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| Term | Definition | |
|---|---|---|
| Electronic key | An electronic key takes advantage of a database to facilitate the identification of an unknown plant to family, genus, or species. Electronic keys generally consist of four boxes as follows: (1) characters and character states upper left hand box), (2) taxa included in the keys, e.g., all of the genera, species, and infraspecific taxa in a plant family or all of the taxa in a Flora (upper right hand box). As choices are made species that do not have given characters are eliminated and appear in the lower right hand box, 3) all of the characters and character states that have been used while progressing through the key (lower left hand box), and 4) all of the taxa that have been rejected as a possible determination (lower right hand box). The advantages of electronic keys are 1) the key can entered no matter what characters are present in the plant being identified, 2) links can be made to electronic glossarys so the meaning of the characters can be understood by consulting their definations and seeing illustrations of them, 3) links can be made to family, generic, and species pages to confirm or reject determinatiions, and 4) a determination is always reached which ideally is a single taxon but if more than one taxon, the possibilities can be accepted or rejected based on viewing the taxon pages. |  |