Creating and Editing Checklists in J-Bird (Version 0.5.2)

Summary

• A checklist is a subset of species from the master species list.
• It is possible to tick from checklists species that are observed on trips. You can also include checklists in trip reports and in species lists to show species that might have been observed but were not.
• Checklists have parents, and when building a checklist, species are selected from its parent list.
• When selecting checklists to edit, checklists are presented in a tree that reflects parental affiliations.
• All manipulations of checklists (e.g., create, delete, edit) are done by right-clicking on checklists in the tree.
• To create a checklist, click on the "Create checklist" button, or right-click on the checklist that will be the parent of the new checklist and select "Create child of ..."
• To edit a checklist right-click on it in the tree and select the menu item that allows you to edit the species list. Or, just double-click on the checklist.
• On Linux and Windows, several checklists can be selected from the tree by holding down the ctrl key when clicking on checklists. When the finished, right-click for a menu that allows you to either edit all selected checklists or delete them.
• To select several checklists on Mac OS X, hold down the apple key while clicking to select multiple checklists, for all but the last checklist to be selected. For the last checklist, hold down ctrl-apple while clicking to activate the pop-up menu. The pop-up menu allows you to edit all selected checklists or delete them.
• To edit checklist meta-data such as its name, description and parent on Linux and Windows, click on the checklist in the tree to select it, and then right-click on the checklist and select "view/edit list info".
• To edit checklist meta-data such as its name, description and parent on Mac OS X, right-click on the checklist and select "view/edit list info".
• Checklists can be assigned to regions and to trips as preferred checklists. Preferred checklists are used by J-Bird to suggest checklists to you when you edit ticks observed on trips and when you create trip reports.
• If a trip has been assigned a preferred checklist and the trip's region has been assigned another preferred checklist, J-Bird will recommend the checklist that is associated with the trip.

Overview

Checklists in J-Bird are used much like you would use checklists in the field. They contain subsets of birds of the World that you expect to see in more specific places. You can build checklists, tick species that have been observed on trips, and include checklists in trip reports and in lists of species that you have seen to indicate what you might have seen but did not.

You are responsible for building the checklists that you want to use with J-Bird. Checklists are not distributed with J-Bird (although a master species list is). Your best bet is to build a checklist that reflects your favorite bird guide (e.g., the National Geographic Society's guide to the birds of North America, the Sibley guide, etc.). When building your first checklist, you'll check-off species from the master list of birds that you loaded into J-Bird. Alternatively, you can import checklists into J-Bird. Imports are covered in the next section. This section describes how to create and manually populate checklists.

Checklists can be organized hierarchically. Your first checklist will be a subset of species in the master species list. The second can be a subset of either the master species list or a subset of your first checklist. For example, your first checklist might be birds of North America, and your second list might be subset of North American birds that are found in the southeastern states. Your third checklist, might be the birds of North Carolina. You might also have a list of the birds of South America that is subset of the master list of birds, and a list of the birds of Argentina that is a subset of South American birds.

Checklists in J-Bird are independent of the regions to which trips are assigned. However, you will probably build checklists that correspond to regions. And, you can assign checklists to regions or to trips to be used as preferred checklists. If you assign a checklist to a trip, that checklist will be suggested to you when you edit the list of species that were seen on the trip. If a trip has not been assigned a checklist and if a checklist has been assigned to the region that is associated with the trip, J-Bird will suggest the region checklist for use when you edit the list of species that were observed on the trip. Preferred checklists are optional. If you make no assignment, J-Bird will suggest the checklist that was used most recently.

If you choose to use preferred checklists, the most flexible strategy is to liberally assign them to regions and conservatively assign them to trips for exceptions to your regional preference. When you change the preferred checklist of a region, the newly assigned checklist will be recommended for all trips in the region except those for which checklists have been set explicitly.

Presently, checklists can be assigned to regions only when regions are created. (That limitation will be lifted in the next version of J-Bird.) Hence, you need to create checklists before creating the regions to which they will be assigned. Sorry for the inconvenience. Checklists can be assigned to trips when they are created or when you edit trip information.

Creating checklists

Select Browse/Edit Checklists in the task chooser at the upper left side of the J-Bird window. The bottom portion of the window will display a tree that depicts checklists. Initially, there will be only one entry - the master species list, and your first checklist must be a child of it.

To create a checklist, click on the "Create checklist" button. Alternatively, click on the checklist that will be the parent of the new checklist on Linux or Windows (not necessary on Mac OS X). Right-click on parent (all platforms), and select the menu item "Create child of ...". A new window will appear that provide blanks in which you can record information about the new checklist.

• Name of list - A short name that will be displayed when you select checklists as parents or for trips, and species lists. For example, you might name a checklist "Pea Island" if it contains a checklist of birds for Pea Island National Wildlife Refuge.
• Description - A longer descriptive title of the checklist. Example: Birds of Pea Island National Wildlife Refuge.
• Data source - The place from which you obtained the checklist (e.g., the field guide in which you examined maps and decided whether species should be on the current list; or, a web site from which you downloaded the list. Example: Refuge office.
• J-Bird contributor - the person who imported the list into J-Bird. This may be useful if you trade checklists with other J-Bird users. Example: Otto Helderbink.
• Version - Checklists may be dynamic, and this field provides a place to keep track of that. This may be useful if you trade checklists with other J-Bird users. Example: 2002, October.
• Parent checklist - the list from which you will select species to be included in the new checklist.
• Species -
• Select from parent checklist - the parent checklist will be displayed when the dialog is dismissed, and you can select species from the parent list to be included in the checklist.
• Import - species in the checklist from one of the following: file of comma-separated values, Excel spreadsheet, table in a web page, query from a relational database. A wizard will appear to guide you through the import. Details are available on the import pages.
• Defer selection - species will not be added to the checklist. This is useful if you wish to create several checklists and then populate them all at once by selecting species from the parent list.

Click the commit button when you have finished filling out the form, and the checklist should appear in the tree of checklists.

Editing checklists

Select "browse/edit checklists" from the task chooser at the upper left corner of the J-Bird window if you have not already done so. To edit the list of species that is included in a checklist, you can double-click on the checklist in the tree or right-click on it and select the entry in the pop-up menu that allows you to edit species that are included in the list. You can edit more than one checklist at a time by selecting multiple checklists (hold down the shift key while clicking on them), right-clicking on any one of the selected checklists and choosing the item in the pop-up menu for editing all selected checklists.

A table of species and checkboxes will appear, or if you have selected a checklist for which the parent is the master list of species, a table of families will appear. You can expand or collapse families by clicking on the wedge/v to the left of family names. The table of species includes the parent checklist, or a composite of parent checklists when more than one checklist is being edited. Click on the check boxes to add or remove species. The database is updated dynamically as you mark and unmark boxes.

You can change information that is displayed in the table by using the View menu. You can toggle between scientific names and common names. You can hide or display family names. If family names are displayed, it is possible to enable and disable the capacity to expand and contract families. Finally, it is possible to change the set of species from which you select species to include in checklists. This allows you to include in a checklist species that are not included in the checklist's parent. The View menu Template entry allows you to select from increasingly more inclusive sets of species, beginning with the parent of the checklist being edited, through parents of the parent checklist, and ending with the master species list. When editing more than one checklist, the parent list that is displayed in the table is a composite of the parents of all checklists being edited. In the Template menu entry, composite parent lists are identified only as "composite checklist".

Table geometry can be manipulated. The window can be resized, and the widths of columns in the table respond to changes in the size of the window.Widths of individual columns can be adjusted by placing the mouse cursor on the divider between the header of a column to be adjusted and the column to its right. The cursor will change, usually to a thick vertical bar. Push down on the mouse button and drag the divider to the left to decrease the width of the column and to the right to increase the width of the column. Release the mouse button to set the width. The order in which columns appear can be changed by dragging around columns with the mouse. Place the mouse cursor in the center of the header of a column that you want to move. Press down on the mouse button, drag the column horizontally to where you want it, and release the mouse button to place the column.

The File menu allows you to save the displayed table into a web document (HTML) file or into a file of comma-separated values (CSV). These functions do not modify the database itself. The database is modified dynamically as you mark/unmark boxes.

The Find menu allows you to activate the species finder, just as it does for ticking species that were observed on trips. Detail on using the finder is available on the finders page.

Checklist examples

Here are some quick instructions for manipulating checklists. To do any of them you must selected "browse/edit checklists" from the task chooser at the upper left-hand corner of the J-Bird window.

• Create a checklist.
• Click on parent of checklist to be created (Linux and Windows only).
• Right-click parent of checklist to be created. Note that if you have not already created a checklist, your only choice is to right-click on the master species list.
• Select "Create child of XXX", where XXX is the parent.
• Fill in the blanks on the pop-up dialog that appears, and commit the change.


• Edit species in a checklist.
• Click on parent of checklist to be created (Linux and Windows only).
• Right-click the checklist to be edited.
• Select "View/Edit XXX species list", where XXX is the checklist to be edited.
• A table will appear. If it contains only family names expand families by clicking on the ">" that precedes families for which you wish to add species.
• Click on the boxes next to species that you wish to add to the checklist.
• Click on checked boxes to remove species from the checklist.
• When finished, close the table using the File menu or by clicking the window-close icon.


• Add to a checklist a species that is not on the parent checklist.
• Open the checklist editor as explained in the previous example.
• Click on the View menu, and move the mouse cursor to the Template item.
• On the list of options that appears there will be a series of more general choices, beginning with the parent checklist and ending with the master species list. Select one that's appropriate.
• The table window will disappear and then reappear with another set of species for selection. Edit as in the previous example.


• Edit species on several checklists at once.
• Select all the checklists that you want to edit by holding down the ctrl key while clicking on them. Then right-click on one of the checklists, and select "View/Edit all selected". (On Mac OS X hold down the apple key while clicking all but the the last checklist to be edited. Then, hold down ctrl-apple while clicking on the last checklist to edit. Select from the pop-up menu "View/Edit all selected.)
• A table for editing checklists will appear. Columns will be checklists. Click on boxes as appropriate.
• When finished close using the File menu or by clicking the window close icon.


• Change the name, description or parent of a checklist. checklist.
• Click on parent of checklist to be created (Linux and Windows only).
• Right-click on the checklist that you want to alter, and select "View/Edit XXX list info", where XXX is the name of the list.
• Click in field that you want to change, and change the values. Clicking on the parent checklist, brings up a tree of available parents.
• Commit or cancel.


• Delete a checklist.
• Click on parent of checklist to be created (Linux and Windows only).
• Right-click checklist to be deleted.
• Select "Delete XXX species list", where XXX is the checklist to be deleted. NOTE THAT THERE IS NO CONFIRMATION DIALOG.

A tip

Species names and genera change over time, and it can be challenging to match names on the checklist that you are entering with names in the master species list. Indeed, genera and specific epithets are often less stable over time than are common names, at least for the purpose of building checklists in J-Bird. Good resources for looking up synonyms are

• Avibase and
• John Penhallurick's Bird Data Project.

A thought on organizing checklists

Checklists often include all species that have ever been observed in an area. Such expansive checklists hinder ticking because you must visually pick your way through many species that are very unlikely to be seen. As an alternative, you might maintain two checklists for some areas: a checklist of the usual birds of the area and a checklist of accidental species of the area. Ticking will be faster most of the time if you tick from the list of usual suspects. When you encounter accidentals, you can switch to the checklist of accidentals by using the View menu item "Alternative checklist ...". At times when you prefer to tick against both checklists, you can select both the usual-suspect checklist and the accidental checklist as you select the checklist from which you will tick.