A few beginner questions

[Guest Ross Murphy]

Hi, I see that these forums are now working. Good.

Well, I have various questions about the project and how I might contribute. I joined it months ago, but didn't do much. I've been editing it a bit over the last few days though and trying to get to grips with how it works.

I was searching through many mammal lineages, to see the evolutionary trees. For instance the Musteloidea. I found that all of the living species were listed as extinct, so I started going through some of the groups and trying to correct that (and put in some of the common names of species and subspecies where I could), but the task is kind of overwhelming (I edited all 42 subspecies of the Long-tailed weasel, Mustela frenata). It just takes so long to edit each individual entry and change it to "Extant", if you have to do that like 100 times.

Is there any other way to, like, designate a whole family or genus as Extant? Or do you literally have to just edit each entry on its own?

I have plenty of experience as a Wikipedia editor but I'm new to this software, so I'm not clear on all the options.

I assume that all entries were initially designated as "Extinct", because most will be (with all the fossils). But it is a real chore to correct this for living species.

 

Anyway, I will probably have more questions, but that's something that has just come up. Thanks.

[brachiosteve 13]

Hi Ross.

Have we communicated before? Thank you so much for helping out. Are you in the Facebook group?

You highlight a well-known key problem area. A development update included the ability to make the extinct function work as a clade. As you may well know, if ANY clade node is denoted as extinct, then NOTHING subordinate to that clade node can be extant. The problem was, that the new function which enables this, was put in after many annotations had already been entered, some wrongly.

The data entry team are suspending much of the data entry imminently in order to prepare some exciting new things.

If you haven’t already, please (with Weare Borg’s help) get into the Data entry forum which is a communication hub for data entry where all relevant things will be raised.

Data entry are also looking for help in preparing the ground with various roles available which may interest you. They will no doubt post in the forum shortly.

Thanks,

[We are Borg 12]

@Ross Murphy Phylogeny Explorer Project facebook group can be found here https://www.facebook.com/groups/phylogenyexplorerdevelopment/

[We are Borg 12]

Going to tag @brachiosteve to answer this.

Also please register on this forum for more functionality. 

[Guest Ross Murphy]

57 minutes ago, We are Borg said:

Going to tag @brachiosteve to answer this.

Also please register on this forum for more functionality. 

Ok, how do I register exactly?

I am already signed up to the Explorer and am signed in to it.

[We are Borg 12]

If you can goto https://phylogenyexplorerproject.org/register you can signup there or at the right side you can use Facebook or Twitter to register.

[Ross Murphy 0]

Ok, I've registered for the forums.

On 8/14/2019 at 7:34 PM, brachiosteve said:

Hi Ross.

Have we communicated before? Thank you so much for helping out. Are you in the Facebook group?

You highlight a well-known key problem area. A development update included the ability to make the extinct function work as a clade. As you may well know, if ANY clade node is denoted as extinct, then NOTHING subordinate to that clade node can be extant. The problem was, that the new function which enables this, was put in after many annotations had already been entered, some wrongly.

The data entry team are suspending much of the data entry imminently in order to prepare some exciting new things.

If you haven’t already, please (with Weare Borg’s help) get into the Data entry forum which is a communication hub for data entry where all relevant things will be raised.

Data entry are also looking for help in preparing the ground with various roles available which may interest you. They will no doubt post in the forum shortly.

Thanks,

I was signed up to the project by someone called Stephen Owen, was that you? (the system is a bit silly that it doesn't register you with the forum at the same time as registering you for the Explorer itself, but ok).

Unfortunately I'm not on Facebook or any other social media.

When you say data entry is being suspended, does that mean I should not try to edit the explorer at the moment?

Where is the Data entry forum?

[brachiosteve 13]

Hi Ross.

Yes, I'm Steve

Registering on the Website gives you access tg0o additional forums. You'll need to register as a volunteer if you haven't already. As a data entry person for example. This will then give you access to the data entry team forum. You can then receive a personal project e-mail.

If you have any questions about onboarding, please let me know. W

We want to make things as easy and clear and well signposted as possible, and this appolies to everything, so if any of this wasn't or isn't clear, I'd really like to know (you can include screen shots if you like) and I will look into making this better.

Did you get edit access recently?

Pleaase make yourself known to the data entry team. Gabe and Joao are running it and they can advice on what can be done on the explorer.

[Ross Murphy 0]

3 hours ago, brachiosteve said:

Hi Ross.

Yes, I'm Steve

Registering on the Website gives you access tg0o additional forums. You'll need to register as a volunteer if you haven't already. As a data entry person for example. This will then give you access to the data entry team forum. You can then receive a personal project e-mail.

If you have any questions about onboarding, please let me know. W

We want to make things as easy and clear and well signposted as possible, and this appolies to everything, so if any of this wasn't or isn't clear, I'd really like to know (you can include screen shots if you like) and I will look into making this better.

Did you get edit access recently?

Pleaase make yourself known to the data entry team. Gabe and Joao are running it and they can advice on what can be done on the explorer.

I signed up for the project back in August 2018 (after talking to Aron Ra on the YouTube comments of one of his phylogeny videos), but I think at that time the Explorer was not editable for me. There also was no forums then, and since I wasn't on Facebook or anything, I didn't become a member of the community. I think you sent me an email back then saying that things were soon going to be starting up and you would send me more information in future. But that was the last communication (I understand you were probably busy trying to organise many other things).

Anyway, I then did a small bit of editing the Explorer on my own over the last few months (and a bit more in the last week or so). Just minor things like marking living species as Extant, etc. I also deleted one obvious joke/vandalism entry.

By Volunteering do you mean this applications page?: https://phylogenyexplorerproject.org/application/

I'm not entirely sure what I could do there. I also couldn't promise to commit a large amount of time to a role here. I was more intending to just casually edit the Explorer from time to time (add species and subspecies, correctly mark extinct/extant, maybe write some info and find picture, and what not).

Is that basically what "data entry" is? I don't have any real programming/coding skills, I can edit stuff like Wikipedia and the basic stuff on the Explorer, but that's about it.

BTW, is there some general editing guide or rule-set available for the project?

[brachiosteve 13]

Hi Ross.

I see.

You need to register as a volunteer and for data entry, so the data entry team know of your existence and can log you and any work done. You can do as much or little as you like and will get updates in the forum and you'll get a personal project email.

I will speak to the social media manager anmd wed w8ill work on clarifying onbosarding, based on your experience/feedback, too.

We are working on documenation and it will be shared/available when ready.

Was the joke, 'Heinz 57' in the dog clade?

I really appreciate your help, Ross. Please stick with us. You can continue to edit until/unless any other update comes up, which will be in the data entry forum.

Hope that helps.

[Ross Murphy 0]

1 hour ago, brachiosteve said:

Was the joke, 'Heinz 57' in the dog clade?

Yes it was. I assumed it was some kind of vandalism.

Anyway, I've submitted an application to become a data entry volunteer.

[brachiosteve 13]

Great. Will get that sorted. It was my Heinz 57. It is a British joke about the number of varieties of naked beans and I had plnned it to be used by Aron Ra on one of his videos. Thanksd for removing.

[brachiosteve 13]

Hi Ross. I can't seem to find you on the Facebook group and we seem to have lost contact. Apologies if this is my fault. Please do get back in touch if you can.

[Ross Murphy 0]

1 hour ago, brachiosteve said:

Hi Ross. I can't seem to find you on the Facebook group and we seem to have lost contact. Apologies if this is my fault. Please do get back in touch if you can.

Ok hi. I'm not on the Facebook group. I literally only joined Facebook during lockdown, because some friends wanted to play DnD through it.

Can you link me to the group?