Joe wrote;

<DOCUMENT> <DESCRIPTION Taxon_Name = "Viola hederacea"> <CHARACTER Character_Name = "Leaves"> <STATE State_Name = "present"> </CHARACTER> </DESCRIPTION> <DESCRIPTION Taxon_Name = "Viola banksii"> <CHARACTER Character_Name = "Foliage"> <STATE State_Name = "present"> </CHARACTER> </DESCRIPTION> </DOCUMENT> Are the characters "leaves" and "foliage" comparable in this document? Probably they are, but the only way to be 100% certain is to examine specimens of Viola hederacea and Viola banksii. This will put me back into the same situation that I have been struggling with all of my professional career: attempting to match the variable, and sometimes wild terminology, occurring in descriptions.

I am not sure how you could come up with a standard that would prevent this sort of headache... Both delta and lucid editors allow you to build and encode the above with no problem at all, not even a warning message... It is the knowledge, skill and intellect of the compiler that keeps it out...

Where a standard could have an impact is in the area of trying to combine data from different compilers with different knowledge, skill and intellect... If we have a standard description/character/state specification it might be possible to map the leaves/foliage/flat_green_things of different compilers to each other...

This is the end of the spectrum I am coming from. A standard or specification that allows, encourages, or even enforces, internal consistency within a document is only slightly interesting, and delta or lucid can do that already. But something that can bring together and give useful access to descriptive data from different sources and different times - that is exciting...

The second point is that humans, as a species, have a strong tendency to "take the easiest path".

Show me the way, brother, show me the way...

Unless a significant reward is provided or they are forced to use a certain technique, they will invariably do the easiest, simplest thing. If they can just throw in hunks of description, as the default, that is what they will do. I support Eric's idea that character and taxon lists should be the default standard, and something extra has to be done to throw in hunks of description. Perhaps this will encourage them in the right direction.

This is the direction I would like the specs go as well... accommodate and encourage structure, but tolerate the free spirit...

jim