ClassHierarchy

BobMorris - Tue Jun 07 2005 - Version 1.1
Parent topic: TopLevelStructure
In the EFG project we are using !ClassHiearchies for a number of ecological relationships, e.g. LarvalHostPlants and NectarPlants for butterflies and Herbivores for plants. In all cases thus far, these are lists of taxa together with, for each one, a list of taxa that are in the named relationship. Thus, in a butterfly dataset !ClassHiearchy labeled "Larval Food Plants" we have a list nodes which (contain a reference to) butterfly taxa in the Classes and under each of which are nodes for references to the host plant. We use the same mechanism to associate with various taxa a list of taxa which, in an opinion expressed by the data provider, are morphologically similar and so easily confused with the given one.

A problem we encounter is that for those !ClassHiearchies for which the attribute isPhylogenitic=false, we would like to provide some hint to applications beyond the label what is the nature of the !ClassHiearchy. We have decided to do this with an additional attribute on the hierachy, as permitted by the schema, which is some URI that identifies the Hiearchy. However, it seems to us that some of these could be agreed upon in the terminology in some way, or even possibly have some standard ones provided in some auxiliary way, e.g. registered, or fetched from registered external ontologies.

-- Main.BobMorris - 07 Jun 2005