This page describes the scope, design, and processes for contributing to the Paleo Data Knowledge Hub.

This website is a hub designed to enable open access to information for anyone producing, managing, or utilizing paleontological specimen data. Ideally, the hub facilitates ongoing engagement and continuous knowledge sharing across stakeholder communities, in particular by hosting resources that are broadly relevant, and even adaptable to domains beyond paleo. All community users (e.g., you) are invited to engage as both information seekers and knowledge contributors. In the initial implementation of this knowledge hub (ongoing throughout 2025), content creation will focus deeply on the information needs of paleo collections professionals, and intro-level on the needs of paleo researchers using collections-based data.

This initial implementation was made possible in part by National Science Foundation awards 2324688, 2324689, and 2324690/2525603. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.

Scope

Narrative content on the Knowledge Hub is directly related to paleontological data, and is curated by subject matter experts. Relevant external resources are annotated and linked out to where appropriate. Notably, content related to the physical preparation and care of fossil specimens is out of scope for the Knowledge Hub, though potentially relevant to link out to.

Information architecture

Content in progress

Integration with Zenodo

Content on the Knowledge Hub is maintained as a living resource, and expected to evolve over time with contributions from multiple individuals. Contributors are noted for each page, but where authorship, citability, and/or intellectual control are important, content creators should publish their work independent from the Knowledge Hub. The site is designed to integrate with Zenodo for such publishing.

How to contribute

Feedback, content suggestions, content creation, and other contributions to the Paleo Data Knowledge Hub are welcome! An editorial board supported by PDWGPaleo Data Working Group. Community of practice centered around collections-based paleo and informatics professionals responds to user suggestions, solicits and edits new content, and maintains the scope and style of content included on the site. Pathways for contributing are described below.

Make a suggestion about any given page

Each page on the Knowledge Hub has metadataInformation describing data, e.g., who collected it, where, when, how. at the bottom of the content to let users know when the page was last updated, who has contributed to the content, and where to find the page source file. On the line that starts with “GitHub:” there is a link titled “Suggest a change to this page.” Click on this link to open a new GitHub issue seeded with information. Add your thoughts to the issue and submit! Please note that you must have a GitHub account to submit a GitHub issue; creating an account is free and fast.

File a GitHub issue to report a bug, request a feature, or suggest content

If you have a suggestion that isn’t directly related to a page, or you encounter a bug, filing an issue directly on GitHub is a better option. To do so, go to the GitHub repositoryInstitution or collection that houses and curates specimens. that hosts this site and navigate to the repository issues. Click on the green New issue button in the top right of the interface. Choose “Blank issue,” or select one of the following issue templates to be prompted for information that will help us respond: Bug report to let us know about bugs or other unexpected technical behaviors Content request to suggest content for the Knowledge Hub Feature request to suggest a feature for the Knowledge Hub site, like improved or new functionality in the interface Please note that you must have a GitHub account to submit a GitHub issue; creating an account is free and fast.

Edit content on GitHub and submit for review

If you want to make changes to content on the Knowledge Hub and you feel relatively comfortable with GitHub (or willing to learn), we encourage you to fork the Paleo Data Knowledge Hub repository, make changes, and submit a pull request. Pull requests are reviewed by individuals who volunteer to participate on an editorial board for the Knowledge Hub. The review process is informal but important.

To learn more about the technical process of forking and editing content on GitHub, see the repository’s readme. This readme provides directions for editing directly in your browser, or on a local copy of the site. It also contains information about formatting and templates to use when writing site content.

Participate in upcoming PDWG happy hour meetings

PDWG happy hourName of the regular meetings hosted by the Paleo Data Working Group meetings regularly focus on discussion that informs Knowledge Hub content, either directly or indirectly. Check the schedule to see upcoming topics, or suggest a future happy hour topic related to something you want to see added or updated on the Knowledge Hub.

Join the editorial board

This Knowledge Hub relies on a team of volunteer editors who facilitate suggestions from users, solicit and edit new content, and maintain the scope and style of content included on the site. Members of the editorial board have permissions to edit the site repository and are lightly overseen by the PDWG Organizing Team. If you are interested in joining the editorial board, we ask that you commit to being involved for one year, at minimum, and that you contribute to the site within three months of joining. In the interest of maintaining momentum, inactive members of the editorial board will have their permissions to the GitHub repository revoked.