International Union of Speleology
Informatics Commission

Speleological Subject Classification Scheme
Introduction

Updated: 2023-04-30

This is the Speleological Subject Classification (SSC) scheme being used by the UIS Informatics Commission (UISIC) originally to enable the categorisation and grouping of cave- and karst-related data fields, pending the possible introduction of a comprehensive UIS Speleological Subject Classification scheme. It has now also been used to classify concepts in the UIS Caver's Multi-lingual Dictionary.

It is a simple expansion of the existing scheme published by the UIS Bibliography Commission in No. 32 of its Speleological Abstracts. It has been created solely by adding further detail, and in some cases adding extra words to a classification for better clarity when the term is to be used stand-alone. Hence it remains compatible with the SA scheme. The Speleo Abstracts scheme becomes in effect a sub-set of this scheme.

In addition to the extensions included here, further subdivision of the topics will eventually be needed to cater in more detail for data fields used by scientific workers in the various aspects of speleological study. If other speleo subject schemes exist, then the data fields can be classified according to them also. Fields can also be given several classifications from the same scheme when necessary. If only one classification is allowed, and a field relates to several sub-classifications under the one parent, then the parent classification should be used.

Many fields could well take several classifications, but to simplify the UISIC Field List, only one has been chosen. The classification chosen has been based not on the entity the field belongs to, but on the main aspect that the field is describing. For example, the map field [Map controller person ID] has three subjects - maps, access to them, and it's actually an ID. However it has not been classified under maps (you already know it's related to maps), nor under identifications, but under the main aspect of the field, namely, access restrictions 6.3.

Note that the purpose of the scheme shown here was solely for classifying cave/karst-related data fields, although the notes related to bibliographic classification have been retained for completeness. Notes that are specific only to Fields, or to Bibliography, have been identified by F: or B: respectively.

Although the scheme shown has been arrived at by classifying over 600 cave/karst fields so far, it still has some areas of difficulty, and constructive comment or further suggestions are welcome.

Rules:

To enable its continued use with data fields, the following simple rules should guide any further development of the SSC scheme:

1. Any topic is allowed to be divided into not more than 10 sub-topics at the one level. Hence each sub-topic can always be represented by a single digit code (0-9). A compact reference string which consists solely of digits will therefore remain unambiguous as to the sub-classification intended.
2. Two of the codes are to retain the following consistent meanings:
   0 - General: Matters which could apply to all or several classifications under the parent classification.
   9 - Other: Specific topics which fall under the parent topic but which are not covered by any of the existing topics at that level.
3. If only one classification is allowed, and a field relates to several sub-classifications under the one parent, then the parent classification should be used.
4. The maximum depth of subdivision allowed is up to 8 levels, e.g. 1.2.4.2.8.4.1.7