Article: A deductive enquiry system for a palaeontological database of museum material

The use of database management systems for cataloguing museum material is becoming widespread. Recent advances in database management systems indicate that in future such systems will have a range of increased facilities, including deductive capabilities and natural language interfaces for casual enquiries. In order to explore some of the consequences of these developments for museum catalogues, a prototype system has been written and examples of its use demonstrated. These show that such systems will have significant research potential in a number of areas in geology in addition to taxonomy.