Adding images to GRSciColl pages, access Latimer Core formatted data and ongoing discussions

Global Registry of Scientific Collections
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Our developers have implemented some changes in GRSciColl. The details were listed in my previous email and accessible on this forum post.

Notable changes are that:

  • You can now access GRSciColl data as JSON following the Latimer Core standard. You can do so for any entry, from the editing interface (click on the “More” button in the upper right corner and “Download as Latimer Core). Here is an example: https://api.gbif.org/v1/grscicoll/collection/latimerCore/2935ebce-1f44-4360-9bc7-ab3d7eeba712
  • You can now add featured images to your GRSciColl pages. The idea is to make those pages more visual and customizable. For example, you could have a picture of your institution, or of a drawer, or of a specimen or a staff group photo, etc. See these two examples:

Note that most entries won’t have any image. What do you think the idea of pulling images from homepage when available?

Here are three examples where we tried using the homepage opengraph:image metatag. The images aren’t always relevant but make the GRSciColl pages more visual. What do you think? Let me know. Thanks!

You are welcome to participate in our ongoing discussion on whether GRSciColl should mint DOIs for collections. You will find the thread here.

As always, thank you for helping improve GRSciColl!

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I think it is not a bad idea to using the homepage opengraph:image metatag but might lead to some interesting visuals (such as the skateboarding guy) :slight_smile:

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Maybe we should make them suggestions that the editors can review?

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re: pulling images. You could also do so via wikidata entries if you either captured the Q number in GRSciColl or if there were a GRSciColl ID, RoR, other used in wikidata entries upon which you could query. Same goes for logos, coordinates, and other metadata. Example: Natural History Museum, London - Wikidata

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That’s a very good idea!
We have 1685 institution entries with at least one Wikidata identifier: https://api.gbif.org/v1/grscicoll/institution?identifierType=WIKIDATA. So we could makes some suggestions based on Wikidata for these.