Progress in developing an online portal to herbarium specimen collections for Northwestern North America Ben Legler David Giblin Dick Olmstead University of Washington Botany 2008 Vancouver, B.C. July 27, 2008 Alaska British Columbia Idaho Montana Oregon Washington Yukon Territory

Presentation Outline Overview of regional herbaria and collections Funding and initiation of portal development Current progress and deliverables Future directions & unfinished work Consortium of Pacific Northwest Herbariawww.pnwherbaria.org

Regional Herbaria & Collections Consortium of Pacific Northwest Herbariawww.pnwherbaria.org 53 public and private herbaria. 3,344,738 specimens. Alaska 5 herbaria 228,681 specimens (ALA) British Columbia 9 herbaria 890,800 specimens (UBC, V, UVIC) Washington 13 herbaria 1,124,300 specimens (WTU, WS) Oregon 11 herbaria 475,300 specimens (OSC) Yukon Territory 1 herbarium 4,000 specimens (private collection) Montana 6 herbaria 278,850 specimens (MONTU, MONT) Idaho 8 herbaria 342,807 specimens (ID, IDS, SRP, CIC)

Regional Herbaria & Collections Consortium of Pacific Northwest Herbariawww.pnwherbaria.org Collections currently online: Herbarium# of records online Oregon State University (OSC)149,130 University of Alaska, Fairbanks (ALA)143,498 University of British Columbia (UBC)408,200 University of Montana (MONTU)47,000 University of Washington (WTU)166,710 Collections soon to be online: Total online: 914,538 Total expected: 410,000? HerbariumExpected # of records Albertson College (CIC, Idaho)35,000? Boise State University (SRP, Idaho)30,000? Idaho State University (IDS)60,000? University of Idaho (ID)135,000? Washington State University (WS)150,000 } } 1,324,538?

Funding and Initiation of Portal Development Consortium of Pacific Northwest Herbariawww.pnwherbaria.org Supplement Budget: Salary & benefits$18,138 Supplies$1,200 Travel$804 Indirect costs$11,858 Total$32,000 1.Link regional herbarium specimen records through online portal. 2.Provide unified access point for online resources associated with participating collections. 3.Develop data-sharing protocols to minimize redundant data entry. 4.Facilitate databasing efforts at smaller institutions. Stated goals in NSF supplemental request: Portal initiation: Discussions among regional curators initiated in late 2006 by Dick Olmstead following early completion or WTU’s previous NSF grant. Favorable support of regional curators led to submission of supplemental request to NSF; request was awarded in early 2007.

Current Progress Consortium of Pacific Northwest Herbariawww.pnwherbaria.org 1.Website providing access to about 400,000 specimens collections from 3 regional herbaria (ALA, OSC, WTU), with infrastructure in place to easily add more collections. 2.Linked list of online resources hosted by regional herbaria. 3.Contact info and statistics for regional herbaria. What has been accomplished thus far? 1.Data sharing among herbaria to minimize redundant data entry. 2.Facilitate databasing of regionally significant collections at smaller institutions. Note: portal provides a means for smaller institutions to put their data online. Initial goals not yet accomplished:

Live Web Site Demo Consortium of Pacific Northwest Herbariawww.pnwherbaria.org

Infrastructure & Technology Consortium of Pacific Northwest Herbariawww.pnwherbaria.org Provider Database Portal Cache Update Log Data/Metadata Request Data/Metadata Response DiGIR Access Point Cache Update Scripts HTTP/XML HTTP/HTML Search Request Search Response Search Log Web Scripts PHP, MySQL Provider Web Servers (ALA, OSC, WTU) PNW Herbaria Portal Web Server Web Browser HTML, JavaScript Cache update scripts run nightly. Records are cached in full on portal server. (TODO: provider feedback)

Future Directions & Unfinished Work Consortium of Pacific Northwest Herbariawww.pnwherbaria.org 1.Integrate additional collections into the portal as they become available online with DiGIR access points. 2.Develop mechanism to report data usage statistics to providers. 3.Migrate to newer and more data-rich data sharing infrastructure (such as an update to Darwin schema, TAPIR). 4.Increase portal functionality with additional features and complete unfinished portal pages! Maintain and update current web site. 5.Facilitate data sharing among herbaria. 6.Assist smaller regional collections with databasing efforts, possibly by developing an online data entry interface. Much remains to be done: Additional funding???

Questions? Consortium of Pacific Northwest Herbariawww.pnwherbaria.org