Trends and Developments in Biodiversity Informatics
Flora brasiliensis Revisited
Structured data management in modern on-line Flora treatments
Jim Croft(1), Helen Thompson(2) & Greg Whitbread(1)
(1) Australian National Herbarium, Centre for Plant Biodiversity Research,
Canberra
(2) Australian Biological Resources Study, Canberra
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While filling a valuable niche in the area of biodiversity knowledge,
traditional Floras have major limitations in the way they store, present
and distribute information. A collaborative project between the Centre
for Plant Biodiversity Research and the Australian Biological Resources
Study is investigating ways to store information from the printed
volumes of the Flora of Australia in a relational database and deliver
this information via the Internet in a variety of formats for different
purposes.
Text and images (line drawings, photographs and maps) from the published
Flora volumes are included, converted from the original word-processor
format to a structured XML data-file and loaded into an Oracle
relational database from where it can be standardized and exported
entirely or in part in response to routine local or Internet database
queries.
The Internet gateway to the database allows fields of Flora
information to be queried and delivered to standard browsers and other
devices in XML and HTML formats in a vast range of definable styles for
specific purposes. Once the legacy of published volumes has been
converted, it is proposed that future volumes of the flora be compiled
directly into the database, from which camera ready copy will be
generated when needed for printed volumes. This not only allows for
greater comparability and consistency of the data provided, but provides
a mechanism for on-going maintenance of the data as new information
becomes available. It also offers a degree of open architecture
archival future-proofing of the data independent of proprietary
publishing formats.
Modern printed Floras and revisions are structurally very similar and
relatively simple generalizations of the Flora of Australia data
structure would be needed to enable wider use in the publication of
botanical information. An exciting research tool based on the on-line
availability of Flora databases is the potential to provide integrated
access to distributed national and regional Floras allowing simultaneous
comparison of alternative and complementary treatments.
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