Online Cortex Thoughts on Science and Technology

BBC released a video showing flying Penguins migrating to the tropics.

You gotta love computer-generated imagery!

Kevin Knuth
Albany NY

Posted under Birds, Fun, animation

I have just submitted my first Google Gadget.
It is called Bird of the Day, and it simply presents a photo of a new bird species each day. The photo is a public domain image from Wikipedia, and I link back to it so that you can get more information.

Here it is:

You can put it on your iGoogle page by clicking here…

I am going to write a few other versions that will complement my BirdPlanner.com site. The first will be a modification of the above where the user can enter their latitude and longitude to get birds that are present in that locale. That way people can prepare for their birdwatching trips.

I will also try writing one which is a Bird Identification Quiz. It will be a multiple choice quiz. I can vary the difficulty by sampling from birds of the same genus, from the same family, or from the whole set of birds.

This is a fun way for me to become familiar with the computational technology. The google gadget is just an XML file. The tag <Module> identifies it as a Google Gadget.

The remaining XML has three parts:

1. <ModulePrefs>, which encodes the properties of the gadget.
2. <UserPref>, which encodes the user information.
3. <Content>, which encodes the content.

My gadget is pretty straightforward.  There are no User Preferences, so I just have the first and last sections. 

You can look at the xml code here.  You will see that the workhorse of the content section is a php file that emits an html file.  In this case the gadget simply holds a simple web page.

In the future, I will write more details about how all of this works.

Kevin Knuth
Albany NY

Posted under Biology, Birds, Coding, Gadgets, Inventions, Software

I am pleased to publicly announce the launch of BirdPlanner.com

I have been working on this project for one year now, and it is now ready for public consumption.  The site enables bird watchers and ecotourists to create a list of the birds that live at any location in the Western Hemisphere.  If you are travelling and want a general idea of what birds you might be able to see, this site will do just that.

I currently consider a region size of 0.5 degree latitude and longitude, which corresponds to about 20 mile radius on the equator.  I will be expanding the range to about a 60 mile radius to account for regions where there are abrupt changes in habitat.  In addition, a 60 mile radius would still correspond to driving distance.

I came up with this idea in February 2007 when my wife and I travelled to Ecuador.  I spend about 2 weeks digging through field guides to get some idea of what birds I might find.  Now, you can get this information in seconds!

This site is absolutely free… and will stay free.
For this reason, if you find it useful, please consider either a donation or purchasing a field guide via one of the links.  I will use the proceeds to keep this site alive and improve it.

At this point the errors run at about 10%.  I will continue to work to reduce any errors that are found.  The ordering currently follows Sibley and Monroe.  I will be adding an option for the American Ornithological Union ordering in the near future.  I also plan to highlight the selected region on the Google map, but I am having trouble with this.  Last, some migratory birds and newly separated species are not represented in all regions where they are present.  I’d like to be able to keep up with this as well. 

I have data for all of the mammals of the Western Hemisphere, and I’d like to add that as well.  Last, I would love to extend this to the entire world.  If you have any ideas on how to do this efficiently, or where to get data, please let me know!

Please try out BirdPlanner.com.
Use BirdPlanner.com to plan your trips.
Spread the word about BirdPlanner.com
Link to BirdPlanner.com on your webpages!

I single-handedly built this entire website from scratch and I’d love to see people use this!

Enjoy,
Kevin Knuth
Albany NY

Posted under Birds, Ecology, Solutions, Wildlife

I recently learned of the project called “Encyclopedia of Life“, which endeavors to create an online encyclopedia featuring every known life form on Earth.  From what I can see, this is going to be done in an open access manner.

Sample pages exist for the following organisms:

Death Cap Mushroom    (Amanita Phalloides)
Rice   (Oryza Sativa)
Yeti Crab   (Kiwa Hirsuta)

and come in three flavors

Polar Bear   (Ursus Maritimus) : Novice Users
Polar Bear   (Ursus Maritimus) : Expert Users
Polar Bear   (Ursus Maritimus) : Biodiversity Heritage Library

I can’t wait!

Kevin Knuth
Albany NY

Posted under Biology, Birds, Climate, Exploration, Green, Internet, Wildlife

Ornithologists Alexander Cortés-Diago and Luis Alfonso Ortega recently announced the discovery of a new hummingbird in the cloud forests in the Serrania del Pinche in south-west Colombia.  The bird was sighted three times during surveys of the region in 2005. 

Surveys in 2006 yielded photographs of the bird, which enabled scientists at the International Bird Conservation/Zoological Research Museum in Germany to identify the bird as a new species.

The hummingbird, which has been named the Gorgeted Puffleg Eriocnemis isabellae, is named for the iridescent throat patch (after gorget which was a crescent-shaped piece of ornamental armor worn around the neck) and the puffy feathers around its legs. 

Currently Serrania del Pinche, the habitat of the Gorgeted Puffleg, is unprotected and is being threatened by slash-and-burn agriculutre and growing coca fields. 

Kevin Knuth
Albany NY

Posted under Birds, Wildlife