'Synonyms and Other Taxonomic Changes' vs. 'Explanation of Names'

I often edit info pages after I research a taxon I've been working on...frequently adding synonyms & taxonomic history (plus "Print References" which may have used those prior synonyms).

I often find the "Synonyms and Other Taxonomic Changes" field is empty and the "Explanation of Names" field has been filled w/ just the current species name, author, and publication date (with author's name in parentheses if there's been a new combination somewhere along the line...but not the original or intermediate names & combinations it may have, which are useful to know if trying to search out or correlate references).

I agree with John & Blaine...it seems clear to me that "Explanation of Names" pertains to the etymology of a name, not its currently valid formal name or taxonomic history.

I'm guessing perhaps an editor who wanted to provide the current "formal" name (i.e. binomial + author + date)...which in a sense, is not really a synonym (except tautologically ;-)...may have thought a field named "Synonyms and Other Taxonomic Changes" wasn't quite the right place for that, and instead (mis)interpreted the "Explanation of Names" field as a better place for such info. So Blaine's suggestion to change the name of the former field to "Taxonomic History" seems a good one to me.

I have to admit that, unless I know the etymology, I usually just add any list of synonyms I've searched out to the data field where I initially find the valid name...which is usually in the "Explanation of Names" field. [FWIW, I've noticed this seems to be the case especially on "skeletal" info pages with no content beyond the automatic info page template (contributed by, say, editor "X"), together with the single added data point of the formal name/author/date...where the only editor name under "Additional contributions" at the bottom of the page is an amazingly energetic and seemingly omnipresent BugGuide stalwart who appears to quite diligently & conscientiously add author & date info to guide pages where an initial editor X neglected to do so! ;-)   But I may well be mistaken there.]

At any rate, once the practice of placing taxonomic history under "Explanation of Names" becomes widespread, others editors may interpret that as the convention on BugGuide. I don't know how the situation can be effectively remedied at this point...other than if some super-sharp programmer can write a script that can somehow correctly interpret when the current content of an "Explanation of Names" field has only taxonomic history info in it, and then swap that info over to the "Synonyms and Other Taxonomic Changes" field?

An alternative is for editors to make such "moves" as they run into info pages with this sort of mis-placed data...but that will be a slow & piecemeal process. However, I'm willing to do it whenever I run into the problem while editing an info page for other reasons. (And, after all, "slow & piecemeal" kind of makes a good slogan for characterizing the progress of taxonomy anyway ;-)