Wikipedia:WikiProject Palaeontology/Region fossil list tutorial

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
  1. Replace "?" in the taxon resolution columns with "tentative report".
  2. Replace "cf." in the taxon resolution columns with "or unidentified comparable form".
  3. Replace "aff." in the taxon resolution columns with "or unidentified related form".
  4. Replace """ in the taxon resolution columns with "report made of unidentified related form or using admittedly obsolete nomenclature".
  5. Replace "n. sp." in the taxon resolution columns with "type locality for species".
  6. Replace "n. gen." in the taxon resolution columns with "type locality for genus".
  7. Copy genus column.
  8. Copy species column.
  9. Arrange new genus column with one column separating it from new species column.
  10. Fill the cells of the blank cloumn with a single space apiece.
  11. Copy the new genus, space, and species columns and paste them into MS note pad as unformatted text.
  12. Copy the tab character padding the document out with extra space.
  13. Paste it in the find part of the find/replace dialogue and replace it with nothing.
  14. Replace the original species name column with the new list of binomials.
  15. Insert a column before the column of species binomials.
  16. Fill every cell in the new column with "** †''[[". (Don't use the dagger if most taxa are extant.)
  17. Insert new column before original genus column and fill every cell with "* †''[[" Don't use the dagger if most taxa are extant.)
  18. Add the contents of the species resolution column to the bottom of the genus resolution column.
  19. Add the contents of the double asterisked "** †''[[" column to the bottom of the single asterisked "* †''[[" column.
  20. Add the contents of the binomial column to the bottom of the original genus column.
  21. Insert a new column after the combined genus and binomial column.
  22. Fill each cell in the new column with "]]'' – ".
  23. Create a new column after the "]]'' – " column
  24. Move the column of combined taxonomic resolution data to the new column.
  25. Replace "sp." with nothing.
  26. Erase all informal species from the final list.