pcplantdb

[Stephanie Gerson <sgerson@stanfordalumni.org>]

hi there everybody,

1 hot synthesis, freshly baked, coming right up:

‡ WEBSITE –
-I’m getting a little worried about the UI design of hg, which will be *
critical* if we want the medium to match the message.  It seems like the 
techie folks have experience with backend, but not so much with frontend 
(please correct me if I’m wrong).  I have a bit of experience with 
Photoshop and Dreamweaver, and have designed websites (er…one website), 
and I could definitely take UI design on as part of my role.  Or, and 
this might serve us well, would we want to recruit someone to be in 
charge of UI design?


‡ FUNDING –
Currently working on proposals for the Whole Systems Foundation and SARE.  
Would be wonderful to have proof of concept by October 15th (when both 
are due), but no pressure if that’s not possible.  What do you think, 
Chad?


‡ INFORMATIONAL ARCHITECTURE –
-Chad wrote, “One thing I need to know from the group is what
constitutes a unique plant root object. I think the line between what
is a cultivar or very minor subspecies is perhaps a little fuzzy. One
thing we could do is have subobjects be children of multiple plant
root objects where the information was sufficiently similar. Anyway,
my question is what combination of nomenclature should we use to
identify a unique plant in the context of what will be the most useful
division to our users.”  As users and seekers of this kind of information 
ourselves, what would be most useful to us?

Also, Chad wrote, “I think is sort of a user interface thing. In order to 
create a relationship between elements you first have to select the 
elements to relate, if this is more than one element you have to group 
them together somehow. This seems like a pretty complex process. How can
we make this easy?”  Hmmm, I am intrigued.  This seems to be a main crux 
of hg.  Can you describe this a bit further?  Because I’d like to respond 
to your question…


‡ PROJECT PLAN –
-Updated tasks are also pasted below – haven’t changed since last time so

I guess I shouldn’t really call them “updated.”  But I felt like it.  Do

whatever you need to do, and tell me whatever you need to tell me.

Phase 1 goals are also described below.  Does anything need to be 
modified, now that we have a clearer picture of how long tasks are 
taking?


‡MISCELLANEOUS –
-Updated bios are pasted below – Scott, Chad, Lawrence, and Johns already 
responded about theirs, but I haven’t heard back from Rich.  Please let 
me know if you’d like additional changes.  And yes Chad, feel free to add 
these to the PIW website.

-Ecosystem Information Engineering – This may be a fertile source of 
inspiration for us, and I know Lawrence recognized it.  I am gathering 
resources about this particular branch of Industrial Ecology, and will 
get back to you.  For the time being, if you are interested, I have 
attached the article I was referring to, “Industrial Ecology and 
Ecological Engineering,” as a pdf file (shhh, I am a paying member and am 
not supposed to be doing this…but for the Love of hg).  If you don’t have

too much time, I would recommend reading only the section pertaining to 
Ecosystem Information Engineering, starting on page 13.  I’m curious to 
hear what yalls think.

-Lawrence suggested that I “Get a text editor: UltraEdit (Uedit), NoteTab 
Pro and Textpad” to alleviate my ugly emails.  How do I do this?  
Actually, I think Chad gave me straightforward instructions a while back, 
I just have to find them and follow them…

Ok, hope you all had a Lovely weekend.

adios
*Stephanie

…………….
UPDATED BIOS
Stephanie Gerson is the spearheading and acting as the main contact for 
this project.  She graduated from Stanford University in the Science, 
Technology, and Society program, and has a Permaculture Certification 
from MAYA in San Francisco.  She has performed project management 
professionally, both for small and large enterprises, and has 
professional experience with both environmental and interactive 
education.  Stephanie will be responsible for Project Coordination/
Administration, additionally offering knowledge and experience in 
Environmental Education, Interactive Educational Technologies, and HCI/UI 
Design. 

Richard Morris is the webmaster for the Plants for a Future Foundation 
(http://www.scs.leeds.ac.uk/pfaf/), a resource center for rare and 
unusual plants, based in the UK but offering comprehensive information 
about plants found worldwide.  PFAF’s Species Database, the largest 
online plant database, provides data for 7,380 plants, including 
extensive details regarding their edible, medicinal, and other uses, 
along with their cultivation and habitats.  This database will act as an 
invaluable resource for the proposed project.  Richard will be a head 
programmer for this project.

Chad Knepp is a researcher of sustainable technologies, performing his 
research with the application of a number of accumulated skills and a 
high level of creativity.  He seeks to create and present information 
regarding sustainable lifestyles that not only reflects a higher 
ecological value, but also embodies a higher quality of life.  He has 
additionally worked as a carpenter, cook, system administrator, and 
farmer.  He is the sole developer of Eden (http://galatea.org/eden/), an 
online and freely accessible sustainability sourcebook providing 
information about Permaculture, natural building, simplified lifestyles, 
alternative energy, sustainable agriculture, and more.  Chad will be a 
head programmer for this project.

John Schinnerer specializes in whole systems design and technology 
services, offered through his Eco-Living practice (http://www.eco-
living.net/).  He completed a Master's degree in Whole Systems Design 
from Antioch University, with a graduate project focus in what he called 
"cultural and ecological designing."  John will offer his Whole Systems 
Design expertise, along with expertise in Quality Assurance, and will act 
as the primary QA tester and UI/design critic.

Lawrence London is the current administrator of the most widely used
Permaculture mailing list (http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/
permaculture) and of the
database-oriented listserv used by the PIW team to communicate 
(http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/pcplantdb).  He is an advanced
Permaculturist, with additional expertise in web authoring, information
management, and collections development.  He developed EcoLandTech
(http://www.ibiblio.org/ecolandtech), an online repository of 
Permaculture-related resources, and Market-Faming.Com (http://market-
farming.com), an online resource connecting sustainable agriculture 
initiatives with market opportunities.  Lawrence will act as a subject 
matter expert in Permaculture and guild design, provide guidance with 
backend and database development, and offer general assistance with the 
project.

Scott Pittman is well known as an expert Permaculturist and senior 
teacher, and has been in the field for twenty years.  He has given 
numerous Permaculture design trainings in the United States and abroad, 
in countries including Australia, Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, Bali, 
Thailand, Nepal, Brazil, Colombia, Mexico and Ecuador.  Scott currently 
lives, teaches, and consults in Northern New Mexico, where he co-founded 
with Bill Mollison and is the President of the Permaculture Institute, 
(http://www.permaculture.org).  He also co-founded with Manuel Abascal 
and was a board member of the Permaculture Credit Union (http://
www.pcuonline.org/), and is the owner of Environmental Design Concepts, a 
company specializing in Permaculture design and construction projects 
ranging from backyard designs to thousand-acre farms.  The Permaculture 
Institute will provide the PIW project with fiscal sponsorship, and 
Scott, as its president, will offer general project oversight and subject 
matter expertise.

……………
LATEST TASKS
∑ Everyone – now
1. Make an account on bugzilla, create bugs, check Johns’s docs (has 
anyone done this, Johns?)
2. Add/change stuff to/on permaculture.info website – check your bio 
(attached), make UI design suggestions, etc. 
3. Check Phase 1 goals below, respond with feedback and timeline ideas 
(no one responded last week, so I’m trying again)
4. Check project budget, make recommendations
5. Respond to the questions below 

∑ John S.
1. look into customization options with John H.
2. once we are ready, set up more permanent issue tracking system and 
whatever data/parameters/customizations are necessary to start using it 
on our project
3. post this info on the shared web workspace (whether wiki or otherwise) 
for feedback (is this what Chad just did?)
4. organize for user test of first “build” (to start happening weekly in 
1-3 weeks?)

∑ Chad and Rich 
1. create a working database (with no real data) with php connection and 
simple front end (basically just checking that the different bits can 
work together)  - no worries, Chad!
2. Rich – start doing whatever needs to be done in order to get the 
latest version of PFAF that is under the CC-BY-NC-SA (2 weeks to 
complete)

∑ John Howe

∑ Scott 
1. Let us know about PCU loan for server.

∑ Lawrence
1. Create new and improved wiki, or other form of shared work webspace

∑ Stephanie 
1. write up description user interface/experience, send to list
2. re-connect with Paula
3. grant-seeking…
4. send group Industrial Ecology references
5. write mission and vision statements for website


……………
PHASE 1 GOALS
Johns wrote:
"We don't even have a basic spec of any kind.
No need for volumes of yadda-yadda, but some fundamental statements as 
to what the phase one system will DO are IMO necessary.
For example:

Permaculture.info web application, phase one, will:

* enable authorized users to create plant entities within the 
permaculture.info database
* enable authorized users to input plant data into such plant entities, 
in various forms (string, text field, numeric, date, list, image, etc.)
* enable authorized users to edit plant entity data in various forms (as 
above)
* enable registered users to add discrete information to (annotate...?) 
a plant entity (narrative comments, additions/suggestions, etc.)
* enable anonymous users to search for (query the database on) plants or 
plant-related information using a variety of search fields including but 
not limited to:
   - name(s) of plant(s)
   - botanical characteristics of plants
   - functional characteristics of plants
   - location, climate, etc.
   - etc. etc. (I am just giving example of high-level spec - more 
details needed here)
* implement initial plant entity creation, input, editing, annotation 
and searching  using css- and xhtml-validated web forms/web pages 
accessible by all browsers/internet devices.
* and so on...

The above example implicitly creates three user classes already - 
authorized, registered and anonymous - so that's part of a spec as well 
- user type definitions and privileges.

The above is also extremely high-level - a bit (but not too much) more 
detail would be a very good idea, such as inserting an eventual plant 
entity attribute list, details of search options/implementation, 
how/what of registered user annotation, and so on.

IMO there is no clear idea common to us all as to what "phase one" will 
actually DO. This is likely to lead to more annoyance and wasted time/
money when Chad and Rich implement what they think it ought to do and the 
rest of the group finds out it's not necessarily what they think it ought 
to do.

Annoyance if we don't take the time to sort at least the basics out 
first, so people know what to expect to a certain extent.
Wasted time/money in hashing out phase one basic specs *after* some 
amount of implementation has already been done and then has to be 
redone."

Chad added:
"My personal desire is to also provide an intelligent search that
queries all of aspects of the database from a single text box."

and

"This is pretty much exactly what I had in mind to start doing with one
one addition and the questions where noted.  The addition being adding
relationship elements and allowing authorized users to create and edit
relationships.  The relationships would possibly be displayed in some
text/html way in a browser but would much more likely be used by our
GBI package (TouchGraph/FreeMind/whatever)."


+++++++++++++++
Stephanie Gerson
sgerson@stanfordalumni.org
(c) 415.871.5683


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