A new R package, exsic, to assist taxonomists in creating indices1. (7th June 2013)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Simon, Reinhard; Spooner, David M.
• Is Part Of: Applications in plant sciences. Volume 1:Number 6(2013)
• Page Start: n/a
• Page End: n/a
• Publication Date: 2013-06-07
• Subjects: exsic -- exsiccatae -- R -- reproducible research -- software; Plants -- Periodicals; Plant physiology -- Periodicals; Plant Physiological Phenomena; Plant physiology; Plants; Periodicals; Periodicals; Fulltext; Internet Resources; Periodicals; 580
• DOI: 10.3732/apps.1300024
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 2168-0450

Abstract

Abstract : Premise of the study: Taxonomists manage large amounts of specimen data. This is usually initiated in spreadsheets and then converted for publication into locality lists and indices to associate collectors and collector numbers from herbarium sheets to identifications ( exsiccatae ). This conversion process is mostly done by hand and is time‐consuming, cumbersome, and error‐prone. Methods and Results: We constructed a tool, 'exsic, ' based on the statistical software R. The exsic function is part of the R package 'exsic' and produces specimen citations and exsiccatae conforming to four related formats. Conclusions: The tool increases speed, efficiency, and accuracy to convert raw spreadsheet tables to publication‐ready content.