Archive
GrassBase Updated
The World Grass Species database has been updated with a number of very important changes. With this new name we hope to become a central resource for Agrostologists worldwide.
New Name
The database has been christened GrassBase following the trend of a number of other web projects.
New Descriptions
Just over 150 new descriptions have been incorporated into the database, including their associated nomenclature (which can be found in the updated synonymy database). This brings our total number of species with descriptions to 10,982. If you feel we are missing any data please don’t hesitate to inform us. If you have an earlier version of the nomenclature database please download it again as the links will be out of date.
New Search Page
We have finally updated our search page and it is now much faster. In addition you can add GrassBase to your personal Google Homepage to quickly search our data.
Generic Descriptions
We have successfully generated descriptions for all grass genera from our species descriptions using Delta’s built in abilities to summarise individual taxon descriptions.
New Links
Each description page (species and genera) has been enhanced with the provisions of links that will search a number of different internet resources, including searching for specimens on Kew’s Herbarium Catalogue and electronic Plant Information Centre or ePIC. Many of the specimens within the Herbarium Catalogue are type specimens and have been scanned at high resolution which will help with your identification process. Additional links are also provided to GBIF (the Global Biodiversity Information Facility) , w3 TROPICOS and Google. These links will help to streamline your data gathering process, giving you more time to focus on what’s important to you.
Ubuntu Studio – Let your Creativity Fly
OOh – this’ll get those creative juices flowing!
Ubuntu Studio – Let your Creativity Fly
Coming this April…
Ubuntu Studio. A multimedia creation derivative of Ubuntu.
Ubuntu Studio is aimed at the linux audio, video and graphic enthusiast as well as professional.
Upload previews | drupal.org
Adds image preview thumbnails to the file attachment section on node editing pages. That way, users can see what image they are dealing with instead of guessing it from the file name. To prevent ultra wide tables, a file is now spread over two lines with the first displaying the image and the filename and the second one containing the checkboxes for deletion and listing, as well as the file size information.
XML Sitemap (formerly Google Sitemap) | drupal.org
XML Sitemap (formerly Google Sitemap) will enable google to see GrassBase’s contents.
The XML Sitemap module creates a XML sitemap in accordance with the Sitemaps.org specification.
The module maintains a short change history for nodes in order to better approximate the change frequency. It calculates the relative priority of each node based on node type, number of comments, and promotion. It can optionally submit your sitemap to Google (support for other search engines will be added once they support the ping interface) whenever it is changed and can log when your sitemap is downloaded by a search engine.
This module was originally written as a part of the Google Summer of Code program.
Pathauto | drupal.org
Pathauto will generate nice clean urls that help with site navigation. The Category module has a category_pathauto module that becomes available when pathauto is installed, which will enable sensible link creation.
The pathauto module automatically generates path aliases for various kinds of content (nodes, categories, users) when no explicit alias is provided by the user.
Discussion group: Stay up to date on Pathauto Development and provide insight by subscribing to the Paths Group on Groups.Drupal
Version Compatability Note: You must use the version of Pathauto that corresponds to your Drupal installation (e.g. 4.6, 4.7, etc.) Pathauto currently has three branches that are being maintained to varying degrees.
* Pathauto for 4.6 will get “bug fixes” if it’s a really critical bug.
* Pathauto for 4.7 still gets bug fixes.
* Pathauto 5.x is mostly updated for Drupal5.0. You can follow and assist with 5.0 updating in the Issue Queue. The 5.x version is also the home to any feature development or changes in functionality, so it may break your site.
Markdown with SmartyPants | drupal.org
Markdown with SmartyPants will be useful to write easy to format page text. Insert links with [[square brackets]]
The Markdown with SmartyPants module allows you to enter content using Markdown, a simple, plain text syntax that is filtered into valid XHTML, and will automatically convert plain ASCII characters to their proper Unicode entities in context (“curly quotes,” et al.) using SmartyPants.
Existing import / export modules in Drupal contrib
Jeremy Epstein has developed an Import/Export API for drupal. In doing so he has also documented JExisting import / export modules in Drupal contrib
Import / Export API | drupal.org
Import / Export API | drupal.org
Very useful for importing/exporting species description. Still in beta mode, but will hopefully work.
The import / export API allows for the definition of data entities within Drupal. The definition system lets data entities be related to each other, and it includes a number of different field types. It also supports a system of import (parsing) and export (rendering) engines, for formats such as XML and CSV. Data entities are able to be exported from, and imported into, a Drupal site, for purposes such as backup, offline editing, data migration, and data transfer between Drupal databases.
This module is currently in beta mode, and testers are welcome. Documents such as specs, schedules, and status updates can be found on the wiki.
This is one of the Google Summer of Code 2006 Drupal projects.
OAI-PMH Module | drupal.org
OAI-PMH Module could be useful for providing access to species description nodes.
This module provides an Open Archives Initiative Protocol for Metadata Harvesting (OAI-PMH), interface to the Bibliography Module.
Currently it only exposes metadata from the biblio module; however if there was demand I believe that it could be made configurable to expose other node types as well.
This module was inspired by and I have used some code from http://physnet.uni-oldenburg.de/oai/ writen by Heinrich Stamerjohanns.
Drupal and the New Paradigm for Content Management | The Couch Kamote Reviews
Drupal and the New Paradigm for Content Management
Drupal uses taxonomy to organise content and this paper discusses why it surpasses other CMS’s. It shows that we need to use a different perspective when managing content, rather than separating content style (the old paradigm), content needs to be central to the management process.
I. Is Drupal similar to other CMS?
1. Giving a point by point comparison of Drupal and traditional content management systems (CMS) like PHPNuke, PostNuke or XOOPs is a tricky and difficult undertaking because of two reasons: First, a comparative matrix of features will not accurately tell the tale. Second, Drupal’s impact is more on the back-end and can only be fully appreciated by web programmers/developers. Both of these reasons are explained further in th…
Zen | drupal.org
Zen theme intends to be a good starting point for a custom CSS theme
Zen is the ultimate starting theme for Drupal 5. If you are building your own standards-compliant theme, you will find it much easier to start with Zen than to start with Garland or Bluemarine.
The idea behind the Zen theme is to have a very flexible standards-compliant and (relatively) semantically correct XHTML theme that can be highly modified through CSS.
Out of the box, Zen is clean and simple with a provided fixed-width subtheme called Zen-fixed.
The name is an homage to the CSS Zen Garden site where designers can redesign the page purely through the use of CSS.
This theme has been written for Drupal 5 and there is (currently) no version for 4.7
Sympal Theme | drupal.org
Sympal Theme could serve as the basis of a CSS theme for grassbase
A base theme. A framework for CSS themes. A theme developers theme.
If you have been following some of the recent CSS and webdesign trends, you might have noticed the trend slowly bending towards semantic correct designs. As it should have been from the start.
This means that you don’t just design a site, but really build it. Starting with a good blueprint, which results in a good foundation.Such a foundation must be semantically best. This way we fulfil four mayor requirements, for free:
* fully SEO supporting
* accessible on mobile devices
* highlight the content, content comes first
* use very consistent XHTML, CLASSnames and IDnamesIn fact we want to use three buzzwords:
* Source order
* Tableless
* What’s in a name
SMTP support | drupal.org
SMTP support | drupal.org to allow grassbase to communicate with the rest of the world
This module adds SMTP functionality to Drupal. More specifically, the ability for your site to send mail using an SMTP server that requires authentication.
This module uses the smtp and mail class’s from PHPMailer.
http://phpmailer.sourceforge.net
Site tours with Amberjack | drupal.org
Site tours with Amberjack will be useful for user documentation and howtos
Amberjack (http://amberjack.org/) is a lightweight Open Source library, enabling webmasters to create cool site tours. With this module you can create an unlimited number of site tours, improving user understanding of the site’s functionality.
Requirements
The module requires the Amberjack javascripts and skins (http://amberjack.org/src/stable/ for the last minute updates)
Usage
The module provides an administration page to manage site tours. You’ll be able to create new tours and edit the tour pages.
Each tour has an url ID that is used to recall the tour by the url /site_tour/[url ID]. This is the url you can open to launch the tour.
Services | drupal.org
Whippee – GrassBase can potentially act as a web service!Services | drupal.org
The services module package was created out of a need for a standardized solution of integrating external applications with Drupal, specifically Flash and Flex applications.
Note: XMLRPC server support is included in this package. To enable AMF support for Flash and Flex, you must download and install the AMFPHP server module in addition to this module.
**More information and documentation coming soon!
Features:
* service browser
* manage api keys
* services are defined in modules using the service api
* servers such as XMLRPC and AMFPHP are defined in modules using the server api
Links Package | drupal.org
Links Package | drupal.org
The Links Package is a multi-module set for managing URL links in a master directory, and attaching them in various ways to your content pages. This package is new for Drupal 4.7.
Links offers the following features: – see Links Package
freelinking | drupal.org
Use freelinking to create links to other content automatically. Putatively useful, but once documentation pages are created. This is useful as an alternative to Markdown with Smarty Pants
The freelinking.module for Drupal implements a filter for input formats, creating links to existing content or links to new content creation via automatic linking of CamelCase words or words with double-square-bracket delimiters. It can be used ‘wiki style’ to provide links between content or easy creation of new linked content. It does not implement a ‘wiki’ type of content; this can be done with the flexinode module or using another core content type like blog or story.
Content Construction Kit (CCK) | drupal.org
Use Content Construction Kit (CCK) to further modify content types.
The Content Construction Kit allows you create and customize fields using a web browser. The 4.7x version of CCK creates custom content types and allows you to add custom fields to them. In Drupal 5.x custom content types can be created in core, and CCK allows you to add custom fields to any content type.
Several contributed projects provide additional field types and widgets for CCK:
* computed field: lets you add a PHP-driven “computed field” to CCK node types
* date: creates an ISO or unix timestamp date field
* email: validated email field
* image field: an image field
* link: a URL fieldOther modules related to CCK:
* content template (contemplate): allows for control over the form and display of fields, including teaser and RSS feeds
* views: provides many types of listings of content; CCK exposes its fields to the Views system.
Accents | drupal.org
Accents is simple module that removes accents from words to provide better search results. For example “á â Å ã” all become “a”.
After installation you will need to re-index your search.
Category | drupal.org
The Category Module provides quite useful wrappers for Taxonomy and Book modules to make a hierarchically organised website. Need to decide whether to use this or use the normal Taxonomy module.
The category module allows you to structure your site into a tree-like hierarchy of pages, and to classify your dynamic content, all within one seamless interface. It is built upon the foundations of the core book and taxonomy modules, and it provides all of the functionality of these two modules, and much more, to help you in customizing the navigational experience of your Drupal site.
Announcements and documentation can be found at the official category module web site.
This is not a single module, but rather a package of modules, which includes (among others):
* category: the core system.
* category_menu: auto-manages menu items to match the category structure.
* category_display: fine tunes display of many elements per-container, e.g. TOC, nav links.
* ‘Wrapper modules’: to allow full backwards-compatibility with the taxonomy and book modules (which this module is based upon), and thus with all other modules that depend on them.
* category_export: provides a printer-friendly version of a category and all its children.
* category_legacy: import / export from taxonomy / book.
Kehan's Blog 