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Arctos is an ongoing effort to integrate access
to specimen data, collection-management tools, and
external resources on the Web.
Nearly all that is known about a specimen can be
included in Arctos, and, except for some data
encumbered for proprietary reasons, data are open to the public.
Features:
- Everything is over the web in real time, and
independent of client-side operating systems.
You need moderate band-width, a reasonably modern browser,
and nothing more.
- Specimen-search screen is user-customizable
to about 100 search terms.
Find specimens by project and/or publication.
Save and e-mail searches.
- Customizable table for result sets, summarize
and graph result sets, download (as text, CVS, or XML).
- Customizable by individual collection using
headers and footers of their own design, and CSS.
- Any catalog item can have any number of attributes,
and attributes are customized to collections.
- Reciprocal linkages with external resources
(BerkeleyMapper,
GenBank,
and MorphBank).
- Identifications can be formulaic combinations
of terms drawn from a separate taxonomic authority.
- Maintains history of determinations for taxonomic
identifications, georeferencing, and biological attributes.
- Specimen records, specimen parts, attributes,
and citations can be entered or edited individually,
or in batches.
- Object-tracking using nested-containers model,
bar codes, and container-condition history.
- E-mail reminders for loans due, permit expirations, etc.
- Encumbrances can mask localities, collector names,
or entire records from unprivileged users.
- Print labels, reports, transaction documents, etc.
- Arctos is a
DiGIR
provider.
Participation
Arctos is currently three systems sharing the same code.
One is a
multi-hosting version
that includes collections
at the
University of Alaska Museum of the North,
the
University of New Mexico's Museum of Southwestern Biology,
and
Western New Mexico State University.
A second server in Berkeley is run by the
Museum of Vertebrate Zoology,
and a third is under development by the
Harvard Museum of Comparative Zoology.
Arctos is rooted in the
Collections Information System at MVZ.
Development efforts are being shared,
and programming is freely available.
Collections or institutions interested in having their
data hosted in Arctos, or interested in participating in
the development of Arctos should contact
Gordon Jarrell.
System Requirements
We attempt to keep the client-side of Arctos applications as generic as possible,
but we have made some exceptions:
- JavaScript:
We have used JavaScript throughout the applications.
Your browser must be JavaScript enabled to access all
the features of such applications.
- Cookies:
We use cookies only to set and preserve user preferences and user rights.
In order to benefit from all but the most basic public features,
you must enable cookies.
Browser Compatibility
- Mozilla Firefox:
All applications have been tested in Firefox.
- Microsoft Internet Explorer:
While we've attempted to support IE, we've chosen to follow
W3C
standards as closely as possible.
Microsoft is not always standards-compliant,
and some features of this site may not work in IE.
Let us know if
you have trouble accessing this site via IE. We'll fix it if we can.
- Safari:
Public applications are fully supported.
Some AJAX applications for data operators do not work.
Data Usage
The collections data available through Arctos are separately
copyrighted © 2001 - 2007 by the University of Alaska Museum of the North
(University of Alaska, Fairbanks, AK),
and by the Museum of Southwestern Biology (University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM),
and the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology (University of California, Berkeley, CA).
All rights are reserved.
These data are intended for use in education and research and may not be repackaged, redistributed, or sold in any form without prior written consent from the appropriate museum(s).
Those wishing to include these data in analyses or reports must acknowledge the provenance of the original data, notify the appropriate curator, and should ask questions prior to publication.
These are secondary data, and their accuracy is not guaranteed.
Citation of Arctos is no substitute for examination of specimens.
The data providers are not responsible for loss or damages due to use of these data.
Suggestions?
The utility of Arctos results from user input.
If you have a suggestion to make, let's hear it.
We accomodate many special requests through custom forms or custom queries,
and many of these are then incorporated into Arctos.
Please send email to Dusty or
Gordon if you have any questions, comments, or suggestions.
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