On Sat, 16 Apr 2005, David Blomstrom wrote: >I think my question is more oriented towards PHP, but >I'd like to ask it on this list, as I suspect the >solution may involve MySQL. > >I'm about to start developing an enormous database >focusing on the animal kingdom and want to find a key >system more user friendly than the traditional >scientific name.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?db=taxonomy I use the 'tax_id' that they use. You can get a dump of the DB here ftp://ftp.ncbi.nih.gov/pub/taxonomy/ see ftp://ftp.ncbi.nih.gov/pub/taxonomy/taxdump_readme.txt > >So imagine instead a page with the following in the >head section: > >$AnimalID = 'canlup'; > >This page displays information on the wolf, based on >the first three letters of its genus and species name, >Canis lupus. > >Now imagine a page with this value: > >$AnimalID = 'bal'; > >This page displays information on the whale family >Balaenidae. But what about the whale family >Balaenopteridae, which begins with the same three >letters? > >I could solve this problem by adding a numerical key >to my database and displaying the following: > >$AnimalID = 'bal23'; >$AnimalID = 'bal24'; > >The problem with this is that it makes it much harder >to work with my data. When tweaking a page or writing >a script, I can easily remember that bal = Balaenidae, >but I can't possibly remember which numeral is >associated with each mammal family. Also, what happens >if I add or subtract rows from my database table, and >the above values suddenly change to bal27 and bal28? > >So here's what I think I'd like to do: > >$AnimalID = 'canlup1'; >$AnimalID = 'bal1'; >$AnimalID = 'bal2'; > >The page with canlup1 will display the FIRST (and >only) instance of canlup in the database - the wolf. > >The page with bal1 will display the first instance of >bal, which will always be Balaenidae, whether the >absolute value is bal27 or bal2884. A page with bal2 >will always display the next mammal family that begins >with bal, Balaenopteridae. > >So I THINK all I need to do is create a variable that >reflects a particular value's ordinal position in a >database... >abc1 >abc2 >abc3, etc. > >Plus, I'll have to join two or three fields together >to form a key; e.g. animals.species + animals.numerals > >Does anyone know how I can do this? Thanks. > > > >__________________________________ >Do you Yahoo!? >Plan great trips with Yahoo! Travel: Now over 17,000 guides! >http://travel.yahoo.com/p-travelguide > > -- MySQL General Mailing List For list archives: http://lists.mysql.com/mysql To unsubscribe: http://lists.mysql.com/[EMAIL PROTECTED]
