Contents...

The contents of biosystematic information can be view from the user perspective (see biosystematic information) or that of the producers, taxonomists. Traditionally, taxonomists have presented their results as monographs and revisions. The components of these publications and how we envision their translation into electronic format are as follows:

Title Page: This is the initial (logon) screen that the user sees when they access the digital medium via gopher (top menu), World Wide Web (WWW; home page) server, or a program loaded from CD-ROM.

Table of Contents: This translates into the menu of options that the user can select from. This will frequently be a hierarchical series of menus (linked HTML pages), the first of which is part of the logon screen.

Introduction: This will be an ASCII text file (or series of text files) marked up according to the appropriate "hypertext" markup language (HTML).

Acknowledgments: This will also be an ASCII text file.

Keys: These will be replaced by an expert identification system. They use DELTA datafiles (ONLINE). The datafiles for the identification program may be separate from those of the phylogenetic program (see below) as not all characters are useful for both functions. While markup languages allow for the traditional key to be used in a digital environment, the hypertext format still restricts the user to a predefined path through the characters (if you don't know the first or subsequent characters, you are stuck at that point). Hence, this approach will only be used in those environments (Internet) where more interactive programs are not supported. Currently, the keys available on the WWW are largely static HTML pages, but research is underway to made a JAVA application to server DELTA datafiles as truly interactive keys (Contact Mike Dallwitz of Entomology, CSIRO, Canberra, Australia miked@ento.csiro.au.

Phylogeny & Biogeography: The analyses will be included in marked-up ASCII text files, but the supporting data will be included as character ß taxa (phylogenetic) or taxa ß area (biogeography) matrices. The preferred cladograms and maps will also be stored as images.

Taxonomic descriptions: Descriptions will be derived from the character ß taxa matrices that are available from the previous sections. Descriptions will also be stored as marked-up ASCII text files (HTML).

Nomenclature: Will be derived from a database. Predefined queries will generate the traditional formatted list of names and nomenclatorial details (literature citations, type material, status, etc.).

Distribution: Will be derived from a database of specimen label data. Mapping programs will be included to generate graphic images of distributions.

Life histories: Will be summarized in marked-up ASCII text files (HTML), but data on associates, phenology, etc., will be stored in databases.

Figures: Illustrations of characters, species, distributions, relationships (cladograms) and any other necessary figures will be image files.

Bibliography: Will be in the form of a database.

Index: Will not be necessary!

Given the current status of the digital environment, monographs and revisions will be disseminated both on CD-ROM and over the Internet. The CD-ROM version will consist of HTML pages, Adobe Acrobat PDF (portable document file) files, relational databases (FileMakerPro) and expert system (Pankhurst's ONLINE r.pankhurst@rbge.org.uk. The Internet version will be the same. The user interface will be provided by browsers, such as Microsoft Explorer and Netscape Navigator. Short abstract will be printed in the traditional scientific literature as necessary to meet the requirements of the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature (see Electronic dissemination and Zoological Nomenclature).