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A Database for Agroecological Research Data: II. A Relational Implementation

DLO-Inst. for Agrobiology and Soil Fertility, P.O. Box 14, 6700 AA Wageningen, the Netherlands
Escuela de Agric. de la Región Tropical Húmeda (EARTH), Las Mercédes, Costa Rica

Scott D. Krieger and John V. Carlis

Dep. of Computer Science, Univ. of Minnesota, 4-192 EE/CSci Building, 200 Union St. SE, Minneapolis, MN 55455

John M. Baker

USDA-ARS, Univ. of Minnesota, 439 Borlaug Hall, 1991 Upper Buford Circle, St. Paul, MN 55108

^* Corresponding author author (f.k.vanevert{at}ab.dlo.nl).

With the goal of creating a generally applicable database for agroecological research data, we developed and described a data model. The objective of the present work was to determine the practical usefulness of a database implemented from that data model. We used a commercially available relational database management system and mapped the entities of the logical data structure to tables, entity attributes to table columns, and entity relationships to foreign keys. The attributes of the entity representing measurement values were distributed over two tables, both to reduce the size of the database and to reduce the response time of queries involving this entity. We found that loading data into the database was the most significant hurdle to its use, and so developed a set of stored procedures that function as a data input language. The input language and other methods were used to load the data from an intensively monitored, multisite, multiyear experiment into the database. The database was used to manage, explore, and analyze the data from these experiments, as well as to share the data between collaborators and with others in an effective way. We conclude that a database implemented from the previously designed data model is a practical and extremely useful tool for research.

Received for publication March 30, 1998.

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