Guide to taxt tags
Last edited about 4 years ago — Added over 4 years ago
"Taxts" and "taxt tags"

"Taxt" refers to any plaintext content that is mixed with database ID tags ("taxt tags"). While mainly used for history items, there are about ten different database columns that support "taxt" content.

Standard catalog tags
What Code Example Usage
Taxon link {tax 429349} Formica For linking and referring to non-homonyms
Taxon link (with author citation) {taxac 429349} Formica Linnaeus, 1758 For linking and referring to homonyms; the author citation is included for disambiguation only; should not be followed by a colon/pages
Protonym link {pro 154891} Lasius Not 100% decided, currently mainly for genus-group name protonyms
Protonym link (with author citation) {proac 154891} Lasius Fabricius, 1804 As above, but with author citation
Terminal taxon link of a protonym {prott 154891} Lasius Does not handle Protonyms with more than one terminal taxon protonyms
Terminal taxon link of a protonym (with author citation) {prottac 154891} Lasius Fabricius, 1804 As above, but with author citation
Reference link {ref 126902} Linnaeus, 1758 Used to backup scientific "claims", should be followed by a colon and page numbers


Cleanup-related tags
What Code Example Usage
"Missing taxon name" {missing <i>string</i>} Dangerosa For hardcoded taxon names that are missing from the catalog
"Unmissing taxon name" {unmissing <i>string</i>} Dangerosa For hardcoded taxon names that are not missing from the catalog
Misspelled name (taxa, protonyms, epithets) {misspelling <i>string</i>} Dangerrrrosa For hardcoded taxon names that are misspelled, exact usage is TBD
Hidden editor notes {hiddennote string} Hidden editor note: check reference For (short-lived) notes, only visible to logged-in users; they make parsing more complicated, so we only want to use them to temporarily tag history items with issues so they can be found and fixed
  • missing and unmissing tags were added to make taxts parsable by script, and to make it possible to find missing database entries.
  • Hardcoded names wrapped in "missing" and "unmissing" tags render for visitors just as if the name were hardcoded. For logged-in users, they appear in bold red/gray.
  • Any time you see a hardcoded [Taxon] name in a history item, and we want to create a Taxon record for that name, you can wrap it in a missing tag like this {missing <i>Prionopelta nominata</i>}.
  • Creating the missing Taxon record is of course even better, but if you don't have time to do that, just tagging the content is still an improvement.
  • Additional italics tags between words like {missing <i>Prionopelta</i> <i>nominata</i>} can be left as is if there are any.
  • History items with missing tags are collected in this script: History items with missing tags (queue 1) taxt-hist slow-render has-quick-fix
  • unmissing is used for hardcoded names that we don't want to create Taxon records for - this was added mostly to make it easier to see which hardcoded names have already been processed.

"missing" vs. "unmissing"

A 100% complete ant catalog would not need a missing tag type, while unmissing would still be relevant for hardcoded names, since even a complete ant catalog would not necessarily keep Taxon records for homonyms outside of Formicidae.

unmissing can also be used for Formicidae-ish names that we do not currently have plans to create Taxon records for. For example Dorylidae, which is now Dorylinae. Example:

  • {tax 469626} in {unmissing Dorylidae}, {tax 429481}

Which renders as:

"unmissing" and Bolton

Bolton indicates families of taxa outside of Formicidae using parenthesis at the end of items, like here:

  • [Junior homonym of †Myrmicium Westwood, 1854: 396 (Pseudosiricidae).]

On AntCat, the same entry would be formatted like this:

  • [Junior homonym of †Myrmicium (Pseudosiricidae) Westwood, 1854: 396.]

With the whole name wrapped in an unmissing tag, to keep it in one place, and so that it can be parsed as a single name by scripts.

<-- see https://github.com/calacademy-research/antcat-issues/issues/11 -->


Tag conversions suffixes

tax tags can be converted to protonym-based tags by suffixing the ID. Replacements can be previewed and are performed when items are saved.

Target protonym-tag Original Original with suffix Output
pro
{tax 510903}
Acanthomyops niger		 {tax 510903pro}

{pro 164565}
Formica nigra
proac
{tax 510903}
Acanthomyops niger		 {tax 510903proac}

{proac 164565}
Formica nigra Linnaeus, 1758
prott
{tax 510903}
Acanthomyops niger		 {tax 510903prott}

{prott 164565}
Lasius niger


See also