Menu of frequently identified species in Identify?

[dan_johnson]

When I’m using Identify, I find myself frequently typing the same species name over and over and over. This begs the question: is there a menu of frequently identified species available? I might have run into it accidentally, but don’t know how I did it. 2-3 times suddenly this list of about 3 species appeared in a list over the upper left corner of Identify. At the time, I was kind of annoyed, thinking “where did this window come from?” I couldn’t figure out how to delete it without reloading Identify. Is this perhaps something I can use?

[astra_the_dragon]

can you provide specific examples of what your Identify settings / url would be, and what species?

[upupa-epops]

@pisum

just as an example, this time of the year, i’ll often look at observations that have been identified as Rudbeckia amplexicaulis, and i’ll end up invariably doing one of 3 sets of actions in 95% of cases:

1. ID as Rudbeckia sect. Rudbeckia + comment “probably R. hirta or something similar. R. amplexicaulis would not have hairy green parts like this.” + annotate as flowering
2. ID as Ratibida columnifera + annotate as flowering
3. ID as R. amplexicaulis + annotate as flowering

so instead of having an Agree button (especially since i’m often the first to make a disagreement), i would much rather be able to press 1 to do #1 above, press 2 to do #2, and press 3 to do #3.

Similar idea from the Agree thread.

[bouteloua]

The thing I suspect you’re referring to is a known bug:
https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/spurious-dropdown-menu-appears-in-identify-mode/10114

[arboretum_amy]

There is a thing which might be at least sort of related. It’s not what you frequently identify, but what people frequently observe nearby

[teellbee]

Sometimes, I set up keyboard shortcuts for creating oft-used bits of text such as you describe. I don’t know that you need an iNat feature, if you can find such a function on the platform(s) you prefer. (Not that a keyboard shortcut as above would handle your annotations .)

@pisum

i’ll end up invariably doing one of 3 sets of actions in 95% of cases:

1. ID as Rudbeckia sect. Rudbeckia + comment “probably R. hirta or something similar. R. amplexicaulis would not have hairy green parts like this.” + annotate as flowering
2. ID as Ratibida columnifera + annotate as flowering
3. ID as R. amplexicaulis + annotate as flowering

so instead of having an Agree button (especially since i’m often the first to make a disagreement), i would much rather be able to press 1 to do #1 above, press 2 to do #2, and press 3 to do #3.

[pisum]

what you’re describing seems like it more directly addresses what dan_johnson was asking for. my suggestion that was quoted from another post would be to combine multiple actions into a single keystroke. for example, pressing “1” would add an ID and add a comment and add an annotation. whereas with your keyboard shortcuts, or using some other sort of personal set of commonly used text snippets, you’re still having to ID, then paste in and select a taxon, then paste in comment text, then select an annotation… but some version of what you’re describing is probably the most efficient thing for most people in the current world.

[teellbee]

Yes, you are right and the shortcut text I described would not handle the accompanying annotations. Perhaps someone with the right kind of expertise can describe if writing a macro of some kind would address such a need.

[pisum]

@teellbee

Perhaps someone with the right kind of expertise can describe if writing a macro of some kind would address such a need.

yes, back in the day, i had thought about making a whole page that would serve as a prototype for what i was describing, but it’s a lot of work with that kind of approach. but it might be easier to make something like this by going with a browser extension approach like @sessilefielder demonstrated here (https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/computer-vision-should-tell-us-how-sure-it-is-of-its-suggestions/1230/44), perhaps even extending that project to include something like what i’m describing here. (the downside with an extension is that you’d have to maintain one for each browser or related set of browsers. i’m also a little paranoid about browser extensions in general because of the level of access you have to provide them to let them do what they need to do sometimes.)