DICKINSON, RICHARD B.1,2* and TIMOTHY A. DICKINSON3. 1Department of Botany, University of Toronto, 25 Willcocks Street, Toronto, Canada M5S 3B2; 2Center for Biodiversity and Conservation Biology, Royal Ontario Museum, 100 Queen's Park, Toronto, CANADA, M5S 2C6; 3Center for Biodiversity and Conservation Biology, Royal Ontario Museum, 100 Queen's Park, Toronto, CANADA, M5S 2C6. - Web-based Interactive Identification Using Pollyclave 2.
PollyClave 1.06 (http://prod.library.utoronto.ca/polyclave/) is a CGI
program written in ANSI C. The main design objective for Pollyclave is
to allow DELTA databases to be deployed on the web in a manner that
imitates the functionality of the DELTA program INTKEY. A server-side
DELTA database is queried in an exchange of forms between the user and
the server. Since its release in 1996 there have been major advances
in software for querying databases via the internet. Pollyclave 2 also
uses DELTA databases, together with SQL and Cold Fusion forms, to
enable the user to identify taxa, and to access images and information
pages. Individuals interested in developing their own on-line
identification system can take advantage of the new DELTA editor and
use it to generate directive files (e.g. chars, items, specs).
PollyClave 2 will parse these files into an ODBC database that is read
by Cold Fusion. PollyClave 2 then uses this database to generate the
forms that are exchanged with the user in the course of an
identification or information retrieval session.
Key words: computer, DELTA, identification, interactive, internet, Pollyclave