How to Use SLIKS
To key out something with an
existing data set:
Click on the file SLIKS.html (or PDASLIKS.html) to start. Note that it
might also be called by the name of a taxon (e.g. Acer.html).
The buttons at the top do the
following:
"Matching Taxa"
pares down the list at the right to only those taxa that have the
states that you have indicated by checking boxes in the set of
characters at the left.
"Applicable Chars"
(versions 1.0-1.9 only - the character set defaults to this
automatically in later versions) is used after you have used at least
once. It pares the list of characters at the left down to only
those characters that differ among the remaining taxa listed at the
right.
"Best" Reports the
number of taxa remaining with a character state after the description
of that character state. It makes your choice of characters much more
efficient but can slow your computer on large data sets..
"Restart" restarts the identification process and clears the
memory.
"About" well just press that
one and see.
"Help" is self expalanatory
"Lookup" You can higlight any
word in the Character Area (the left block) and hit the "Lookup'
button. A new window will open with the definition of the
term from Google. This is an easy parameter to change in
SLIKS and some keys may be mapped to look up terms elsewhere.
"Describe Remaining Taxa"
prints out full descriptions of the taxa remaining in your set of
possibilities.
The "Keep all characters visible"
box lets you keep all characters visible in versions 2.0 on, which
default to showing only the applicable characters in the menu. You
won't likely need this but it is useful in teaching applciactions
sometimes.
And on the right....
Clicking on the "D" button in
front of any taxon at the right gives you the entire list of characters
with their states for that taxon.
Clicking on the "R" button
next to any chosen character on the right removes that choice and
recalculates the list of potential taxa without it.
Clicking on the taxon name
itself sends you to the web page or image that is indicated in the
character matrix for that taxon. Some keys have added icons for
multiple data sources.
To make your own data set for SLIKS you need to look at "How to
make the data file" and make a file called "data.js" the only thing to do after
that is put that file into the same directory/folder as the other SLIKS
programs and click on the file SLIKS.html (or PDASLIKS.html) to
start. If the folder is web enabled, SLIKS will run on the web
the same way that it does on your computer. Just make a link to the
SLIKS.html file in your web pages.
Page last updated: 29 Nov. 2004
Contact STINGER at STINGERSPLACE.COM for more information.