The Glottolog Data Repository

The Glottolog data repository is the place where the data served by the Glottolog web application is curated. But the repository also provides an alternative way to access Glottolog's data locally, and possibly even locally customized by forking clld/glottolog.

Languoids

Data about Glottolog languoids (languages, dialects or sub-groups, aka families) is stored in text files (one per languoid) formatted as INI files. The directory tree mirrors the Glottolog classification of languages.

References

The Glottolog bibliography is curated as a set of BibTeX files, which are merged into a single reference database for each release/edition.

The python client library pyglottolog

The data in this repository can be conveniently accessed via a command line interface and a python API, both implemented in the python package pyglottolog, which is distributed as part of this repository.

Install

To install pyglottolog you need a python installation on your system, running python 2.7 or >3.4. Run

python setup.py develop

on the top level of this repository to install the requirements, pyglottolog and the command line interface glottolog.

CLI

Command line functionality is implemented via sub-commands of glottolog. The list of available sub-commands can be inspected running

$ glottolog --help
usage: glottolog [-h] [--verbosity VERBOSITY] [--log-level LOG_LEVEL]
                 [--repos REPOS]
                 command ...

Main command line interface of the pyglottolog package.

positional arguments:
  command               isobib | show | edit | create | bib | tree | newick |
                        index | check | metadata | refsearch | refindex |
                        langsearch | langindex | tree2lff | lff2tree
  args

optional arguments:
  -h, --help            show this help message and exit
  --verbosity VERBOSITY
                        increase output verbosity
  --log-level LOG_LEVEL
                        log level [ERROR|WARN|INFO|DEBUG]
  --repos REPOS         path to glottolog data repository

Use 'glottolog help <cmd>' to get help about individual commands.

Python API

Glottolog data can also be accessed programmatically from within python programs. All functionality is mediated through an instance of pyglottolog.api.Glottolog, e.g.

>>> from pyglottolog.api import Glottolog
>>> api = Glottolog('.')
>>> print(api)
<Glottolog repos v0.2-259-g27ac0ef at /.../glottolog>

Accessing languoid data

>>> api.languoid('stan1295')
<Language stan1295>
>>> print(api.languoid('stan1295'))
German [stan1295]

Accessing reference data

>>> print(api.bibfiles['hh.bib']['s:Karang:Tati-Harzani'])
@book{s:Karang:Tati-Harzani,
    author = {'Abd-al-'Ali Kārang},
    title = {Tāti va Harzani},
    publisher = {Tabriz: Tabriz University Press},
    address = {Tabriz},
    pages = {6+160},
    year = {1334 [1953]},
    glottolog_ref_id = {41999},
    hhtype = {grammar_sketch},
    inlg = {Farsi [pes]},
    lgcode = {Harzani [hrz]},
    macro_area = {Eurasia}
}