Thesis abstract
Taxonomists in the Royal Botanic Gardens, Edinburgh specialise in the classification of flora from around the world. The classification of flora is a complex task involving historical records, literature references and specimens collected from the field. Using this information the taxonomists formulate classifications which are continually under review and vary between taxonomists. Currently the taxonomists at RGBE use an application called Pandora, which has been developed using a relational database[1], to manage their classification information, however the system is limited in the support required to model and manage this type of information. Object oriented databases are seen as a possible solution to supporting the work of the taxonomists and a study was undertaken to investigate the migration of Pandora from a relation process from a relational to an object-oriented database and its implementation was undertaken[2]. This project highlighted some problems that classical OO modelling is not able to address to support the taxonomic data. The purpose of this thesis is to investigate the issues associated with handling taxonomic data in order to provide taxonomists with better tools for their work. The first part of this thesis will be the analysis of their tasks and data manipulation, and the evaluation of the technology supporting their job. This will lead to the description of their needs and the definition of the problems inherent in the computerisation of their work. Object-oriented technology will be evaluated as a candidate for solving these problems, and mechanisms for extending it where necessary will be investigated. Finally, the solutions to the problems defined during this project will be extended to other application areas utilising classification mechanisms.

References
[1] Martin Pullman and Richard Pankhurst, Pandora User Guide Version 3.1
[2] Cedric Raguenaud, Migration from a Relational Database to an Object- Oriented Database, 1997, MSc project, Department of Computer Studies, Napier University, Edinburgh
 
 
 

Last modification: 20/08/98