Taxonomic hierarchy in SDD

[Lander, Nicholas]

This raises the old argument for scoring _data_ in our databases rather
than information derived from those data. This is to say that your
system should at least allow of scoring descriptive data at specimen
level rather than at the conceptual level of species (or other taxa).
Thus the descriptions of taxa could be derived "just in time", ie on the
fly when required. Redetermination of a given suite of specimens would
result in all the relevant descriptions, keys, and other products being,
in effect, dynamic. This will be vital for projects which are
institutional or international in scope.

Nicholas Lander
WA Herbarium (PERTH)

-----Original Message-----
From: Steve Shattuck [mailto:Steve.Shattuck at CSIRO.AU]
Sent: Tuesday, November 27, 2001 1:51 PM
To: TDWG-SDD at USOBI.ORG
Subject: Re: Taxonomic hierarchy in SDD


Sounds fine, store the hierarchy but keep it separate from the items.
No
worries.  The idea of supporting multiple hierarchies for different
inheritances is interesting and I can see its potential importance.
I'll
need to test it out here in "biology land" to see if it makes sense in
practice.

I believe that the classification is tied very closely to taxon
concepts,
and that descriptions are certainly tied to concepts. If you change the
concept you almost always change the description, and so knowing the
classification can be important in understanding what the author is up
to.

Steve