool stuff. Before I reply I should point out that you are still mailing to the old, yahoo spammy, mailing list. We got an official tdwg list which is the one you should use from now on: biogeosdi(a)lists.tdwg.org > Hi, > > After our IRC chat about the Campinas workshop, I've been trying to > extract data from the Catalogue of Life. I din't find any documentation > or API, nor a web-service of the "WMS" type (i.e. a GET request and an > XML response), so I started playing around a bit with some PHP coding, > and I've come up with : Ed Donavan wrote a web service around CoL - but where / if there is any documentation for this I dont know. > > curl_from_CoL.php : performs a cURL query on CoL, puts the results into > a local tab-separated outputfile. The fields of the (GET) request are > hardcoded for now, could be parametrised (is that a word ?) very easy. > Parameterised works for me :-) > parse_CoL_output.php : reads in the tab-separated file from the CoL > request, writes out the taxonomic ranks we're interested in (e.g. all > valid names at species level) - again, the filter settings would be very > easy to parametrise... > Cool stuff. Javier and I will have a play with it in our pre hackfest hackfest! :-) Perhaps you could attach these files to the wiki too if you havent already done so so that we can keep all the useful code snippets in one place. Regards Tim > Any comments are welcome. > > kind regards, > > Bart. > > -- > Bart Meganck, > > ICT & GIS engineer, > African Zoology Department. > > Royal Museum for Central Africa, > Leuvensesteenweg 13, > B-3080 Tervuren, > Belgium. > > Tel : +32(0)2 769 56 92 > Fax : +32(0)2 767 02 42 > Email : bart.meganck(a)africamuseum.be > Website : www.africamuseum.be > > ########################################### > > This message has been scanned by ICT - Africa Museum > > ________________________________________ > 27/3/2007 - Filtered through antispam by ICT > > __._,_.___ > Messages in this topic () Reply (via web post) | Start a new topic > > > > Change settings via the Web (Yahoo! ID required) > Change settings via email: Switch delivery to Daily Digest | Switch format to Traditional > Visit Your Group | Yahoo! Groups Terms of Use | Unsubscribe > > > Recent Activity > Visit Your Group > SPONSORED LINKS > > > Geographic information systems > Geography > Geography of > World geography > Geography book > > > Top Scientist > > 10 Greatest Ever > > Share and vote > > on Bix.com! > > Yahoo! News > > Entertainment News > > The latest on stars, > > movies, and more > > Yahoo! Mail > > Next gen email? > > Try the all-new > > Yahoo! Mail Beta. > . > __,_._,___ > -- -- Tim Sutton Visit http://qgis.org for a great Open Source GIS Home Page: http://linfiniti.com Skype: timlinux MSN: tim_bdworld(a)msn.com Yahoo: tim_bdworld(a)yahoo.com Jabber: timlinux Irc: timlinux on #qgis at freenode.net

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RE: [tdwg-ncd] RE: NCD version 0.50 mappings
by "Döring, Markus" 15 Mar '07

15 Mar '07

Barbara, I dont think we have to be afraid of too many fields, especially due to additional language attributes. It's a matter of the editor frontend rather than the data standard. The editor should surely be easy to use and focus on the important things first, leaving secondary information for "expert". best wishes, Markus -----Original Message----- From: tdwg-ncd-bounces(a)lists.tdwg.org on behalf of Thomson, Neil Sent: Wed 3/14/2007 10:58 AM To: bmathe(a)amnh.org Cc: tdwg-ncd(a)lists.tdwg.org Subject: [tdwg-ncd] RE: NCD version 0.50 mappings Hi Barbara, Many thanks for this - I've been out of the Museum for a few days and will take a look as soon as I can. Thanks also to Ricardo for sorting the bounce - I attach the original file here for the rest of the group to see, as intended. Cheers, Neil -----Original Message----- From: Barbara Mathe [mailto:bmathe@amnh.org] Sent: 13 March 2007 03:35 To: Neil Thomson Cc: Barbara Mathe; tdwg-ncd(a)lists.tdwg.org Subject: Re: NCD version 0.50 mappings Folks, Forgive me but I am simply attaching the excel file to this e-mail since it is late and I must catch a plane early tomorrow AM. I have found this particularly difficult, in part for reasons I will describe below. That said, the document is now rainbow colored--for better or worse--at least it's cheerful. I have highlighted all changes from the earlier mapping (basically the cumulative changes from 0.34 to 0.50 in yellow. Someone should double check to make sure that I included all the fields. I believe I have but I could use some copyediting here. I have also noted any questions that I have in green. You will notice a few questions about certain fields, e.g. McGinley, now described as such, should not (I think) any longer need a source specified. I also added a copy edit or two myself. Neil, in particular, I think you should have a good look. However, I am still concerned about two things. 1. My basic lack of experience with EAD. This must be reviewed by someone facile with this standard as opposed to me who must constantly consult (and interpret) the documentation. This mapping is very important and I've said this before but I just am not confident of my expertise here. I believe that someone with such expertise could answer the questions, I have noted but I have to say that I'm still uncertain about how to handle language attributes, in particular. The mapping is close but this is something that should be perfect. 2. Speaking of the language attributes, I am struck at the number of fields that now (since 0.34) specify a language attibute and although I realize these are not required, after battling with them, I fear, once again, at the complexity of the schema. I think we will have to look at interface issues down the road, at least for participants who will be directly entering data rather than mapping it from another source. We will need a NCD "simple" to encourage contributions. Right now, with attributes, there are 146 fields! NB: The DC mappings in column D and E have been carried over but are hidden. There may be some updating needed there as well from 0.34 to 0.50 (rows highlighted in yellow!) I'm out of town for the rest of the week but will be checking e-mail. Looking for any and all comments. Barbara > Barbara Mathé > Museum Archivist and Head of Library Special Collections American > Museum of Natural History Library Central Park West @ 79 Street New > York, NY > 10024 > > phone: 212 769-5419 > fax: 212 769-5009 > > > -----Original Message----- > From: tdwg-ncd-bounces(a)lists.tdwg.org > [mailto:tdwg-ncd-bounces@lists.tdwg.org] On Behalf Of Markus Döring > Sent: Tuesday, February 27, 2007 8:47 AM > To: Neil Thomson > Cc: tdwg-ncd(a)lists.tdwg.org > Subject: Re: [tdwg-ncd] NCD version 0.50 > > Hello, > I have added v0.50 to the tdwg resource directory. > > The schema resource is now available at: > http://rs.tdwg.org/ncd/0.50/rddl-2007-02-27.html > > If you want to refer to the schema, please use this URL: > http://rs.tdwg.org/ncd/0.50/NCDv0pt50.xsd > > > The latest development version of NCD is also update and available at > http://rs.tdwg.org/ncd/dev > > best wishes > -- > Markus > > > > On Feb 27, 2007, at 10:04 AM, Neil Thomson wrote: > >> Dear all, >> >> Please find attached version 0.50 of NCD. The following changes from >> v0.40 have been made: >> >> Version 0.40 to 0.50 - (February 2007) >> Ensured all elements with a language attribute are repeatable >> (if not already) >> - AgentRole >> - Note (in Agents) >> - CollectionName >> - Abstract >> - DescriptionForSpecialists >> - Citation >> - Notes (in Descriptive Group) >> - AccessRestrictions >> - UsageRestrictions >> - CustodialHistory >> - InstitutionName >> - SubunitName >> - InstitutionalContactPost >> - Town >> - Region >> - CountryName >> - ExpeditionName >> Removed language attribute from <PostalAddressText> - assume >> native language >> Added <PhysicalAddressText> to cater for P.O.Boxes to >> Institution Group >> Added <SubUnitName> to Institution Group >> >> I hope that no further changes will be required until we get more >> operational experience of working with NCD, but do please let me know >> as soon as possible if there is anything glaringly wrong or missing. >> I also hope that these changes should not have much of an impact on >> any implementations based on the previous version. >> >> The intention is that this version remains as is for some time, so >> that the tasks we undertake this year can be based on a stable >> version of the standard. This includes the production of the NCD >> Toolkit by NLBIF, the conversion to RDF by Markus and the >> documentation and mappings being coordinated by Connie. A complete >> list of deliverables for the year is (or will be shortly) on the wikis. >> >> I will be placing the updated file, with text-based and image-based >> derivations, on the NCD Website and on the RAVNS Basecamp in due >> course. >> >> For those of you that are aiming to attend the NCD 2007 Workshop, the >> dates are almost confirmed as June 18th and 19th, with ETI in >> Amsterdam as the host institution. More information on this later. >> >> With all best wishes, >> Neil >> >> >> <<NCDv0pt50.xsd>> >> ------- >> Neil Thomson >> Head of Data & Digital Systems >> The Natural History Museum, Cromwell Road, London SW7 5BD >> Tel: +44 (0)20 7942 5294, >> Fax: +44 (0)20 7942 5559, >> Email: n.thomson(a)nhm.ac.uk >> http://www.nhm.ac.uk >> >> >> >> <NCDv0pt50.xsd> >> _______________________________________________ >> tdwg-ncd mailing list >> tdwg-ncd(a)lists.tdwg.org >> http://lists.tdwg.org/mailman/listinfo/tdwg-ncd > > _______________________________________________ > tdwg-ncd mailing list > tdwg-ncd(a)lists.tdwg.org > http://lists.tdwg.org/mailman/listinfo/tdwg-ncd > > > -- Barbara Mathe Museum Archivist and Head of Library Special Collections American Museum of Natural History Central Park West at 79 Street New York, NY 10024 Phone: 212 769-5419 Fax: 212 769-5009

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[tdwg-ncd] RE: NCD version 0.50 mappings
by Neil Thomson 14 Mar '07

14 Mar '07

Hi Barbara, Many thanks for this - I've been out of the Museum for a few days and will take a look as soon as I can. Thanks also to Ricardo for sorting the bounce - I attach the original file here for the rest of the group to see, as intended. Cheers, Neil -----Original Message----- From: Barbara Mathe [mailto:bmathe@amnh.org] Sent: 13 March 2007 03:35 To: Neil Thomson Cc: Barbara Mathe; tdwg-ncd(a)lists.tdwg.org Subject: Re: NCD version 0.50 mappings Folks, Forgive me but I am simply attaching the excel file to this e-mail since it is late and I must catch a plane early tomorrow AM. I have found this particularly difficult, in part for reasons I will describe below. That said, the document is now rainbow colored--for better or worse--at least it's cheerful. I have highlighted all changes from the earlier mapping (basically the cumulative changes from 0.34 to 0.50 in yellow. Someone should double check to make sure that I included all the fields. I believe I have but I could use some copyediting here. I have also noted any questions that I have in green. You will notice a few questions about certain fields, e.g. McGinley, now described as such, should not (I think) any longer need a source specified. I also added a copy edit or two myself. Neil, in particular, I think you should have a good look. However, I am still concerned about two things. 1. My basic lack of experience with EAD. This must be reviewed by someone facile with this standard as opposed to me who must constantly consult (and interpret) the documentation. This mapping is very important and I've said this before but I just am not confident of my expertise here. I believe that someone with such expertise could answer the questions, I have noted but I have to say that I'm still uncertain about how to handle language attributes, in particular. The mapping is close but this is something that should be perfect. 2. Speaking of the language attributes, I am struck at the number of fields that now (since 0.34) specify a language attibute and although I realize these are not required, after battling with them, I fear, once again, at the complexity of the schema. I think we will have to look at interface issues down the road, at least for participants who will be directly entering data rather than mapping it from another source. We will need a NCD "simple" to encourage contributions. Right now, with attributes, there are 146 fields! NB: The DC mappings in column D and E have been carried over but are hidden. There may be some updating needed there as well from 0.34 to 0.50 (rows highlighted in yellow!) I'm out of town for the rest of the week but will be checking e-mail. Looking for any and all comments. Barbara > Barbara Mathé > Museum Archivist and Head of Library Special Collections American > Museum of Natural History Library Central Park West @ 79 Street New > York, NY > 10024 > > phone: 212 769-5419 > fax: 212 769-5009 > > > -----Original Message----- > From: tdwg-ncd-bounces(a)lists.tdwg.org > [mailto:tdwg-ncd-bounces@lists.tdwg.org] On Behalf Of Markus Döring > Sent: Tuesday, February 27, 2007 8:47 AM > To: Neil Thomson > Cc: tdwg-ncd(a)lists.tdwg.org > Subject: Re: [tdwg-ncd] NCD version 0.50 > > Hello, > I have added v0.50 to the tdwg resource directory. > > The schema resource is now available at: > http://rs.tdwg.org/ncd/0.50/rddl-2007-02-27.html > > If you want to refer to the schema, please use this URL: > http://rs.tdwg.org/ncd/0.50/NCDv0pt50.xsd > > > The latest development version of NCD is also update and available at > http://rs.tdwg.org/ncd/dev > > best wishes > -- > Markus > > > > On Feb 27, 2007, at 10:04 AM, Neil Thomson wrote: > >> Dear all, >> >> Please find attached version 0.50 of NCD. The following changes from >> v0.40 have been made: >> >> Version 0.40 to 0.50 - (February 2007) >> Ensured all elements with a language attribute are repeatable >> (if not already) >> - AgentRole >> - Note (in Agents) >> - CollectionName >> - Abstract >> - DescriptionForSpecialists >> - Citation >> - Notes (in Descriptive Group) >> - AccessRestrictions >> - UsageRestrictions >> - CustodialHistory >> - InstitutionName >> - SubunitName >> - InstitutionalContactPost >> - Town >> - Region >> - CountryName >> - ExpeditionName >> Removed language attribute from <PostalAddressText> - assume >> native language >> Added <PhysicalAddressText> to cater for P.O.Boxes to >> Institution Group >> Added <SubUnitName> to Institution Group >> >> I hope that no further changes will be required until we get more >> operational experience of working with NCD, but do please let me know >> as soon as possible if there is anything glaringly wrong or missing. >> I also hope that these changes should not have much of an impact on >> any implementations based on the previous version. >> >> The intention is that this version remains as is for some time, so >> that the tasks we undertake this year can be based on a stable >> version of the standard. This includes the production of the NCD >> Toolkit by NLBIF, the conversion to RDF by Markus and the >> documentation and mappings being coordinated by Connie. A complete >> list of deliverables for the year is (or will be shortly) on the wikis. >> >> I will be placing the updated file, with text-based and image-based >> derivations, on the NCD Website and on the RAVNS Basecamp in due >> course. >> >> For those of you that are aiming to attend the NCD 2007 Workshop, the >> dates are almost confirmed as June 18th and 19th, with ETI in >> Amsterdam as the host institution. More information on this later. >> >> With all best wishes, >> Neil >> >> >> <<NCDv0pt50.xsd>> >> ------- >> Neil Thomson >> Head of Data & Digital Systems >> The Natural History Museum, Cromwell Road, London SW7 5BD >> Tel: +44 (0)20 7942 5294, >> Fax: +44 (0)20 7942 5559, >> Email: n.thomson(a)nhm.ac.uk >> http://www.nhm.ac.uk >> >> >> >> <NCDv0pt50.xsd> >> _______________________________________________ >> tdwg-ncd mailing list >> tdwg-ncd(a)lists.tdwg.org >> http://lists.tdwg.org/mailman/listinfo/tdwg-ncd > > _______________________________________________ > tdwg-ncd mailing list > tdwg-ncd(a)lists.tdwg.org > http://lists.tdwg.org/mailman/listinfo/tdwg-ncd > > > -- Barbara Mathe Museum Archivist and Head of Library Special Collections American Museum of Natural History Central Park West at 79 Street New York, NY 10024 Phone: 212 769-5419 Fax: 212 769-5009

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