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Glossary items

I suggest that the plural and adjective forms of a word be included in the title of a single entry, rather than added as separate entries. For example:

- apex [apices; apical]

- genus [genera; generic]

Then it would be immediately obvious that the words are related when viewing the taxonomy tab (example).

A number of glossary entries are blank. Visitors who click these blank entries are likely to be disappointed or even annoyed at finding nothing there. Therefore, I suggest that blank entries be removed, and that information be added to all future entries at the time they are created.

Agreed on (1), not on (2)
(1) I like your suggestion of putting plurals in the definition, and I have been trying to do that.

(2) I don't think we should delete blank glossary pages, because there may be links to them already embedded in guide pages or image pages, and there is no way to tell. It should be a pretty quick job, if you find a blank glossary page, to insert a basic definition. I've done a lot, and have been pleading for more help.

I don't believe I have created any blank glossary entries, but it is possible I've done a couple, meaning to get back to them, and then forgot. Perhaps we could start a thread on "glossary pages needing work", not just for blanks, but for ones where image thumbnails need to be inserted, cross-references added, and the like.

 
A-C cleaned up, including some duplicates
Oh, I did see a couple of entries made under (A) that were blank--I had copied them from Jardine's Dictionary, meaning to get back to them, but did not do so. I later, sensibly, decided not to add blank entries. I cleaned up entries under A-C, I believe.

I did combine a couple of entries (apical-->apex, blacklighting-->black light), but realized I had better proceed with caution and correspond with Chuck Entz, who wrote the entries, before doing more of that editing. (Apologies, Chuck.)

Let's have a conversation about this topic and then proceed to clean up the glossary.

 
No problem
Everything I posted was with the intent that someone could polish up anything I overlooked. My only caution is that forms not obviously connected from the layperson's point of view need to both be visible **Remember that people will look for the form they've run into, not necessarily the form one would look for if one knew the word.

On another subject: While I agree that empty entries aren't a good idea, I kept running into terms that I thought we should include and put them in as placeholders- I was going to read up on them so I could come up with a good definition, but got sidetracked.

It's all well and good to say that one should only create an entry when one can finish it, but the people who can easily define terms are often too familiar with them to even realize they need to be defined.

We should have either placeholder entries that can be adopted and completed by those who know them, or a list somewhere so people can contribute ideas for those more knowledgeable on what entries to create.

A good model would be an "ID Request" for words: those who find a term they don't understand post it somewhere, and an expert puts in in the "guide" with a definition.

I guess it boils down to two different ways of looking at education (which is what we do here):

The conventional view sees only the flow of information from the expert to the learner. I prefer the view that sees the learner teaching the expert about the limits of the learner's knowledge and about the learner's strengths and weaknesses as a learner, so the expert's knowledge can be presented most effectively.

Having a mechanism for submitting terms to be defined fits in well with the latter philosophy, and, in my opinion, will lead to a better result.

 
ID request for terms
Perhaps it could go in the forums just as we have a "Request for new pages".

 
Keeping it simple
An "ID Request for words" might be a good idea for an Article, allowing people to suggest words as time goes on, similar to the way people's suggestions have been added to the Article on non-native species by Beatriz.

But let's not confuse that idea with a glossary, which is a list of technical word definitions. Since people expect a glossary to contain definitions, it's misleading to create glossary entries that are blank.

If we had talked about these things beforehand, we probably wouldn't now be in the position of having to "clean up the glossary." Therefore, I'd like to suggest that in future, editors announce their intentions in the Forums so that the ideas can be discussed before action is taken.

 
A-S complete, simplified, glossary focus
I have filled in, I believe, all of the blank glossary entries for the letters A-S. In a couple of more days, I should be able to get the rest. I have also simplified the entries, to include plural and adjectival forms with the main entry for A-S.

Really, the big work on the glossary lies ahead--inserting hyperlinks into guide pages that point to the glossary terms. I have done some of that, but plenty more needs to be done.

Also, I feel we should have a discussion about exactly what should go in the glossary. I'm inclined to concentrate on morphological and life history terms. Other sites on the Internet, such as Wikipedia, have good entries on many terms of basic biology. I've been inserting links to Wikipedia in glossary entries where they seem appropriate. For instance, Chitin--I see no need for us to have our own glossary entry on chitin--a simple link to that article will serve the purpose.

These are all just my suggestions--certainly nothing needs to be carved in stone.

 
what to include...
An emphasis on morphological and life history terms sounds good. Unusual words referring to specific colors and textures are often found in keys and original species descriptions. I have to look those words up every time because I always manage to forget them soon afterward. Entries like that would be useful.

As for creating hyperlinks to glossary terms, I would only do that for the most frequently used terms such as the example you mentioned (pronotum). For the remainder, re-wording the text or using easier terminology would be preferable, in my opinion. For example, if I had to choose one of the following sentences...

1. Termites are xylophagous insects.

2. Termites are xylophagous (wood-eating) insects.

3. Termites are wood-eating insects.

I'd go with #3.

 
Good, ideas
Good points. Perhaps we should start a thread in this forum on "glossary entry needed", or something to that effect.

I did go through and do basic definitions for, I believe, most of the blanks through "F".

An even harder task than building the glossary, is creating hyperlinks as terms are used. I have done a little of that--I do a search on the term and then go into the item (usually guide pages) and insert the hyperlinks using the shorthand version of link code. Any editor can do this, for instance, a link to pronotum, node 111902:
[url=node/view/111902]pronotum[/url]
gives
pronotum

 
Topic created
It seemed a better fit, though, in the "Requests For Additional Guide Pages" forum. I also put a link to it on the glossary root guide page. Feel free to tinker with the placement or wording of the link- it's just a test of the concept.

When the topic gets too cluttered, we can start another one and just change the link to point to the new one.

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