Bulk add to project

[Zach DuFran]

I curate the "Moths of Oklahoma" project and I am trying to add moth observations within the state that are not currently in our project. I have a good URL for locating the relevant observations (https://www.inaturalist.org/observations?not_in_project=moths-of-oklahoma&place_id=12&subview=table&taxon_id=47157&without_taxon_id=47224,47654) but when I view this list I don't see an option for selecting all observations and adding to the project. It's not really feasible for me to do this one-by-one for 1,200+ observations. Is this possible from a different view? I've marked this as a general-question, but if it's not currently possible, I'd like to request this as a feature.

[Chris Cheatle]

Projects for moths are especially difficult. Assuming this : https://www.inaturalist.org/projects/moths-of-oklahoma is your project, I'd suggest converting it to a new collection project. Assuming you are the owner of the project, there should be a link to do it.

Set the project rules to have a place of Oklahoma. The challenge is the species. There is no exclude function, so you need to enter each superfamiliy of moths. It's a 1 time annoying investment in time.

Collection projects automatically find and collect all observations that meet the rules, no ading records or joining the project. Basically it is a saved search.

For traditional projects, there is no way to bulk add records that are not your own, the 1 by 1 adding is the only option.

[Zach DuFran]

Thanks for letting me know about the new collection project concept, Chris. 

Questions if/when I convert my existing project:

1. Are there any noticeable differences between the collection projects and regular projects?

2. Will people still be able to "join" the project?

3. Will people still be able to add their observations to the project when they are submitting them to iNat?

4. Will blog posts go to only people who "joined" the project or to all people who have their observations automatically added to the project?

[Chris Cheatle]

#1 - the biggest difference I can think of is the new collection projects do not allow access to private or obscured coordinates of sightings, even to the admin of the project. Assuming that is not a requirement for you, then I view that as a fine trade-off for the automated collection of the records

#2 - you dont join a collection project, you "follow" it.

#3 - there is no more adding records. If you set one up, the project automatically will add all moth records from Oklahoma as soon as they are entered, even if the person has not followed the project. Basically the project becomes this search : https://www.inaturalist.org/observations?place_id=12&subview=table&taxon_id=47157&without_taxon_id=47224,47654

#4 - I believe the blog post goes only to people who follow the project, though I'm not 100% certain on this. I also think if you convert an existing traditional project over, all people who joined it are automatically added as followers of the revised projec.

On Monday, June 18, 2018 at 3:45:24 PM UTC-4, Zach DuFran wrote:

[GanCW]

The biggest problem with collection project for moths is there are many moth observations which the observer will not know what family or even superfamily and as there is one one superfamily for moth, the observation will most likely be id as Lepidoptera and will not appear in the collection project. So the moth project will miss out many observations.

The only solution is to implement the exclude taxa option.

[Charlie Hohn]

why are moth people so set on excluding butterflies? After all they are an essential part of lepidoptera diversity, if not as understudied.  It's like me saying 'i am interested in studying the diversity of maple species but want to ignore red and sugar maple'.  Why?

On Tue, Jun 19, 2018 at 7:28 AM, GanCW <gan...@gmail.com> wrote:

The biggest problem with collection project for moths is there are many moth observations which the observer will not know what family or even superfamily and as there is one one superfamily for moth, the observation will most likely be id as Lepidoptera and will not appear in the collection project. So the moth project will miss out many observations.

The only solution is to implement the exclude taxa option.

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Charlie Hohn
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[Chris Cheatle]

Yes, but you can't implement the exclude taxa option in a collection project.

[paloma]

I would just add that an observation that is ID'd as Lepidoptera right now, which doesn't appear in the collection project right now, will appear automatically in the collection project in the future if and when it is ultimately identified to a family or superfamily of moths in the project's criteria.

[Zach DuFran]

Thanks everyone for your feedback.

I'm in a bit of a conundrum now because I like the idea of observations automatically being collected into the project, but there are a significant number of unidentified moths that are lumped in "Lepidoptera" and I don't think they will get identification help from other project members if they're not in the project. I think for now I will leave my project alone and try to manually add more observations that are missing from the project.

Back to my original question, a "bulk add to project" feature would be super handy!

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[Chris Cheatle]

One thing you could consider is flipping it to the collection project and adding a news item / post with a URL to the non-species identified records encouraging people to take a look and see if they can help ID them.

On Wednesday, June 20, 2018 at 12:56:52 PM UTC-4, Zach DuFran wrote:

Thanks everyone for your feedback.

I'm in a bit of a conundrum now because I like the idea of observations automatically being collected into the project, but there are a significant number of unidentified moths that are lumped in "Lepidoptera" and I don't think they will get identification help from other project members if they're not in the project. I think for now I will leave my project alone and try to manually add more observations that are missing from the project.

Back to my original question, a "bulk add to project" feature would be super handy!

On Tue, Jun 19, 2018 at 9:47 AM, paloma <margaret...@gmail.com> wrote:

I would just add that an observation that is ID'd as Lepidoptera right now, which doesn't appear in the collection project right now, will appear automatically in the collection project in the future if and when it is ultimately identified to a family or superfamily of moths in the project's criteria.

On Tuesday, June 19, 2018 at 5:28:38 AM UTC-6, GanCW wrote:

The biggest problem with collection project for moths is there are many moth observations which the observer will not know what family or even superfamily and as there is one one superfamily for moth, the observation will most likely be id as Lepidoptera and will not appear in the collection project. So the moth project will miss out many observations.

The only solution is to implement the exclude taxa option.

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[GanCW]

Your best bet now is to stick to the old project type and manually add them. That is what most moths projects are being handled. There are too many moths which most observers cannot even id to family level.

A batch add would be awesome. For now I manually scan lep observations and add them to project.