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We describe two new species of Ctenocerinae (Pompilidae) from Asia, i.e., Ctenocerus srilankae Shimizu sp. nov. from Sri Lanka and Paraclavelia arabiae Shimizu sp. nov. from Oman. These represent the first records of Ctenocerus Dahlbom, 1845 and Paraclavelia Haupt, 1930 in Asia. Two new combinations and a new synonymy are proposed: Ctenocerus fasciatus (Smith, 1851) (= Micropteryx fasciata Smith, 1851); Paraclavelia decipiens (Arnold, 1932) (= Clavelia decipiens Arnold, 1932); and Ctenocerus Dahlbom, 1845 (= Euclavelia Arnold, 1932). We discuss the difficulty of systematics of Ctenocerinae at generic level. The head and pronotal structures of Ctenocerus and Paraclavelia are presumably specialized for preying on trapdoor spiders. These structures are considered to have evolved independently of other unrelated parasitoid Pompilidae that have been confirmed or proposed to prey on trapdoor spiders. We also discuss the biogeographical distribution of these genera.
Elusive flaws are identified in techniques widely adopted to organize the Material Examined sections in taxonomic publications, mostly regarding the usage of the term ibidem and the nesting of information such as country and states. Logical errors are identified that prevent objective retrieval of the original information and can hinder or block its interpretation, even in case-by-case analyses. It is demonstrated that the free usage of ibidem in the sense of “same as previous except as follows” compromises the interpretation of data, characterizing bad practice. Solutions are proposed for the precise usage of both the term ibidem and the nesting technique. A new technique for organizing, compressing, and presenting information, called grid-setting, is described and evaluated. Its most notable practical effect is that the Material Examined section becomes literally a coded data sheet, which can be accurately converted back to spreadsheet format. In addition, the grid-setting technique was able to generate texts up to 30% shorter than those edited with the best-known traditional techniques. The new ideas and fixes are incorporated into a new software, flexible enough to process varied and unlimited data into largely user-defined texts, which remain nevertheless universal in their format and logical interpretation.