Building EOL species pages

Cynthia Parr, PhDSpecies Pages GroupChief Scientist

@cydparr@eol

Building and aggregating species pages

Goals

1. To provide some practical information about tools for capturing and sharing species information

2. To get feedback on EOL tools and processes for future improvement

3. To discuss good ideas that can inspire each other as we work both together and separately

Show of hands

• Do you contribute to a website(s) already?• Do you run your own website?• Would you rather just publish scientific

papers?

Outline

• EOL is part of a sharing network• Standards for sharing species descriptions• Tools for capturing content

– Direct on EOL– Multimedia repositories– Wikis– Literature– Specialist web sites

• Sharing content with EOL• Curating EOL content• Using content from EOL

From Parr et al. 2012. Evolutionary informatics: unifying knowledge about the diversity of life. Trends in Ecology and Evolution 26: 94-103.

EOL is part of a rich data sharing ecosystem about living organisms

The GBIF hub has subnetworks

Key individuals seek out hubs

TOLWeb

EOL Schema Sources: Data standards

Content type• Taxa• Attribution & licensing• Text objects & links• Multimedia

Standards used• Darwin Core Archive• Dublin & Darwin Core• Species Profile Model,

Plinian Core, etc.• Dublin (+ Audubon Core)

Taxonomy is frameworkNot the goal

ITIS and COL

NCBI

Use your own classification standardYou do NOT have to follow a designated classification

Share your taxonomic hierarchy with your EOL contentEOL does its best to match the content with pages we already have

Contribute to COL and ITIS (and their partners)Then all projects will have access

Outline

• EOL is part of a sharing network • Standards for sharing species descriptions• Tools for capturing content

– Direct on EOL– Multimedia repositories– Wikis– Literature– Specialist web sites

• Sharing content with EOL• Curating EOL content• Using content from EOL

Contributing to EOL

• Flexibility

• Blank canvas

• Consider curating

http://eol.org/info/contribute

Members can add text directly to EOL

Choosing a subject determines where on the EOL page the information is displayed

Also important for other applications that want to use the content

Be sure to add references

If you have a lot of content

• Work with a hub like India Biodiversity Portal• Spreadsheet upload to EOL• Find a specialist website that is already a

partner with EOL

Spreadsheet methodhttp://eol.org/info/cp_getting_started

General images & video flickr.com/groups/encyclopediaoflife

>3000 people, 163K images

Professional research images morphbank.org

Or add to online museum catalogue

Or add to online museum catalogue

Citizen science images inaturalist.org

Other multimedia repositories

Sound Video

Soundcloud.com

Wikipedia/Wikimedia

BUTOnly the English version, starts unreviewedHighly formatted, not always consistentNot always easy to reviewAbout 150K taxa, 122K imagesEasy to add new taxa

Biodiversity Heritage Library

biodiversitylibrary.org

Pensoft.net• Pensoft has a process to

generate EOL-compliant XML for new species

• Also sends images to Morphbank, specimens to GBIF

• They registered the URL at EOL

• Our script checks for changes once a day

• EOL Open Access Fund

Plazi.org

GoldenGATEmarkup

Published articles ZootaxaSmithsonian ContributionsOthers

Photo credit: DIYLibrarian, Flickr CC-BY-SA

If you need your own specialist website

Prepare to raise funds for a programmerSpend a lot of effort populating and keeping it running

OR try

.eu

LifeDesks

Outline

• EOL is part of a sharing network • Standards for sharing species descriptions• Tools for capturing content

– Direct on EOL– Multimedia repositories– Wikis– Literature– Specialist web sites

• Sharing content with EOL• Curating EOL content• Using content from EOL

Working with existing EOL partner?

• Using their tools

Add content

• May need to add special tags• May need to change licenses• May need to add to an EOL group

Follow instructions

• Your content will be updated automatically whenever we harvest from that partnerThat’s all!

If you already have your own website(or spreadsheet)

• Create EOL member account• Add content partner with contact infoRegister on EOL

• Spreadsheet OR Darwin Core Archive• EOL will work with youPrepare resource

file

• Provide file for one time upload• Or provide URL and set harvest frequencyAdd resource file

• Notifications of traffic statistics• Curation actions• Comments (Please respond!)

Receive feedback

Darwin Core Archivehttp://eol.org/info/cp_getting_started

Content partner registration

http://eol.org/info/cp_getting_started

Don’t forget the logo

http://eol.org/info/cp_getting_started

Outline

• EOL is part of a sharing network for species • Standards for sharing species descriptions• Tools for capturing content

– Direct on EOL– Multimedia repositories– Wikis– Literature– Specialist web sites

• Sharing content with EOL• Curating EOL content• Using content from EOL

EOL curation http://eol.org/info/curators

• Trust, untrust, hide taxon associations• Add new taxon association

• Leave a comment

• Add a rating

• Set preferred classifications• Add and set preferred

common names

More info at:

http://eol.org/info/curators

http://eol.org/info/curators

• Register as a member at eol.org• Edit your profile and provide your credentials– For assistant curator, just your real name– For full curator need academic affiliation OR

publication reference OR referral from another full curator

• Curate only as much as you are able

Outline

• EOL is part of a sharing network • Standards for sharing species descriptions• Tools for capturing content

– Direct on EOL– Multimedia repositories– Wikis– Literature– Specialist web sites

• Sharing content with EOL• Curating EOL content• Using content from EOL

Using content from EOL

No need to ask permission

Follow license conditions

Provide attribution

Manually

Docs at http://eol.org/api

Register for an API key

Follow terms of use

Set up either a dynamic query or refresh a cache of results

API

• Contact our partners at the India Biodiversity Portal• Contact me at parrc@si.edu• Use the contact us form on EOL

flickr.com/groups/encyclopediaoflifeinaturalist.org, morphbank.orgbiodiversitylibrary.orgpensoft.net, plazi.orgscratchpads.eueol.org/info/cp_getting_startedeol.org/info/curatorseol.org/api

Questions?