Collections - Kew Gardens

Mark Jackson

Collections

Collection Databased Not databased Database online?

Herbarium 464,000 specimens 7,000,000? Yes

Fungal Herbarium 577,000 specimens - Part

Living Collection 195,000 accessions - No

Economic Botany 81,000 specimens - No

Microscope Slides 68,000 slides 165,000 No

Seeds 56,000 seed lots - No

DNA 36,000 samples - Yes

http://www.kew.org/collections/index.htm

Collection Mgt Solutions

• Bespoke solutions for each collection written by internal software team

• Client-server – Sybase/MySQL rdbms– Visual Basic clients– Java-based web clients

• A few packages- CRIS for Herbarium transaction management- Brahms for research and GIS datasets

Herbarium

BrahmsBrahms

AccessAccess

ExcelExcel

Global IT Architecture

It’s a mess!

Issues

• Silos - no shared services, functionality or data• Poor integration: difficult to search; track

material; validate against authority files; can't import data from other collections

• Duplication and variable quality• Maintenance burden and legacy software• Digitisation mountain• Scale of the problem!

Some Good Things

• We have a lot of stuff – see our website• We have some much-loved systems tailored

to local audiences• We have internal capability and control• We have a plan…

Future Plan

• Strategic IT Programme– Across the board to improve infrastructure, systems and

information management- New infrastructure and Oracle software suite- Science and Horticulture Systems (SHS) project...

Expectations of the Workgroup

• Information Exchange and Advice• Collaboration – what is the appetite for…– Level 1: Common standards and processes– Level 2: Sharing of data e.g. duplicates/authority

lists– Level 3: Portals & joint developments– Level 4: Integrated systems and planning

• Think beyond IT!