Help:About

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Introduction

About MetaBase

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MetaBase is a user-contributed list of all the biological databases available on the internet. Right now we have 1,756 articles that have been edited 9,817 times by 85 registered users!

Contents

[edit] Database Description

In detail, MetaBase aims to fulfil the following list of requirements;

  • As a basic requirement, the MetaBase will contain a list of databases, URLs and descriptions of the most commonly used biological databases currently available on the internet.
  • The MetaBase should be flexible, allowing many users to contribute, update and maintain the data. The data management software should be flexible, allowing a continuous growth of the range and scope of databases and database information.
  • The MetaBase should be 'classifiable'. That is to say that it should not contain just one fixed database classification scheme, but many. Potentially any user could create his or her own classification of databases according to any criteria, and those classifications should be available to everyone.
  • The MetaBase should be extensible, allowing, for example, scientific papers to be linked to the databases through a variety of relationships.
  • The MetaBase should provide an up-to-date source of biological database information, as well as tools for gathering database usage and quality information from the biological community.
  • The MetaBase should facilitate more communication between the database developer and user communities.
  • Potentially the MetaBase could be used as a source of 'genuine' meta-data for data integration projects.
  • The MetaBase should be published in a suitable open access journal.

This list of requirements should not be considered static. The MetaBase aims to be a flexible, user-driven (user-created) resource for the biological database community. The above aims can be constantly revised to meet new requirements as they arise.

[edit] Current Status

The above list of requirements was found to fit very well with the feature set provided by MediaWiki. For this reason, MetaBase has been implemented using MediaWiki (version 1.12.0) and is currently hosted on BiO.

[edit] Content

(text included from MetaBase content)

The initial release of MetaBase was derived entirely from the content of the Nucleic Acids Research (NAR) 2007 Database Issue. Specifically, each MetaBase database page was 'seeded' with text from the 'Database Summaries' cite provided by NAR. Because of the way this text is licensed, its use is subject to several restrictions that in turn restrict the complete use of MetaBase. Although the NAR Open Access policy allows us to use the text, the following two important stipulations apply;

  1. The text for each database must be reproduced verbatim and in its entirety.
  2. The use of the text is to be strictly non-commercial.

For more information see the NAR license.


NOTE: The above restrictions only affect the MetaBase 'seed text'. The rest of the content in MetaBase is freely licensed. For information on using MetaBase along with instructions on how to work with the seed text see Working with MetaBase.

[edit] Recent Developments

BiO Freedom!
BiO Freedom!

[edit] See Also


[edit] External Links

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