[Taxacom] Announcement: New edition of Terms Used in Bionomenclature

[dipteryx at freeler.nl]

Van: taxacom-bounces at mailman.nhm.ku.edu namens David Remsen (GBIF)
Verzonden: do 27-5-2010 15:03

Dear Taxacomers,

FYI

I'd like to announce the publication of an updated edition of Terms  
Used in Bionomenclature, compiled by Prof. David Hawksworth.   This is  
a glossary of over 2,100 terms used in biological nomenclature - the  
naming of whole organisms of all kinds.   The glossary is available in  
print-ready PDF format as well as via an online web application that  
can be browsed, searched, and output in HTML, JSON and RDF to support  
re-use and referencing.   GBIF is also producing a limited number of  
paper copies of the glossary which will be available at GBIF-supported  
meetings and events.   The web application supports the development of  
controlled vocabularies using resolvable identifiers for nomenclatural  
terms.

More information and links to the PDF and web versions can be found on  
the glossary home page at

http://www.gbif.org/communications/resources/print-and-online-resources/bionomenclature/

The web application is online at http://bionomenclature-glossary.gbif.org/

I'm happy to field comments on the implementation and pass on comments  
regarding the content to David Hawksworth.

Kind regards,
David Remsen
(GBIF)

***
Clearly, this represents a very great deal of work!

A few comments, based on the web application (the PDF does not download
at all?):

The items in the "contents" index in very great part (the greater part?) 
do not directly lead to the actual entry (for instance "Taxacom" does 
lead to the relevant entry, but "misapplied name" does not), and the same 
appears to be the case for the internal links (from within one entry to 
another entry).

For many entries there is an indication of the field of nomenclature, 
with a link, but:
* these links are non-informative (I am not sure what they actually do: 
something like opening a subset of the glossary?)
* in some cases these are haphazard (as in "available name" with all the 
sub-entries purportedly being botanical, and in "homonym" all being 
phytological)
* the terms themselves are rather inconsistent, with sometimes adjectives 
(Botanical, Palaeontological, Phytological, Zoological), sometimes the whole
thing (Biocode, Phyllocode), and sometimes in between (virus, Cultivated Plants,
Prokaryote). In the case of the "Biocode", "Phyllocode" [ sic! ] the preferred 
form should be BioCode and PhyloCode. 

I am also seeing some inaccuracies in content and some typo's, but I am not 
sure I want to go into those.

Best wishes, 
Paul van Rijckevorsel