We have been asked a few time recently about why we make license base software and what our views are on open source software.  So we decided to make a little video answering some of these questions.  The short answer is we do make open source software but not always under our name since it is normally funded by other organizations.  We make license based software to support a sustainable business model to development and support current and future projects. So each license is a portion of the funding needed to develop each application.  So the more user base we have the more the software will be improve.

In our upcoming release of SilverCollection v1.1 we are moving to support the loading and sharing of Darwin Core Archives.  For those that are not familiar with this we have put together a short video explaining about what they are, who uses them, and how to build them.  Any questions please contact us. Enjoy!

With the Advancing Digitization of Biological Collections (ADBC) around the corner we thought it would be good to explain how to image a herbarium collection using a copy station and silver image.  If you are interested in learning more visit our product page or contact us directly.

This is our first newsletter for our planned image tour and we would like to thank everyone that has submitted a request for us to visit.

In this Issue:

• How to stay informed
• Who we will be visiting and when
• SERNEC meeting during ASB
• Final Result

How to stay informed:

We will be communicating through newsletters like this one and our special webpage at: http://www.silverbiology.com/botany2010/imagingtour.html.  Our goal is to provide as much information about what we are doing to get ready for this imaging tour.  If you have any questions about this event that we have not addressed please let us know.

Who we will be visiting and when:

Currently we are still collecting invitations on who we will be visiting and where you would like us to go.  We will be accepting requests until May 1st.  At that time we will start to plan a route and confirm some dates that we are able to visit.  Once we get in contact with each collection we will post the planned schedule online. The map that we will be using is located here: SilverBiology Imaging Tour 2010 Map

Current we have included everyone that has made a request with the following key:

• Green Icons = Invited
• Yellow Icons = Pending Invitation
• Red = Confirmed Location and Date

SERNEC meeting during ASB:

Tom Sasek will be presenting an overview about CyberFlora Louisiana (http://news.cyberfloralouisiana.com/) and how well the imaging method works.  This SilverBiology method will be the same as what we will be demonstrating during the tour.  We would also like for you to encourage other SERNEC members that are interested in digitization efforts to join in the tour or come visit while we are giving our demonstration.  We can only visit so many collections during this tour but knowing everyone that is interested might encourage us to extend or follow up with a second tour in the near future.

Final Result:

The final result will be an online SilverCollection web portal that will have all images and information available that we have processed.  This will be a small fraction of the total specimens in the United States but should act as a viable solution for larger plans for state and regional efforts.  We will also include a related webpage that will contain all the information about how we processed this data, how long it took and anything else that is related.

Have some ideas?

We hope to learn more about providing national imaging and processing solutions.  We hope to demonstrate simple, efficient, and quick solutions to mobilizing scientific collections.  We will continue to listen and do whatever we can to make our software as user friendly as possible.  If you have an idea you can send an email to: contact@silverbiology.com or reply back to this email and let me know what is on your mind.

If you know someone that would like to receive future newsletters they can go to:
http://www.silverbiology.com/newsletter/

In this Issue:

• Collections currently providing images
• Where we are with the software
• New this month
• What are our plans for April
• Summer Imaging Tour

Since our public announcement at TDWG 2009 we have had the chance to talk with a number of large and small collections interested in this method and technology for processing herbarium label images.  It is our goal to implement an international service that can help all herbaria.

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We are please to announce we will be attending BOTANY 2010 this year. Being the year of biodiversity we decided to also perform an experiment & case study by volunteering to image herbarium specimens before and after the conference along the east coast. This year the conference will be held in Providence, Rhode Island on July 31 - August 4 at the Rhode Island Convention Center. More information about the conference can be found on the official website.

Imaging Tour

SilverBiology will be performing full day imaging and demonstrations of our software.  We will be leaving from our office in Baton Rouge on July 18th and driving to Botany 2010 (BSA Conference in Providence, Rhode Island).  We will be passing through the east coast until August 15th.  During this time we would like to stop and provide a one day workshop on imaging, processing, and interacting with herbarium specimen sheets.  Our goal during this tour is to image and process over 5,000 specimen sheets then present that information online in our newest version of our SilverCollection web portal.  We are asking for interested herbaria to request that we stop and visit by sending us an email at contact@silverbiology.com.

For complete details on the project please visit: http://botany2010.silverbiology.com/