Yesterday we surpassed 30,000 dogs in our database.

Today I changed the ChessieDB URL from http://www.chessiedb.org/ to http://chessiedb.org/. Hopefully this won't cause any noticeable issues, except for having to enter your name and e-mail address again when submitting your next dog (previous values are recalled from a cookie, which is based on the URL hostname).

You may not have noticed, but there's "Donate" button on the left side menu. ChessieDB is free to use by anyone, but we do appreciate a little financial help on occasion. :-) A big thanks to those of you who've donated in the past.

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I've spent the last few days writing some new scripts to download and compare the Orthopedic Foundation for Animals (OFA) database entries. The OFA results will be updated monthly and saved under the OFA Resources Folder as CSV and ZIP files. Another script allows anyone to browse and compare the OFA results with our own database entries. The interface uses a sophisticated configuration file to define and manipulate CSV file content. In the future, this should allow us to verify and import a variety of CSV files from other organizations. The standard user interface highlights the differences between the CSV content and our database, while some admin features also allow us to manipulate and save those differences. I've already started to update our database (starting with 1974), but with over 15,000 entries in the OFA CSV files, it'll take some time to catchup. :-)

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We just passed the 25,000 record mark, thanks in large part to your submissions -- on the website, by e-mail, and even by postal mail. If you have some Chessie related documents laying around that you don't know what to do with, send us an e-mail for our shipping address. And if you're a breeder, photocopy those breeding records and send them to us! The more source material we have, the more accurate our database records will be -- for the benefit of everyone.

As usual, if you have any comments or suggestions for the website, send us an e-mail. I know everyone's been waiting for the Breeder / Owner contact database, but you'll have to be patient on that one -- it's still a few months out.

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I've been cleaning up some code, and at the same time decided to add some additional Inbreeding Analysis information to the Dog Info page, along with a few extra fields, like number of Offsprings and Cause of Death. The Cause of Death should be available shortly on the Update Info page. There have also been a number of minor tweeks to many of the other pages, including the use of all 4 of a dog's photos (thumbnail size) on the Pedigree page (for the first generation).

You may not have noticed, but there's "Donate" button on the left side menu. ChessieDB is free to use by anyone, but we do appreciate a little financial help on occasion. :-)

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Melanie has been taking care of the database for several months now. She's done a great job, but now that I'm working on the code again, I realize two issues have to be taken care of... The first is Carroll's Island. Most Chessie lines can be traced back to this island and gun club. Unfortunately many Carroll Island breeding and owner records were lost, and later registrations with the AKC created duplicate names, muddying the waters even more. To address these two issues, here's what I've done:

• Because Carroll's Island is so significant, and many lines can be traced back to it, I've added "Carroll's Island" to the list Registration Agencies. The search page has also been improved recently to allow searches on multiple fields, like the Registration Agency, so a search could be run to list all dogs from Carroll's Island. As Melanie and I find more information on these dogs, I hope to complete the Owner and Breeder fields, along with a few pertinent notes for each dog.

• In the late 1800s, Chessies were not registered with an official agency like the AKC. Consequently, many Chessie dog names were later accepted by the AKC, which had already been used on Carroll's Island. Even on the island itself, there are several duplicate names like Belle, Duck, Duke, Jack, Zip, etc. When duplicate names are found, the year it was born will be added in parenthesis after the name. For example, "Belle (1888)" and "Belle (1890)". If the year of birth is not known, then a numerical increment will be used, like "Boatswain (N1)", "Boatswain (N2)", etc.

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I'm working on a new database to manage breeder and owner contact information. This information will be displayed on the Dog's Info page. You can see an example on Donnett's Pepper Pete Info Page. Don't worry - e-mail addresses are encoded in javascript to protect them from harvesting. :-) If you've submitted a dog to our database, and identified yourself as it's breeder, you're name and e-mail address has been added to our breeder database. An online form will be available in the future to update your contact information. For now, if you find a dog has been attributed to you by error, send us an e-mail and we'll correct the problem. The search page will also be enhanced soon to search and display breeder contact information, including a list of dogs attributed to them.

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The ChessieDB has just reached a new milestone -- we have over 20,000 dogs in the exported database! Thank you to Melanie, who's been entering paper-based pedigrees donated by Janet Wilson, and everyone else submitting pedigrees online.

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I've added a new Pedigree stats line at the bottom of each pedigree page. Hopefully this will be useful as you work towards expanding your dogs pedigree. For example, when retrieving Donnett's Pepper Pete's 11 generation pedigree, the following stats are provided: 630 unique dogs out of 2035 listed, from a possible maximum of 2047 (12 dogs missing).

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To minimize confusion, I've changed the date format to yyyy/mm/dd. This applies to all dates on pedigree pages, as well as submission forms.

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A special thanks to Janet Wilson and Don Carter of Donnett's Kennels -- they have donated several boxes of pedigree information in the form of print-outs and various publications. Melanie will be entering these slowly over the next several months (and maybe even years).

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Tenset offers a FREE application called FSpeed to calculate inbreeding co-efficients (COI). You can download a special version of the ChessieDB for use with FSpeed. This archive is updated regularly and should contain the same dogs as our online database.

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All pedigree URLs can now be bookmarked. In the past a dog's record was tied to an index pointer, which could change as the database was modified. An index record ID number is still used, but a second check is performed to make sure the right dog is located. So, feel free to bookmark you dog's pedigree page.

Contact information in submission forms will now be validated through an automated e-mail process. When you submit or update a record, and use a new e-mail and/or IP address, an e-mail is sent with a URL to continue the submission process. Once validated, additional submissions will be accepted without this e-mail verification step (until your e-mail and/or IP address changes).

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