code: def get_specs(self,data):
          
      # sort the specimen names
      #
  #        print "calling get_specs()"
          speclist=[]
          for rec in data:
            spec=rec["er_specimen_name"]
            if spec not in speclist:speclist.append(spec)
          speclist.sort()
          #print speclist
          return speclist
docs: takes a magic format file and returns a list of unique specimen names