We are days away from the 2019 Clements update being released. Significant numbers of the changes from the 2018 update remain unprocessed and in draft mode.
What plans are in place to deal with the 2019 update, and what steps can curators take to help since birds are locked to changes by only 2 people on the site ?
It is my understanding that the rest of us can still make changes, only that they remain in draft mode until applied, right?
Yes and no, some changes can be made in draft mode, but for instance you canāt create a new taxa if needed, since that is locked as well.
You should be able to make new taxa, you just canāt activate them.
There seems to be a reoccurring impression among some curators that branches on the tree are completely un-editable if they are ācompleteā/āFrameworkedā. This is l untrue - as @bouteloua and @cmcheatle describe above, most curators can still edit quite a bit.
We need better means of explicitly making it apparent that having a Framework does not mean that part of the tree is ālocked downā.
Well, the issue is that while some edits can be made by normal curators, the ones that matter cannot.
Or if they do matter ā in terms of helping the taxon curators with ābackgroundā work for needed taxon changes ā then that should be made much clearer to the curator community, maybe with a specific list of helpful tasks for ālockedā taxa in the Ways to Help Out wiki topic.
Counting myself among those curators - I think Iāve gotten that impression from some of the message wording associated with actions on those taxa. So yes, whatever we can do to make it more apparent what kinds of help other curators can contribute to locked taxa would be a win-win.
Pretty much everything that can be done by regular curators has now been done for the 2018 changes - creating new taxa, drafting taxon changes, atlasing new taxa. Not all new taxa have range maps yet, though Iāve added some of these where IUCN has the post-split ranges. As noted above, the delay has been in committing the draft taxon changes - there are currently 150+ draft changes for birds waiting to be committed. It does seem that an additional taxon curator for birds would be useful.
ā¦to help spread the workload
Ebird is turning on the changes on August 7th. The list has not been officially released yet, maybe that is the timing. Apparently it is a larger than normal update, with 100 plus splits being done alone, with a main focus outside Europe and NA
Just out of curiosity, do they normally include a list of changes?
Yes, that is what they do.
I dont know when the actual file will be released on the Clements reference page, but if anyone wants to get started, or see what the changes are :
@loarie @maxkirsch would it be useful for other curators to help draft changes for this year?
The sound of silenceā¦
Bueller? Any thoughts on an additional bird taxon curator?
I would also love to see another bird curator. @maxkirsch hasnāt logged in for two months and @loarie has way too much on his plate to cover all of birds. Beyond the taxonomic updates, there are also taxonomic problems that need to be addressed (like Pica pica sensu lato is still active even though the split subspecies are already up and running).
Apologies if this was directed at existing curators, but if you guys need another bird curator/regular curator that can draft the changes; I have a ton of free time currently that could be put to good use. I follow bird taxonomy quite closely so I know what needs to be done.
Since it is apparent the only way these will get done is to crowd-source entering the details and then hopefully Scott can activate the changes added by others, I have created an online Google Sheets file to track which drafts are done.
It is here : 2019 Clements changes
Please note I have started a few, but have not gone through to find others that might already be done.
Ideas to update the file are welcome, but please note I wont be able to implement until late this evening Toronto time.
I second @whimbrelbirder as I have plenty of time on my hands and I would be more than willing to help update bird taxonomy to the most recent Clements updates.