GBIF

GBIF (Global Biodiversity Information Facility)

GBIF is a very powerful network and platform for specimen and observation data. Via the GBIF portal one can search for more than 322 million records worldwide. All required software packages are available for free. Please read the GBIF sites for more information. GBIF's most relevant tool in this context is the wrapper software. It enables the transformation of different database structures into standard formats.

- How to join the GBIF Network

- Informatics infrastructure

Wrappers/Provider Software

Three wrapper types are most often used:

- BioCASe (Biological Collection Access Service)

- DiGIR (Distributed Generic Information Retrieval)

- TAPIR (TWDG Access Protocol for Information Retrieval)

All provider softwares have pros and cons and use standard transfer schemes to exchange amongst others specimen and observation data stored in online accessible databases.

- BioCASe - ABCD Access to Biological Collection Data

- DiGIR and TAPIR - DarwinCore