pcplantdb

[Richard Morris <webmaster@pfaf.org>]

Heide Hermary wrote:
>   We could have
>
> > Relationships
> >     Object related to
> >     Type of relationship: food plant for, etc.
> >     Properties of relationship: might want to add additional info
> >         here
> >
> > And build a list of the types of posible relationships.
>
> Here are some of the types of relationships I think you are referring to:
>
>     * Mutualism: Food / Food  - Food / Propagation - Food / Defense
>     * Competition
>     * Parasitism
>     * Predation
>
> These, however, are just between two organisms.  When you talk about 
> "guilds" we need to refer back to my previous example about the 
> relationship between the plant that feeds byt butterfly larvae, and the 
> plants that feed the butterfly adult. The plants themselves have no 
> relationship to each other, but certainly are required for the 
> functioning of the "guild" or ecosystem. Similarly complex relationships 
> exist between thousands of organisms within the soil environment and 
> within various sizes of ecosystems.

A solution I've though of to the Guild question is to treat a guild
as a seperate object or page in the database.

You can then have a relationship between a plant and the guild. And have 
some text in the Guild page describing the relationship in more depth.

One example of this is the "White Oak Guild" which I gleaned from Toby 
Hemingways work.
http://www.ibiblio.org/pfaf/pcplantdb/showthing.php?BOTNAME=White+Oak%2FHazelnut+community

Currently we are lacking on much data about guilds, this is the only 
example I've been able to find.

> I've thought about this a lot and finally decided not to worry about 
> categories, but to describe the relationships.  Too much is lost by 
> trying to fit organisms and dynamic relationships into tight little 
> boxes.  That's not how life works.  And that's why we don't have much 
> easily accessible information on exactly these things.  Which is the 
> reason for developing this database in the first place.  So let's not 
> condemn it to superficiality right from the start.

Agreed. This is a good case for keeping the DB loosly structured
so we can allow for a lot of flexability.

Categories do have their uses. Computers love them! It can make for 
easier searching, i.e. you can search for a particular category.
There is a problem with the same thing being described in two
different ways, using two different labels.

> Unfortunately I have absolutely no idea what the techies are talking 
> about. PLEASE allow for plain text entry into these fields!! 

What you can have is a list of exsisting relationships, say a drop down 
list. But also allow for a new type of relationship to be added in a 
text field.

> Our
> database is based on Wiki technology and actually works very well.  I am 
> sure this can be integrated with other stuff.  We'd be happy to share it 
> with you to stimulate the though process if that would be helpful.  It's 
> definitely far from perfect, but also definitely on the right track.

I'd love to see the database you've put together.

Rich