Summary of Nomenclature and GUIDs
Roger Hyam
roger at TDWG.ORG
Thu Nov 10 12:47:19 CET 2005
Hi Everyone,
Can I hope to summarize the GUID debate with regard to TaxonNames and
TaxonConcepts and suggest a way forward? (This borrows from Rod's post
and various conversations with others)
1. We have two kinds of GUID (one for TaxonNames and one for
TaxonConcepts).
2. Anyone can set up a system issuing either type of GUID.
3. Big central initiatives (nomenclators like IPNI & ZooBank) will
issue TaxonName GUIDs but they will not have a monopoly on these
enforced by the system.
4. 'sensible' taxonomists and institutions will generate TaxonConcept
GUIDs for the concepts they want to broadcast. Each of these
TaxonConcepts will refer to a TaxonName held in a major
nomenclator (using it's GUID). They may also refer to other
TaxonConcepts from other institutions and their own via GUIDs.
5. Indexers and users of the system can crawl the graph of
TaxonConcept relationships (for query expansion etc) but they know
that the vast majority of concepts should be linked to a GUID
generated by the major nomenclators. The indexer does not have to
string match to try and figure out how the TaxonConcepts are
related (i.e. whether they are different delimitations of the same
name).
6. Not so sensible taxonomists and institutions will not refer to a
major nomenclator. Their TaxonConcepts will be difficult to relate
to others globally.
7. If nomenclators do not do their job well they could,
theoretically, be replaced by some one else setting one up.
*The important thing to note here is it doesn't matter what a name is!*
All the nomenclatural stuff is up to the nomenclator and not the GUID
system. If, for example, ZooBank decided it wouldn't issue GUIDs for new
combinations and it did not meet the needs of the community then the
community would be free to set up another nomenclator or try and force
ZooBank to change. Likewise IPNI and autonyms or whatever. But all these
discussions about gender, spelling etc are separate from the GUID
issues. Basically the taxonomist would go to the nomenclator and say "I
want to describe something you haven't issued a GUID for." Either the
nomenclator would issue the GUID or the taxonomist would have to start a
revolution to get something changed.
So debates about what the nomenclators issue GUIDs for can spin out to
the relevant nomenclator lists (does ZooBank have one yet?).
The second important thing to note is that no one is *forced *to do
anything. If people don't like a nomenclator or system they can simply
go their own way so there is no restriction on scientific freedom or
anything.
There is a great deal to flesh out on this but is it something we could
agree on as a basic plan?
If people don't object to this line of progression I could make up a
page on the wiki that looks like we have agreed on it and we could spin
out to discuss things like how we differentiate between name and concept
GUIDs, central services for issuing GUIDs for those who may not want to
run the resolution thing, what you get back in the meta data etc etc.
All the best,
Roger
--
-------------------------------------
Roger Hyam
Technical Architect
Taxonomic Databases Working Group
-------------------------------------
http://www.tdwg.org
roger at tdwg.org
+44 1578 722782
-------------------------------------
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Hi Everyone,<br>
<br>
Can I hope to summarize the GUID debate with regard to TaxonNames and
TaxonConcepts and suggest a way forward? (This borrows from Rod's post
and various conversations with others)<br>
<ol>
<li>We have two kinds of GUID (one for TaxonNames and one for
TaxonConcepts).</li>
<li>Anyone can set up a system issuing either type of GUID.</li>
<li>Big central initiatives (nomenclators like IPNI & ZooBank)
will issue TaxonName GUIDs but they will not have a monopoly on these
enforced by the system.<br>
</li>
<li>'sensible' taxonomists and institutions will generate
TaxonConcept GUIDs for the concepts they want to broadcast. Each of
these TaxonConcepts will refer to a TaxonName held in a major
nomenclator (using it's GUID). They may also refer to other
TaxonConcepts from other institutions and their own via GUIDs. <br>
</li>
<li>Indexers and users of the system can crawl the graph of
TaxonConcept relationships (for query expansion etc) but they know that
the vast majority of concepts should be linked to a GUID generated by
the major nomenclators. The indexer does not have to string match to
try and figure out how the TaxonConcepts are related (i.e. whether they
are different delimitations of the same name).<br>
</li>
<li>Not so sensible taxonomists and institutions will not refer to a
major nomenclator. Their TaxonConcepts will be difficult to relate to
others globally.<br>
</li>
<li>If nomenclators do not do their job well they could,
theoretically, be replaced by some one else setting one up.<br>
</li>
</ol>
<b>The important thing to note here is it doesn't matter what a name is!</b>
All the nomenclatural stuff is up to the nomenclator and not the GUID
system. If, for example, ZooBank decided it wouldn't issue GUIDs for
new combinations and it did not meet the needs of the community then
the community would be free to set up another nomenclator or try and
force ZooBank to change. Likewise IPNI and autonyms or whatever. But
all these discussions about gender, spelling etc are separate from the
GUID issues. Basically the taxonomist would go to the nomenclator and
say "I want to describe something you haven't issued a GUID for."
Either the nomenclator would issue the GUID or the taxonomist would
have to start a revolution to get something changed.<br>
<br>
So debates about what the nomenclators issue GUIDs for can spin out to
the relevant nomenclator lists (does ZooBank have one yet?).<br>
<br>
The second important thing to note is that no one is <b>forced </b>to
do anything. If people don't like a nomenclator or system they can
simply go their own way so there is no restriction on scientific
freedom or anything.<br>
<br>
There is a great deal to flesh out on this but is it something we could
agree on as a basic plan? <br>
<br>
If people don't object to this line of progression I could make up a
page on the wiki that looks like we have agreed on it and we could spin
out to discuss things like how we differentiate between name and
concept GUIDs, central services for issuing GUIDs for those who may not
want to run the resolution thing, what you get back in the meta data
etc etc.<br>
<br>
All the best,<br>
<br>
Roger<br>
<br>
<pre class="moz-signature" cols="72">--
-------------------------------------
Roger Hyam
Technical Architect
Taxonomic Databases Working Group
-------------------------------------
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.tdwg.org">http://www.tdwg.org</a>
<a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="mailto:roger at tdwg.org">roger at tdwg.org</a>
+44 1578 722782
-------------------------------------
</pre>
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