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Computers in Agriculture

An Automated Template Approach for Generating Web-Based Conservation Planning Worksheets

^a USDA-ARS, National Forage Seed Production Research Center, 3450 S.W. Campus Way, Corvallis, OR 97331
^b College of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sci., Oregon State Univ., Corvallis, OR 97331

^* Corresponding author (jjs{at}ars.usda.gov)

Received for publication May 12, 2005. An automated web-form generator system was created to rapidly produce dynamic web-based inventory and assessment worksheets that are used by the USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) to describe the condition of natural resources on farms and ranches. These worksheets are used by NRCS as part of the criteria for creating a conservation plan to qualify landowners for payments under the USDA Farm Bill Conservation Title. Presently, most worksheets are filled out by hand or in personal computer spreadsheets. If worksheets such as these were available over the web, landowners could also self-assess the conditions on their farms or ranches before requiring assistance of NRCS conservation planners or technical service providers. Because many conservation worksheets have a similar style and behavior, we created an automated web-script generator that produces a dynamic web-page worksheet from a common template file and a configuration file. A worksheet-specific configuration file provides the details for the worksheet. The template, configuration files, and web scripts are all in PHP (PHP hypertext processor). Each configuration file required approximately 5 h to program, a savings of more than 4 d compared with a web-based worksheet programmed individually with a scripting language. In this way, various conservation worksheets can be quickly created for the web, as well as be easily maintained. As an example, we produced a suite of assessment worksheets used by Oregon NRCS with our automated web-form conservation worksheet system. Those worksheets are accessible at: http://yukon.een.orst.edu/ms_apps/wq_indexes/forms/index_menu.html (verified 5 May 2006).

Abbreviations: N-index, nitrogen index • NRCS, United States Department of Agriculture, Natural Resources Conservation Service • PHP, PHP hypertext processor