pcplantdb

[Stephanie Gerson <sgerson@stanfordalumni.org>]

Since I just sent you so many emails, I figured how about another?

But no worries, 'tis an extremely brief synthesis:

‡ WEBSITE –
Chad will be adding blurbs and bios to the website soon.  Notify me of 
any edits you deem necessary.

‡ FUNDING –
Check the funding update I sent earlier this week.

‡ INFORMATIONAL ARCHITECTURE –
Still planning to initiate discussion on this in the near future.

And once again, 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 below, please check them.  Any updates on your end?

Also, Johns, has everyone made accounts on bugzilla per your request?  
And if not, would you still like us to?  Please let us know.

‡MISCELLANEOUS –
-Ecosystem Information Engineering – Sent you 2 articles in a post 
earlier today, and will investigate further resources.  Out of curiosity, 
is anyone interested in this (besides Lawrence)?

It's the anniversary of the '89 earthquake, and first rains arrived 
today...

peace
*Stephanie

…………….
LATEST TASKS
∑ Everyone – now
1. Make an account on bugzilla, create bugs, check Johns’s docs 
2. Add/change stuff to/on permaculture.info website
(attached), make UI design suggestions, etc. 
3. Check Phase 1 goals below, respond with feedback and timeline ideas 
(no one has responded in the last 2 weeks on this, so I’m trying again)
5. Offer your thoughts on applying for a SARE grant 

∑ 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)
3. write up a mini-technical update that I can submit to Whole Systems 
Foundation
4. get Eden running again, if possible

∑ 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 activities
4. send group Industrial Ecology references
5. edit mission and vision statements for website, as Johns suggested

……………
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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