TDWG Darwin Core Column Name Check 08-23-2022

check_dc_cols() checks to see if the column names in your dataframe match the standardized simple Darwin Core names established by the Taxonomic Databases Working Group

check_dc_cols(working_df)

Arguments

working_df

• This is the dataframe you want to run against the function. To call, simply write working_df = "the name of your dataframe".

Value

• The function returns a list of the column names you should fix (not fitting with simple Darwin Core terms, custom name formatting, data quality flagging formatting). Additionally, a small summary table is printed with the counts of the columns falling under each category (DarwinCore, Custom, DQ, Fix Me).

Details

A dataframe is created with all the simple DarwinCore terms, drawn from Darwin Core reference guide: https://dwc.tdwg.org/terms/ last updated 07-15-2021. We have chosen to align ourselves mostly with the simple Darwin Core rules: https://dwc.tdwg.org/simple/. The function runs through each of the column names in your working dataframe to see if they match 1. A standard simple DarwinCore name 2. A name with a pattern of strings matching "custom_", indicating a custom made column or 3. A name with a pattern of strings matching "_DQ", indicating a data quality flag. If the column name does not fit within any of the three categories, a "Fix me" statement is printed alongside the column name. The function then counts all of the names fitting within each category and prints a summary table.

Examples

if (FALSE) { # \dontrun{
check_dc_cols(yourdataframe)
} # }