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Orchid search engine
So you're not talking about databases just coding for acess to a database
the will be created in the futures by someone or individuals. If that's correct and you're just looking for advice on what topics interest people so you can write it into your program, then this whole thing is a lot easier. Mentionned already was lip color. You can add wavy, frilly, small, large; flower recumbent or not; flower large, medium, small, single, small group, cluster; tall spike, medium, or small; spike straight, lax or arched, or downward; plant is small, medium, large, very large, miniature; monopodial growth, sympodial growth; internode is 1", 1", 1". You get the idea I think (credit, please. Just joking) Enjoy yourself. Gary "packat" wrote in message ... Thanks everyone for responding (and sorry for top posting.) What I made the wrong choice of words. What I meant by "intellectual property" is really "infringement". I have never taken a picture of orchids in my entire life so there is no intellectual to protect on my part. Sigh... I have been living in the US for over 30 years, but my English vocabulary can only fill a Chinese restaurant menu! I visited Jay Pfahl impressive site. I am awed at the massive content he accumulated, and cannot guess the amount of time needed to maintain the currency of the classification, now that there are a lot of re-classification efforts around the world. The project I have in mind was a lot more modest that some of you may think. My intention is to develop a web software, not the content. It is not to build a comprehensive information center such as JayPfahl's, which would require in-dept expertise that comes with years of experience on orchids classification which I don't have. I am sure Jay did not just spend a few years collecting pictures and organizing them on his web site. I am more comfortable in designing and writing computer software. I will reach retirement age in a couple of years which make me think what I really want to do to make my retirement meaningful and entertaining. I want to see a web site where people can search pictures by features (pattern, color, shape, etc..) without any knowledge of scientific classification. The search algorithm is not specific to orchids. Before taking on such a massive undertaking (phrase borrowed from Dianna) I need a small manageable sample data for proof of concept. And for that, I planned to use orchids under genus begin with A to D. As Steve and K Barrett suggested, it may be better to share this capability with existing content provider such as Jay Pfahl's and/or American Orchid Society. But I am way ahead of my self. For now, I will only focus on designng and building a proof of concept. Thanks you all, pax On Dec 27, 8:22 pm, "v_coerulea" wrote: I pretty much agree with everything said so far. While I don't think anyone here would do it unless provoked you could be prosecuted for just downloading all those pictures you say you have. That's copyright infringement. If your harddrive were to be confiscated for any reason, those pictures could provide more evidence against you. While most of us probably have some downloaded material hanging around the harddrive, we don't say so or propose to use it. Take the advice and start more modestly. If you manage to work out the basic problems, I'll be the first to try and help. But you have a lot of footwork to do first before anyone will invest time, energy or intellectual property. Gary "Diana Kulaga" wrote in message .. . Pax, I admire your ambition. But truly, the only thing you mentioned that I personally would use (and rarely) is the feature that would allow a look-up based on description. Most of us who grow orchids are pretty much sticklers for having the names of the plants, so it would be a rare time indeed when one of us would use even that function. As to the photos, lifting photos posted on the web is *not* a good idea. You mentioned the intellectual property issue. I don't know how you'd get past that, with the thousands of anonymous posters out there. Between OrchidWiz andwww.orchidspecies.com, there is little that is not now available. Again, though, I do admire you for thinking about such a massive undertaking. Try a couple more orchids! Diana "K Barrett" wrote in message ... "Steve" wrote in message ... packat wrote: Hello, I am a computer scientist who has a deep passion for orchids. My parents grew several orchids where I grew up (Thailand), way back in the 60's. Our fence at the front part of the property lined with 8-9 feet long poles covered with coconut husk and grew Vanda on them. They are very common in Thailand. I don't know what species, but the plants grew as tall as the poles and flowered profusely. The leaves were thin about 10 cm long with round cross section. We had several other kinds of orchids too, mostly natives of Thailand. I now live in Maryland near DC. I have spent fortune over the years trying to grow several orchids I bought from local nurseries and internet. But I wasn't successful. They all eventually died. But even with all these failed attempt, my love for orchids has never faded. I decided to turn to studying them instead of growing them. My new goal is to build a web-site that I (or any site visitors) to search the database that stores taxonomy and various characteristics of each species. For instance, people could request: "find all orchids with red lip, yellow petals, 2-3 cm in size,....." etc. The response would be the list of species that match, or fuzzy match these characteristics. I hope to also show pictures that I collected over the years from the internet. Probably those that some of you took. But I need to work out the intellectual property issue first before I can do that. My questions to the community a 1) Would this be useful to you? 2) Is there a website(s) that has comprehensive list of orchid taxonomy? I have looked at several sites including wikipedia, which are very useful, but I haven't yet found an authoritative and comprehensive site. 3) This is a stupid question: I found several differentiations between sites on the species name: e.g. dayana vs dayanum, coccinea vs coccineum, aurea vs aureum,... and many more. What is the standard practice when it comes to choosing which version to use? Thanks, pax The site most of us use now to look up a species is this: http://www.orchidspecies.com/ Now, if you could do what you say you want to do and make it searchable by a description, that would be most useful when we have no idea what an orchid is. With the site above, a person needs to have an educated guess about what the genus is, in order to find a plant. I'm not sure that you realize what a massive project this would be. Look at the size of the orchid species site and you will have a good idea. As far as your questions about names... the species name needs to match the gender of the genus name. Sometimes scientists decide to place a plant in a different genus. If the new genus has a different gender, the species name needs to change to reflect that. Steve Pax, if you want to get involved with databases, maybe you should ask Jay Pfahlhttp://www.orchidspecies.comif he wants help with his site or ask Alex Maximano if he wants help with Orchid Wizhttp://www.orchidwiz.com, or ask the American Orchid Society if they want help with their site http://www.aos.org. Goodness knows the AOS always needs talent. Otherwise its kinda hard to compete with the Google search engine. If I want to know anything I just google the term and usually I find it to any depth of interest. K Barrett |
#2
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Orchid search engine
On Dec 30, 8:40*am, "v_coerulea" wrote:
So you're not talking about databases just coding for acess to a database the will be created in the futures by someone or individuals. If that's correct and you're just looking for advice on what topics interest people so you can write it into your program, then this whole thing is a lot easier.. Mentionned already was lip color. You can add wavy, frilly, small, large; flower recumbent or not; flower large, medium, small, single, small group, cluster; tall spike, medium, or small; spike straight, lax or arched, or downward; plant is small, medium, large, very large, miniature; monopodial growth, sympodial growth; internode is 1", 1", 1". You get the idea I think (credit, *please. Just joking) Enjoy yourself. Gary Thank for the great tip. You read mind. Is this common among vanda's? ;-) I think the key is to know what key features people are looking for in orkinds. You gave me lots of answers. What I have done so far were the standard thing, petal, sepal and lips color, pattern, relative size, shape, texture. I will add what you suggested. thanks, pax "packat" wrote in message ... Thanks everyone for responding (and sorry for top posting.) What I made the wrong choice of words. What I meant by "intellectual property" is really "infringement". *I have never taken a picture of orchids in my entire life so there is no intellectual to protect on my part. Sigh... I have been living in the US for over 30 years, but my English vocabulary can only fill a Chinese restaurant menu! I visited Jay Pfahl impressive site. * I am awed at the massive content he accumulated, and cannot guess the amount of time needed to maintain the currency of the classification, now that there are a lot of re-classification efforts around the world. The project I have in mind was a lot more modest that some of you may think. *My intention is to develop a web software, not the content. It is not to build a comprehensive information center such as JayPfahl's, which would require in-dept expertise that comes with years of experience on orchids classification which I don't have. *I am sure Jay did not just spend a few years collecting pictures and organizing them on his web site. I am more comfortable in designing and writing computer software. *I will reach retirement age in a couple of years which make me think what I really want to do to make my retirement meaningful and entertaining. * I want to see a web site where people can search pictures by features (pattern, color, shape, etc..) without any knowledge of scientific classification. *The search algorithm is not specific to orchids. *Before taking on such a massive undertaking (phrase borrowed from Dianna) I need a small manageable sample data for proof of concept. *And for that, I planned to use orchids under genus begin with A to D. *As Steve and K Barrett suggested, it may be better to share this capability with existing content provider such as Jay Pfahl's and/or American Orchid Society. *But I am way ahead of my self. *For now, I will only focus on designng and building a proof of concept. Thanks you all, pax On Dec 27, 8:22 pm, "v_coerulea" wrote: I pretty much agree with everything said so far. While I don't think anyone here would do it unless provoked you could be prosecuted for just downloading all those pictures you say you have. That's copyright infringement. If your harddrive were to be confiscated for any reason, those pictures could provide more evidence against you. While most of us probably have some downloaded material hanging around the harddrive, we don't say so or propose to use it. Take the advice and start more modestly. If you manage to work out the basic problems, I'll be the first to try and help. But you have a lot of footwork to do first before anyone will invest time, energy or intellectual property. Gary "Diana Kulaga" wrote in message . .. Pax, I admire your ambition. But truly, the only thing you mentioned that I personally would use (and rarely) is the feature that would allow a look-up based on description. Most of us who grow orchids are pretty much sticklers for having the names of the plants, so it would be a rare time indeed when one of us would use even that function. As to the photos, lifting photos posted on the web is *not* a good idea. You mentioned the intellectual property issue. I don't know how you'd get past that, with the thousands of anonymous posters out there. Between OrchidWiz andwww.orchidspecies.com, there is little that is not now available. Again, though, I do admire you for thinking about such a massive undertaking. Try a couple more orchids! Diana "K Barrett" wrote in message ... "Steve" wrote in message ... packat wrote: Hello, I am a computer scientist who has a deep passion for orchids. My parents grew several orchids where I grew up (Thailand), way back in the 60's. Our fence at the front part of the property lined with 8-9 feet long poles covered with coconut husk and grew Vanda on them. They are very common in Thailand. I don't know what species, but the plants grew as tall as the poles and flowered profusely. The leaves were thin about 10 cm long with round cross section. We had several other kinds of orchids too, mostly natives of Thailand. I now live in Maryland near DC. I have spent fortune over the years trying to grow several orchids I bought from local nurseries and internet. But I wasn't successful. They all eventually died. But even with all these failed attempt, my love for orchids has never faded. I decided to turn to studying them instead of growing them. My new goal is to build a web-site that I (or any site visitors) to search the database that stores taxonomy and various characteristics of each species. For instance, people could request: "find all orchids with red lip, yellow petals, 2-3 cm in size,....." etc. The response would be the list of species that match, or fuzzy match these characteristics. I hope to also show pictures that I collected over the years from the internet. Probably those that some of you took. But I need to work out the intellectual property issue first before I can do that. My questions to the community a 1) Would this be useful to you? 2) Is there a website(s) that has comprehensive list of orchid taxonomy? I have looked at several sites including wikipedia, which are very useful, but I haven't yet found an authoritative and comprehensive site. 3) This is a stupid question: I found several differentiations between sites on the species name: e.g. dayana vs dayanum, coccinea vs coccineum, aurea vs aureum,... and many more. What is the standard practice when it comes to choosing which version to use? Thanks, pax The site most of us use now to look up a species is this: http://www.orchidspecies.com/ Now, if you could do what you say you want to do and make it searchable by a description, that would be most useful when we have no idea what an orchid is. With the site above, a person needs to have an educated guess about what the genus is, in order to find a plant. I'm not sure that you realize what a massive project this would be. Look at the size of the orchid species site and you will have a good idea. As far as your questions about names... the species name needs to match the gender of the genus name. Sometimes scientists decide to place a plant in a different genus. If the new genus has a different gender, the species name needs to change to reflect that. Steve Pax, if you want to get involved with databases, maybe you should ask Jay Pfahlhttp://www.orchidspecies.comifhe wants help with his site or ask Alex Maximano if he wants help with Orchid Wizhttp://www.orchidwiz.com, or ask the American Orchid Society if they want help with their site http://www.aos.org. Goodness knows the AOS always needs talent. Otherwise its kinda hard to compete with the Google search engine. If I want to know anything I just google the term and usually I find it to any depth of interest. K Barrett- Hide quoted text - - Show quoted text - |
#3
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Like you, I grew up in Malaysia, love orchids and have done some database programming in the past. I photograph orchids in the wild, and am constantly frustrated at not being able to ID the photos I take. Your proposed search engine would be of immense value to me. You might like to have a look at some taxonomic orchid books in your local library. Most books starting with 'The Genus ...' or 'Orchids of ...' will have a key to the various species descibed in the book. You will also find all the information for your database therein. The on-going taxonomic revisions should not be a hinderance to your search engine. In the type of books mentioned above, you will always see the name of the person who first described it after the specie name - eg. Laelia purpurata Lindley. Simply use all three names and there should be no confusion as to the plant, regardless of the number of subsequent reclassifications. Do let me know if I can be of help. Weng |
#4
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Orchid search engine
On Jan 15, 2:14*pm, Weng wrote:
packat;826360 Wrote: On Dec 30, 8:40*am, "v_coerulea" wrote:- So you're not talking about databases just coding for acess to a database the will be created in the futures by someone or individuals. If that's correct and you're just looking for advice on what topics interest people so you can write it into your program, then this whole thing is a lot easier.. Mentionned already was lip color. You can add wavy, frilly, small, large; flower recumbent or not; flower large, medium, small, single, small group, cluster; tall spike, medium, or small; spike straight, lax or arched, or downward; plant is small, medium, large, very large, miniature; monopodial growth, sympodial growth; internode is 1", 1", 1". You get the idea I think (credit, *please. Just joking) Enjoy yourself. Gary Thank for the great tip. *You read mind. *Is this common among vanda's? ;-) I think the key is to know what key features people are looking for in orkinds. *You gave me lots of answers. *What I have done so far were the standard thing, petal, sepal and lips *color, pattern, relative size, shape, texture. *I will add what you suggested. thanks, pax - Pax, Like you, I grew up in Malaysia, love orchids and have done some database programming in the past. I photograph orchids in the wild, and am constantly frustrated at not being able to ID the photos I take. *Your proposed search engine would be of immense value to me. You might like to have a look at some taxonomic orchid books in your local library. *Most books starting with 'The Genus ...' or 'Orchids of ...' will have a key to the various species descibed in the book. *You will also find all the information for your database therein. The on-going taxonomic revisions should not be a hinderance to your search engine. *In the type of books mentioned above, you will always see the name of the person who first described it after the specie name - eg. -Laelia purpurata- Lindley. *Simply use all three names and there should be no confusion as to the plant, regardless of the number of subsequent reclassifications. Thanks for the info. I spent last few weekends to collecting taxonomy from various site. Unfortunately, I dropped the author's name (the third parameter) thinking it was not important. Ha! This explains why some species were declared synonymous to two different parents. I will add author name attribute to the schema. Looks like another two weekends to scan through all those species again to get author's name. Thanks for the offer. I will count on it :-) I still have my day job, so the progress is not going as fast as I hope for. So far I created an orchid list browser (wiki style). I will open it up to the public when it is ready perhaps in a few weeks. When I start working on the search engine, I will definitely need help to validate the result... This is still a few months (or years if I don't retire soon :-) in the future. Thanks again, pax But when we get around Do let me know if I can be of help. Weng -- Weng |
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