# dots on maps

[Doug Yanega]

Jim Croft wrote:

>If you are worried about space you can always plonk a number of related
>taxa on the one map.
>
>Of course if you generate the maps on the fly on the web, space is never
>a problem.

But don't forget that you can't validly describe new taxa on the web, so
only revisions that contain no new taxon names could have maps published
this way. "On-the-fly" mapping also requires that you have georeferenced
data, which isn't always an easy thing to get, though we're making some
advances on this front. Just had a nice workshop in D.C., in fact, that
could affect a lot of folks here (development of a "Digital Gazetteer" that
would facilitate georeferencing of natural history data).

Peace,


Doug Yanega        Dept. of Entomology         Entomology Research Museum
Univ. of California - Riverside, Riverside, CA 92521
phone: (909) 787-4315 (standard disclaimer: opinions are mine, not UCR's)
                http://insects.ucr.edu/staff/yanega.html
  "There are some enterprises in which a careful disorderliness
        is the true method" - Herman Melville, Moby Dick, Chap. 82