Title: So what *are* we attempting to deliver in Phase One
Author: Registered Shareware
Company: ©2001

Following is a compilation of Phase 1 discussions.  My comments are in [brackets].

So what *are* we attempting to deliver in Phase One? My own vision of the
software is this:

An application that assists in identifying new Guilds and exploring
existing Guilds. This application being a GPL like project can be
re-distributable and users can have their own local copy for bioregional
observations. There may be a centralized "master" database of guild
entities (Creative Commons License), and users may be able to submit
their own local observations to the master, and/or mirror the master (or
portions of the master) to their local installation. My thinking here is
that if I am wandering around with my laptop/PDA, I have a lightweight
interface to make Guild notations that I observe and upload later perhaps.

Bandwidth issues have a considerable impact on the application, and the
application should be optimized for dial-up users.

As for the database, whether intially RDBMS or ODB, I would like to see
more in depth discussion about the schema design and serious effort made towards normalization. I did some initial research to other university
efforts and it is indeed a complex piece of work. I believe I had posted
links earlier in the list to those resources.  [This research definitely needs to be done!  Can you refer us to your post with a list of these resources?  This is an area I feel Lawrence would be the most helpful with – since he seems to know a lot about what’s available.  Lawrence, would you be willing to take on the task of research what’s already out there?]

Another thing I have learned in my experience of software development is
the concept "good enough for now". So based upon the goals of deliverables for the grant, what would be "good enough for now" with considerable thought put into future extensibility for this application?

Additionally, is the project *just* the database, or is it the front-end
to the database, or a combination of both? I am thinking if this is a
re-distributable software application, what would the seed database look
like?  Would it have one?  [Definitely both!  Perhaps for phase 1, just a database along with specs for the front-end, which could be further developed in phase 2.]

I do have other thoughts regarding the integration of GIS type
functionality and how to map microclimates, though that is a discussion
for Phase 2+ probably.

---

Again, I will loop back to my question, "What are the deliverables for the
October deadline?"

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
* provide an intelligent search that queries all of aspects of the database from a single text box. 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).