ATLAS FLORAE EUROPAEAE

Atlas Florae Europaeae Database

During the first thirty years of Atlas Florae Europaeae (AFE), the basic technology for the collection of distribution data and publication of distribution maps has remained practically unchanged. Manual map production as such is rather tedious. Furthermore, distribution data available only on printed maps are not suitable for further (computerized) analyses. The construction of the Atlas Florae Europaeae database was started in 1992. The primary goal was to make the distribution data available in digital format, and the additional goal was the computerization of the editorial process of AFE. The printed AFE distribution maps were processed this way:

So far all printed AFE volumes (1 to 12) have been processed this way.


ATLAS FLORAE EUROPAEAE 1999 - free software for map viewing

Plant distribution data in this product are based on the printed volumes 1 to 11 of Atlas Florae Europaeae (1972-1996), edited by Jaakko Jalas and Juha Suominen, together with Raino Lampinen (Vol. 11). At present the maps cover about 20% of the European vascular flora (pteridophytes to crucifers).

Please notice the following details when viewing the digital distribution maps:

How to install and use the software (available only for the 32-bit Windows95/Windows98/NT platforms):

  1. Download the self-extracting afesetup.exe (704,275 bytes).
  2. Run afesetup.exe program. The archive will expand and following files will be created: afe99.dot, afe99.emf, afe99.exe, afe99.tax, readme.txt
  3. Create a desktop shortcut for starting afe99.exe, or start the afe99.exe program from the Explorer.

Taxon selection screen

Map window

DISCLAIMER

There may still be errors in the distribution data shown on the digital maps, due to difficulties in the interpretation of certain scanned bitmaps. Please report all taxa with such erroneous data to:

Leo Junikka (leo.junikka@helsinki.fi )
Botanical Museum
Finnish Museum of Natural History
P.O.Box 7 (Unioninkatu 44)
FIN-00014 HELSINKI UNIVERSITY
FINLAND