Capturing Data in the Field: An Application Framework for Easily Creating Custom Data and Metadata Entry Forms on Handheld and Desktop Computers

University Of California-Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara CA

Investigators

Abstract

Ecologists investigate a number of critical and diverse environmental issues, ranging from global climate change to the loss of biodiversity. The data needed to support this range of research are highly complex and variable, and the data are often labor-intensive to collect. These characteristics present distinct challenges for the collection and management of ecological data that are not being met by the range of available software tools. Prospects for the preservation and re-use of ecological data are further compromised by their tendency to be poorly described and inadequately archived. As a result, potentially relevant data that have been collected in the past are often difficult to find or difficult to interpret because of ambiguities in how they were collected. The bottleneck is a lack of standard methods or formats for data documentation or easy-to-use frameworks that assist in these functions. These data management and access problems will be solved by reducing inefficiencies and errors during the process of capturing environmental data in the field. This will be achieved through the design and building of a set of flexible, easy-to-use software tools for handheld field devices, as well as desktop computers-that will streamline field data collection, data entry and data documentation. These software tools will assist in the creation of data entry forms that are well-structured, unambiguous, and visually pleasing-thus eliminating the need for customized database development for each new project, or the often haphazard and error-prone entry of data into "free-form" spreadsheets. Finally, researchers and students will be trained in the use of these new tools. There is a growing need for synthetic ecological studies that will provide for a more powerful understanding of living systems, over larger spatial scales and longer time periods. Such syntheses require integrating environmental data collected from a number of sources. To achieve this goal, it is imperative to pay more attention to how the raw data are collected and preserved. The research should have major impacts on the scientific community by doing this-facilitating the capture, documentation and accessibility of ecological and environmental data. This software is not only intended to simplify the process of collecting data, but also to promote sound data practice by enforcing logically consistent data structures.