Delta and DDATA

[jkirkbri at ASRR.ARSUSDA.GOV]

David Taylor is suffering from a "disease" that plagues everyone
working with the DELTA format, slight incapabilities between the
various software systems.  His original piece of a character set was:

*SHOW Flora of Texas. Revised Sun Apr 02 16:48:17 1995

*CHARACTER LIST

#1. <nomenclatural comments, associations>//

#2. plant <duration>//
 1. annual// 2. bienial// 3. perenial//

#3. plant <habit>//
 habit// 1. aquatic// 2. emergent// 3. terrestrial// 4. hemiepiphytic// 5.
  epiphytic//

#4. roots <type>//
 1. fibrous// 2. tap-root// 3. absent// 4. rhizomes// 5. rhizoids//

To use his characters with the DELTA software, I made up the following
specifications file:

*SHOW Flora of Texas - specifications.

*NUMBER OF CHARACTERS 4
*MAXIMUM NUMBER OF STATES 5
*MAXIMUM NUMBER OF ITEMS 10

*CHARACTER TYPES 1,TE

*NUMBERS OF STATES 2,3 3-4,5

When I checked David's characters using the DELTA software system, I
got the following error statements:

chars,3        *CHARACTER LIST
chars,5        #1. <nomenclatural comments, associations>//
                                                         ^
****** Preceding text character should not have "units" or "states".
chars,7        #2. plant <duration>//
                                    ^
****** State number terminated by period+space expected.
chars,10       #3. plant <habit>//
                                 ^
****** State number terminated by period+space expected.
chars,14       #4. roots <type>//
                                ^
****** State number terminated by period+space expected.
chars,16       *PREVIOUS INPUT FILE
              ^
****** Number of characters not as specified (4).
checkc,7       *END
****** Number of errors = 5
****** Abnormal Termination.

The obvious deviation from the DELTA format was the presence of
pairs of slashes (//) after the character names and states.  I used my
ASCII text editor to find and replace the pairs of slashes (//) with a
single slash (/).  Also in character 3, the word "habit" was repeated
followed by a pair of slashes.  I removed the extra "habit" and its
pairs of slashes and produced the following modified character list:

*SHOW Flora of Texas. Revised Sun Apr 02 16:48:17 1995

*CHARACTER LIST

#1. <nomenclatural comments, associations>/

#2. plant <duration>/
 1. annual/ 2. bienial/ 3. perenial/

#3. plant <habit>/
 1. aquatic/ 2. emergent/ 3. terrestrial/ 4. hemiepiphytic/ 5.
  epiphytic/

#4. roots <type>/
 1. fibrous/ 2. tap-root/ 3. absent/ 4. rhizomes/ 5. rhizoids/

When I checked the modified character list using the DELTA software
system, it ran just fine.

As I wrote at the beginning, David Taylor is suffering from a
"disease" that plagues everyone working with the DELTA format, slight
incapabilities between the various software systems.  I like features
from all the different software systems that truly work with the DELTA
format, the DELTA software system, PANKEY, and DDATA.  But, I learned
very early on that when you have 250 characters and 150-500 taxa,
switching software systems is nearly impossible.  You go crazy trying
to find and make the little corrections necessary each time that you
move from one software system to the other.  To move David's four
characters from DDATA to the DELTA software system, I had to make 18
changes!

Early on, my Laboratory made the decision to use the DELTA software
system.  I would like to be able to run my data sets in PANKEY and
DDATA, but changing them each time is to daunting and time consuming a
task.

Another confusing situation is the DELTA data format and the DELTA
software system.  Since they both start with the word DELTA, you must
also include modifiers to clearly establish whether you are referring
to the DELTA data format or the DELTA software system.  When
communicating, please be sure to be specific.

Joseph H. Kirkbride, Jr.
USDA, Agricultural Research Service
Systematic Botany and Mycology Laboratory
Room 304, Building 011A, BARC-West
Beltsville, Maryland 20705-2350 USA
Voice telephone: 301-504-9447
FAX: 301-504-5810
Internet: jkirkbri at asrr.arsusda.gov