Taxonomic databases, anyone?

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Because I'm trying to cast a wide net, I'm sending this to both Micropal and 
Paleonet, so I'll apologize in advance to anyone who receives it twice.

We at Scripps, and others elsewhere in the radiolarian community, are making 
some progress with the development of electronic taxonomic databases on this 
group of microfossils.   We are anxious to avoid as many pitfalls as 
possible, and would therefore like to compare our experiences with those of 
others who are assembling such databases. 
 
To clarify what I mean by a taxonomic database - it's a sort of electronic 
catalog of (usually previously published) taxa, consisting of descriptive 
text and illustrations, together with information on age and localities from 
which the specimens were obtained, ideas about synonymy, etc.  Our Scripps 
catalog is in the form of a relational database (using Paradox), but a 
similar product could be assembled using Hypercard, Toolbook, or any one of 
a number of other software tools.  Our data entry form incorporates 
hypertext and hypergraphics, as well as the usual validity checks, to help 
maintain consistency.

We are aware of the characteristics of Linnaeus, and the diatom database of 
Edinburgh and London, and Nannostrat, but surely there are numerous other 
paleontologists and biologists out there involved in similar enterprises, 
who could mutually benefit by sharing experiences.

I would be happy to send to people involved in such efforts a description of 
the data model and file structures that we are using, for comparison with 
theirs.  And I'd be interested to share experiences on the amount of time 
and effort involved in the various facets of such a project - scanning and 
editing textual material, scanning and enhancing and compressing images, 
abstracting locality, age and synonymy data, and so on.

I can't imagine that most subscribers to these listservers would be 
interested in the practical details of the development of taxonomic 
databases, so it will probably be best if responses are sent to me 
personally at wriedel@ucsd.edu.  If people not directly involved in such 
work would like to know who is doing it, where, and on which fossil groups, 
I could post a summary list of respondents.

If you know of other taxonomic database assemblers who are not likely to see 
this posting, I'd greatly appreciate having their e-mail or snail-mail 
addresses, or phone or fax numbers.

                                                Bill R.



 
W. Riedel
Scripps Institution of Oceanography
UCSD
La Jolla, CA 92093-0220

wriedel@ucsd.edu
phone (619) 534-4386
fax   (619) 534-0784