[Nhcoll-l] global unique identifiers and natural history collections

[Paul Callomon]

I'm in favor of this concept, but here's a thing: if everyone took part, those numbers would quickly become very large. Say we used zeros to demonstrate that an unusually short number was simply from early in the series, and not a typo. Assuming there were more than 30 million specimens in the bank (not unreasonable; we have 10 million in our dry collection alone), you could thus theoretically have two adjacent specimens in a collection bearing the numbers 312598765 and 000008765. The potential for cock-ups is not absent...


Paul Callomon
Collections Manager in Malacology, Invertebrate Paleontology and General Invertebrates
THE ACADEMY OF NATURAL SCIENCES OF DREXEL UNIVERSITY
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Philadelphia, PA  19103
callomon at ansp.org
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-----Original Message-----
From: nhcoll-l-bounces at mailman.yale.edu [mailto:nhcoll-l-bounces at mailman.yale.edu] On Behalf Of Bentley, Andrew Charles
Sent: Sunday, October 14, 2012 1:12 PM
To: Robert Guralnick
Cc: nhcoll-l at mailman.yale.edu
Subject: Re: [Nhcoll-l] global unique identifiers and natural history collections

Rob

Yes, yes, yes!!!  I have been calling for this kind of initiative (maybe not vocally enough) for some time.  Most people I have spoken with about LSID's or GUID's are of the opinion that as long as there are competing or numerous standards (thereby making the term globally unique redundant) they are not interested in participating in any of the many initiatives in this field.  It makes a nonsense of the whole initiative to have competing standards or mechanisms of constructing GUIDs.

Some sort of centralized GUID repository - along the lines of ISBN for libraries - is what we need for all natural history collections so that numbers assigned by the central repository would be guaranteed to be unique.

This could then be incorporated into database data models and maybe a web service could also be employed to be able to assign these from directly soon the database as you are cataloging material.  Specify for one would be most interested in such an initiative.  We do already support GUIDs in our data model for specimens and taxa but with competing standards, very few of our users have employed this to any degree.

Would be very interest in hearing about or assisting with developments in this regard.  There are some obvious problems that would need to be ironed out but I think it is definitely doable.

Thanks

Andy

Sent from my iPad

On Oct 14, 2012, at 4:58 PM, "Robert Guralnick" <Robert.Guralnick at colorado.edu> wrote:

>  Dear List --- I have been curious about something, and hope you won't 
> mind taking a moment to at least cogitate (or perhaps even
> respond) with some thoughts.  As digitization efforts continue to ramp 
> up in collections, there is clearly an impetus to have global unique 
> identifiers on physical specimens and downstream derivates such as
> images, metadata records, etc.   There are a fair number of arguments
> about how to do this, and lots of recommendations etc. One could argue 
> there are TOO MANY recommendations and arguments!
> 
> The key question is:  If there was a service that provided you, free 
> of charge, with digital object identifiers (DOIs - those global unique 
> identifiers associated with publications) that could be associated 
> with your specimens, would you use it?
> 
> More details on why I am asking (and what we view as a needed "reset"
> on the conversation) can be found in a recent blog post by the 
> BiSciCol (pronounced "bicycle" and standing for Biological Science 
> Collections Tracker) group:  http://biscicol.blogspot.com/
> 
> Appreciate thoughts!  Will summarize here and on the blog!
> Best, Rob
> 
> Dr. Rob Guralnick
> Curator and Assoc. Prof.
> CU Museum of Nat. Hist. and Dept. of Ecol. and Evol. Biol.
> University of Colorado, Boulder etc etc etc 
> https://sites.google.com/site/robgur/
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> Nhcoll-l mailing list
> Nhcoll-l at mailman.yale.edu
> http://mailman.yale.edu/mailman/listinfo/nhcoll-l
> 

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