pcplantdb

["Lawrence F. London, Jr." <lfl@intrex.net>]

John Schinnerer wrote:

> > One of the ways I see PIW moving is to more of an onion type data
> > model.  While the permaculturalist may spend a lot of time on one
> > layer of the dataset specifically the Genus species level.
>
>
> I certainly won't, nor do I understand the origins of this assumption at all.
> Walking through those botanical gardens, the latin gibberish didn't tell
> me anything useful.  What did was either the common names or the groupings

Many people working in a horticultural field will learn the latin names 
of plants and their families that they work with, common names later.
Read the American Nurseryman sometime. Nurseries, contractors, planners 
and architects universally refer to plants they work with by their Latin 
name. Its a lot easier and you can easily positively identify plant 
material, varieties and their origins.
What's the common name for contoneaster?  cotoneaster. You want to find 
out about all the cultivars of cotoneaster? They'll all be in Latin.
You can't go easily from common name (cultivar)  to family or species.

Uses should be a tag or qualifier that is part of an object record and 
exists in the object's data.

> of plants in the one garden, which grouped them by functions, such as
> medicinal, fiber-producing, fodder, human food, etc. etc..
>
>
> > The market
> > gardener/farmer may spend most of their time on the cultivar level of
> > particular plants.  Individuals involved with large scale land
> > management may look at layers of information on the guild/plant
> > community level.

Chad is right about this.

> I think someone working from a PC design basis will be using many levels,

They will be working from the specific to the general or rather from 
families to cultivars (the onion skin) - a dartboard is a good analogy.

> whether they're a 'permaculturist' or any other 'profession' or
> non-profession that has realized the benefits of PC design as a basis for
> whatever they do.
>
> The 'onion' concept is fine, actually.  My concern is with our assumptions
> about who will use what layers and how those assumptions may implicitly
> limit the usefulness of our system.

A landscape architect wiill use the inner layers; the permaculture 
designer will likely use inner and outer 50/50.