[Babase] Re: Enhancements to Ranker

kfenn kfenn at princeton.edu
Tue Jan 8 11:43:22 EST 2008


> I think it is definitely the case that the old ranker loaded them in 
> the previous months rank order.  As I have never needed to actually 
> create matrices, Susan, Tabby, do either of you have any input on 
> whether it would be better to have it automatically load previous 
> rankings, or to load alphabetically and then have the explicit step to 
> ask it to order the individuals according to the previous months 
> ranking?  From what I know of the process, I don't forsee there ever 
> being a time when we won't want the matrices ordered according to the 
> previous month's ranking, but like I said, I haven't run enough of 
> these myself to know whether those circumstances would present 
> themselves that we would want them listed alphabetically, or how much 
> it would slow down the process to have to reorder them each time.
I don't forsee a time when we would use the alphabetical listing for 
ranks.  However, if the program can run the extra step quickly, in 
theory, I don't have a problem with the initial alphabetical listing 
because 1)  it's a good reminder that we need to think about/specify the 
rank order that seeds that matrix  2)  there may be a time when its 
useful to run the matrix in alphabetical order for sname proofing purposes.

But I haven't used the program yet, so I reserve judgement.

>> Back to your example of NET. I think NET should shown as a column 
>> header even
>> though he didn't participate in any interaction, because the order of
>> column headers
>> is what determines the current ranking. If we omit NET from the
>> headers, we wouldn't
>> have any way to specify how NET is ranked relative to the others.
>>   
> This is totally true. My confusion was with the two different date 
> types, which created the issue of NET vs no NET. In the case that an 
> individual is in the group but doesn't interact (which is extremely 
> common) we definitely want his rank. We just don't want him in the 
> ranking if he isn't in the group at all.
I agree we don't want absent individuals to show up in a matrix as if 
they are present, but not interacting.  In old RANKER, new individuals 
showed up with an asterisk next to their snames.  I know females have 
dropped out of the matrix as they died, but I don't know what 
programming mechanism controlled this.  Was it simply that they had no 
interactions that month with ANYONE, or was there a check against the 
census table?  Karl, do you know?


Tabby

Tabby Fenn
Research Assistant

Dept of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
401 Guyot Hall
Princeton University
Princeton, NJ  08544

609 258-6898 (Ph)
609 258-2712 (Fx)



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