[Babase] JA comments on documents sent by Catherine with Laura
Catherine Markham
amarkham at princeton.edu
Thu Dec 22 09:45:40 EST 2005
Hi all,
I'm forwarding this message to the list for archives. See Jeanne's
original note below; her documentation comments (originally a zipped
Word document) have been cut and pasted at the very end of this email.
Catherine
-------- Original Message --------
Subject: JA comments on documents sent by Catherine with Laura
Date: Thu, 22 Dec 2005 16:55:39 +0300
From: Amboseli Baboon Research Project <babsat at stratosnet.com>
To: Karl Pinc <kop at meme.com>, Catherine Markham
<amarkham at Princeton.EDU>, Susan Alberts <alberts at duke.edu>, Leah Gerber
<lgerber at duke.edu>
Hi all,
Many thanks for sending me the printouts Catherine; they were very helpful.
And thanks all for the obvious progress. Karl, apologies for this Word
document, zipped for the time being.
Catherine, would you send this in proper listserv format for posterity?
Thanks.
Karl et al, you will see that I have few things and about half of those
really refer to one issue (Mdate=Tdate). Unfortunately, there were 3
sentences that I just couldn't follow and evaluate; I have marked those in
BOLD for ease of finding them.
jeanne
*******
Jeanne's Comments:
Typos/small wording things (not many!) I’ll just bring back with me on
my marked hard copy. Other queries/comments follow:
Pocket Ref Guide
Table1.
Susan, is POINTS and FPOINTS correct?
ADLIBS—Susan, is this the correct name for what’s here?
Weather data: is there anything we do here that will hinder our
subsequently adding the Weatherhawk data?
Table2. Susan, is PALMTOPS the label you want?
Chapter2
2A; nothing
2B; nothing
2C; nothing
Chapter3
3A; nothing
3B; nothing
3C;
p.37: Tip/Caution—Wht happens if a gap occurs just after a Resumption,
i.e. there will be a Tdate but not a subsequent D for that cycle? Is the
Tdate retained? [you will see that a few of my queries relate to my not
being sure what is happening with partial cycles]
3D; CYCPOINTS.Code values—delete ‘the onset of’ from the description of B
3E; top p.44of 127: not true that ‘Sexskin turgescence begins after
menses’ (or even after onset of menses, which is all we record here),
and this fact is dealt with in a number of places subsequently. It is
possible that they occur on the same day.
3F; nothing
3G; top of p49 of 127: not true that ‘DEMOG contains one and only one
row for every individual for every date for every group where the
individual was noted present in the free for textual field notes’.
Sometimes the notes do not lead to a DEMOG entry. Also, if it is still
the case that an individual is not allowed to be in more than one group
on a single day, a decision is sometimes made by us as to where to
assign the individual, and I believe that a DEMOG entry may contain a
comment about and reference to free-form notes that mention the other
group.
Chapter4
4A bottom p.66 of 127, Warning: My understanding is that this refers
ONLY to live females; if so, that should be specified.
[note to JA& SCA re: this section and elsewhere, we will need to comment
in some introduction or notes that we chose the best short reproductive
terms that we could, rather than make up independent terms, but that
they can sometimes be misleading, e.g. the few post-reproductive females
appearing to continue ‘cycling’ or ‘lactational’.]
bottom p.68 of 127, Caution regarding simultaneous Mdate and Tdate: I’m
confused here. We allow for Mdate and Tdate to be the same date, as we
should (see note above). If that occurs, then CYCSTATS uses the Tdate,
which I understand. However, in what ways does this affect subsequent
calculations and possible queries, e.g. is this considered a missing
Mdate? What happens when MtoM intervals are calculated? Etc
[note probably just as bracketed one above: this means that adolescents
with small sexskin swellings and short turgescent phases during their
first few cycles will sometimes be considered as having only an
ovulatory phase and not a swelling phase when in fact they surely are
not ovulating, they just have a swelling phase; I DO NOT THINK WE SHOULD
CHANGE THIS SCORING, again we just need some good guide to the user]
p.69Note; the few cases of cycles ceasing are more variable than this,
or at least certainly can be. This does not change the coding, but here
and in subsequent relevant places (it comes up elsewhere) a change of
wording is needed, say from
‘will have a State of D and an unusually….’ to ‘may have a State of D
and an unusually…’.
MMINTERVALS (p.70 of 127); see my earlier query about Mdate=Tdate; what
happense to MMINTERVALS?
Note top p.71; ok? Also, how would this be affected by automated M date
generation?
MDINTERVALS (p.72 of 127): Again, what happens when Mdate=Tdate?
Note: ok? Again, does this allow for variability in the state at which
a female stops?
4B; (bottom of p.73 of 127): I’m confused by the last sentence (that
continues on next page).
4C; what will happen with this automatically generated Mdate if it is
=Tdate? And what will it affect (see related queries above).
I am confused by the second part of the first condition; can you clarify
it for me?
Chapter6; nothing
Chapter 7; nb: I felt most shaky with this chapter as I haven’t done
these tasks.
7C; Caution—ok, but if not used for updating, what is it used for?
7D; The second sentence seems to contradict the next one, and the next
one (‘Because….’) does not seem to be true—there is not a DEMOG row for
every CENSUS row is there? There is a CENSUS row for every DEMOG row,
however.
7E; I’m not clear on the last sentence before the Definition;
top p.114 of 127: Series—is CYCLES correct here? Should it be SERIES?
7F; bottom p.115 of 127, Table 7.4: again, in the Series row
descriptin, should CYCLES be SERIES?
Appendices B&C; nothing
THANKS!!!
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