November 22, 1996 Meeting

University of Texas at Austin

1. Data Model Specifications--Longitude and Latitude

The members agreed to exchange data in degrees, minutes, and seconds (rather than positive or negative integers) with N and W being defaults for Texas.

2. Data Model Specifications--Annotation History

It was agreed that any method chosen should accommodate searches for name strings. It was decided that the annotations will be recorded in three fields each--Genus-species-authority, annotator, and date. It is left to each institution to decide how far back to go in recording annotations.

3. Data Model Specifications--Authority File (Plant Names)

4. Publicity Campaign--Worldwide Web Presence

All agreed that it would be helpful for the FTC to have a central home page that was unconnected to any one of the. It was decided that the frontFTP page for each institution be similar in format and content, so that a relatively uniform image could be presented. This page would include the links to particular project pages.

5. Plant Resources Center Newsletter

Carol presented text discussing the FTC/P. This material was proposed for the Plant Resources Center\'92s newsletter. Members approved the content (it was based largely on the FTC brochure) and suggested that the included invitation to membership include a contact address.

6. Non-profit Status for FTC/Use of Logo

Lunch--Faculty Club

7. Upcoming Texas Academy of Science Meeting

The Consortium members were again offered blocks of 15 minutes at the upcoming (March) meeting of the TAS (to be held in Huntsville). Time and space have been reserved for an FTC meeting on the afternoon of the 7th. The banquet is Friday evening. A field trip on Thursday, March 5, is under development. This trip would be an opportunity for members to play with GPS and Arc-info techniques.

8. Upcoming SWARM Meeting

A&M is attempting to get speakers from Texas, Oklahoma, MoBot, Mexico, etc., with an eye to well-rounded coverage of bioinformatics. The plan is to have presentations in the morning and hands-on database workshops at the CSDL in the afternoon. The meetings are scheduled for May 18-22, 1997, but it has not yet been decided which day will be "ours". The botanists of A&M plan to host field trips in conjunction with the meetings.

9. E-mail Archive

10. Past and Future NSF Proposals

11. Serving Data from Small Collections

12. Database Copyright Issues

Washington Initiative Vol 10 #9 has to do with the World Intellectual Property Organization'92s proposal to apply extremely strict copyright and use limitations to databases, copyrights that would in essence apply to the raw data itself. It was agreed that such a measure would hinder the efforts of the FTC and like organizations. Fiona drew up a tactful but strongly worded letter of protest, which was signed by multiple members and e-mailed. The WIPO conference is slated for Dec. 2 -20 in Geneva, but no public hearings are scheduled.

13. Plans for the next meeting

The next meeting is scheduled to coincide with the TAS meetings, Friday March 7, 1997, from 1 to 5 p.m. at Sam Houston State University in Huntsville.