Distributing Data with Distributed Objects: A Prototype for a Plant Names Database

该项目将原型和实施一个基于因特网的数据交换架构--“权威数据服务器”(ADS)，它将形成一个全球分类数据信息系统，为全世界的生物多样性研究人员提供支持。ADS原型将使用前沿的信息学技术，如公共对象请求代理体系结构(CORBA)和Java，以复制共享的社区数据--最初在三个机构之间复制：哈佛大学草药研究所、皇家植物园、英国Kew和澳大利亚国家植物标本馆。这些机构已经组成了一个联盟，其目标是将来自灰色植物标本馆索引(新世界植物物种)、索引Kewens(全球植物物种)和澳大利亚植物名称索引的综合植物名称数据作为一个共享和复制的权威资源在互联网上作为综合的“植物名称索引”提供。这份SGER提案要求提供资金，以便使用皇家植物园“植物名称作者”的数据实施概念验证--这是一项由国际分类数据库工作组批准的社区权威工作，作为核心数据集。一个实用的原型ADS系统将演示更大的“植物名称索引”的可行性，并提供一个用于权威数据分发的分布式对象方法的工作实例。后者的建立将增加世界各地研究机构对在线分类权威文件的采用和整合。由此产生的架构和方法将在国际合作的背景下对美国国家生物信息基础设施(NBII)的发展做出重大贡献，这在生物多样性信息学社区的历史上是前所未有的。

This project will prototype and implement an Internet-based data exchange architecture, the "Authority Data Server" (ADS), which will nucleate a global information system for taxonomic data in support of biodiversity researchers worldwide. The ADS prototype will use leading-edge informatics technologies, such as the Common Object Request Broker Architecture (CORBA) and Java, to replicate shared community data -- initially among three institutions: The Harvard University Herbaria, The Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (UK), and The Australian National Herbarium. These institutions have formed a consortium whose goal is to make the combined plant names data from the Gray Herbarium Index (New World plant species), Index Kewensis (global plant species), and Australian Plant Names Index available as a shared and replicated authority resource on the Internet as the combined "Plant Names Index." This SGER proposal requests funding to implement a proof-of- concept using data from Royal Botanic Garden's "Authors of Plant Names" - a community authority work endorsed by the International Working Group on Taxonomic Databases as the core data set. A functional prototype ADS system will demonstrate the feasibility of the larger "Plant Names Index" as well as provide a working example of a distributed object approach to authority data distribution. The establishment of the latter will increase the adoption and integration of on- line taxonomic authority files at research institutions worldwide. The resulting architecture and methods will be a significant contribution to the development of the US National Biological Information Infrastructure (NBII) within the context of an international collaboration which is unprecedented in the history of the biodiversity informatics community.