On Tue, 24 May 2011 13:26:52 -0700 (PDT), Tom Wetmore <[email protected]> wrote: >The question I am trying to get to in this thread, is how are you going >to handle that evidence, a link to an external something or other in >this case, when you don't yet know what person should link to it? And that's where I find programs like askSam useful. I put such evidence in there, and when I find a person that I think the evidence might link to, it's easy to find the evidence again to check. One example is gravestones. When I visit a cemetery where families I'm interested are buried, I take photos of gravestones of persons I know are related, and those with the same surname that I don't know are related. I then put them into askSam, and also transcribe the inscription (as much of it as I can read), and also put in fields of name, place, and date of death/burial Then if I find another piece of evidence that links that one to someone in my database, it is quite easy to find, and I have a photo of the original gravestone to refer to. The entry form looks something like this: Surname[ First_Names[ Death_Date[ Burial_Date[ Cemetery[ Place[ Prov/County[ Country[ Date_Entered[ ^D Inscription[ ] Picture[ ] Notes[ ] Research[ ] Other_Sources[ ] The fields with a closing square bracket on the following line are multi-line fields, like memo fields in MS Access. By default askSam will search for any word or phrase in any field, though you can restrict searches by using the usual Boolean arguments. It can produce formatted reports based on any combination of fields, like this: Index of monumental inscriptions Burnard, Magdalena M.C. Died 10 Dec 1906 Stellenbosch, Western Cape Burnard, Sibella Margaretha Died 5 Aug 1949 Stellenbosch, Western Cape Coppin, Rebecca Died 22 Jan 1893 Cardinham, Cornwall Hannan, Thomas Died 4 Oct 1890 Girvan, Ayrshire Hayes, Albert Edward Died 7 Sep 1931 Bristol, Hayes, James Died 16 Aug 1943 Axbridge, Somerset Hayes, John Died 10 Jul 1912 Axbridge, Somerset Raw, Donovan Died 14 Nov 1944 Lidgetton, Natal Raw, Leonard Crick Died 29 Mar 1963 Lidgetton, Natal Raw, Lynda Died 19 Nov 1977 Lidgetton, Natal Raw, Margaret Amy Died 24 Nov 1867 Lidgetton, Natal Raw, William George Died 7 Nov 1956 Lidgetton, Natal Riddle, George Died 29 Nov 1878 Cardinham, Cornwall Riddle, Mary Elizabeth Died 20 Sep 1858 Cardinham, Cornwall Riddle, William Died 23 Apr 1848 Cardinham, Cornwall Riddle, William Died 2 Oct 1854 Cardinham, Cornwall Sandercock, Charlotte Died 11 Feb 1880 Cardinham, Cornwall Sandercock, Henry Died 16 Jan 1887 Cardinham, Cornwall Sandercock, William Died 24 Nov 1786 Cardinham, Cornwall Stooke, Edmund Died Oct 1860 Ashton, Devon Tribelhorn, Johannes Jacobus Ferdinand Died 8 Jan 1968 Stellenbosch, Western Cape ______________ Printed 25 May 2011 (the columns don't match when imported into Usenet). Click on any line and you are taken to the original record to check, edit or annotate. In that case, the Riddle ones in Cardinham, Cornwall, were ones I did not know were related, but if I find other evidence that might link to Riddles, it is easy enough to find these ones. In some cases the date of death on a gravestone differs from the date of death on a death certificate or other record. In a lineage-linked genealogy program you usually have one field for recording your conclusion, which is the correct date. But recording the evidence separately means you can change it if fresh evidence turns up giving you reason to revise your conclusion. If I understood your question correctly, I think this answers it. -- Steve Hayes from Tshwane, South Africa Web: http://hayesfam.bravehost.com/stevesig.htm Blog: http://methodius.blogspot.com E-mail - see web page, or parse: shayes at dunelm full stop org full stop uk

On Tuesday, May 24, 2011 11:29:17 PM UTC-4, Steve Hayes wrote: > On Tue, 24 May 2011 13:26:52 -0700 (PDT), Tom Wetmore <[email protected]> > wrote: > > >The question I am trying to get to in this thread, is how are you going > >to handle that evidence, a link to an external something or other in > >this case, when you don't yet know what person should link to it? > > And that's where I find programs like askSam useful. > > I put such evidence in there, and when I find a person that I think the > evidence might link to, it's easy to find the evidence again to check. > > One example is gravestones. > > When I visit a cemetery where families I'm interested are buried, I take > photos of gravestones of persons I know are related, and those with the same > surname that I don't know are related. I then put them into askSam, and also > transcribe the inscription (as much of it as I can read), and also put in > fields of name, place, and date of death/burial > > Then if I find another piece of evidence that links that one to someone in my > database, it is quite easy to find, and I have a photo of the original > gravestone to refer to. > > The entry form looks something like this: > > Surname[ > First_Names[ > Death_Date[ > Burial_Date[ > Cemetery[ > Place[ > Prov/County[ > Country[ > Date_Entered[ ^D > Inscription[ > ] > Picture[ > ] > Notes[ > ] > Research[ > ] > Other_Sources[ > ] > > The fields with a closing square bracket on the following line are multi-line > fields, like memo fields in MS Access. > > By default askSam will search for any word or phrase in any field, though you > can restrict searches by using the usual Boolean arguments. > > It can produce formatted reports based on any combination of fields, like > this: > > Index of monumental inscriptions > > Burnard, Magdalena M.C. Died 10 Dec 1906 Stellenbosch, Western > Cape > Burnard, Sibella Margaretha Died 5 Aug 1949 Stellenbosch, Western > Cape > Coppin, Rebecca Died 22 Jan 1893 Cardinham, Cornwall > Hannan, Thomas Died 4 Oct 1890 Girvan, Ayrshire > Hayes, Albert Edward Died 7 Sep 1931 Bristol, > Hayes, James Died 16 Aug 1943 Axbridge, Somerset > Hayes, John Died 10 Jul 1912 Axbridge, Somerset > Raw, Donovan Died 14 Nov 1944 Lidgetton, Natal > Raw, Leonard Crick Died 29 Mar 1963 Lidgetton, Natal > Raw, Lynda Died 19 Nov 1977 Lidgetton, Natal > Raw, Margaret Amy Died 24 Nov 1867 Lidgetton, Natal > Raw, William George Died 7 Nov 1956 Lidgetton, Natal > Riddle, George Died 29 Nov 1878 Cardinham, Cornwall > Riddle, Mary Elizabeth Died 20 Sep 1858 Cardinham, Cornwall > Riddle, William Died 23 Apr 1848 Cardinham, Cornwall > Riddle, William Died 2 Oct 1854 Cardinham, Cornwall > Sandercock, Charlotte Died 11 Feb 1880 Cardinham, Cornwall > Sandercock, Henry Died 16 Jan 1887 Cardinham, Cornwall > Sandercock, William Died 24 Nov 1786 Cardinham, Cornwall > Stooke, Edmund Died Oct 1860 Ashton, Devon > Tribelhorn, Johannes Jacobus Ferdinand Died 8 Jan 1968 Stellenbosch, > Western Cape > ______________ > Printed 25 May 2011 > > (the columns don't match when imported into Usenet). Click on any line and you > are taken to the original record to check, edit or annotate. > > In that case, the Riddle ones in Cardinham, Cornwall, were ones I did not know > were related, but if I find other evidence that might link to Riddles, it is > easy enough to find these ones. > > In some cases the date of death on a gravestone differs from the date of death > on a death certificate or other record. In a lineage-linked genealogy program > you usually have one field for recording your conclusion, which is the correct > date. But recording the evidence separately means you can change it if fresh > evidence turns up giving you reason to revise your conclusion. > > If I understood your question correctly, I think this answers it. > Steve Hayes from Tshwane, South Africa Steve, Given that a genealogical application does not support evidence it seems like askSam is almost ideal as the "second program" to handle evidence. I would sure like those askSam capabilities built into my genealogy app so I didn't have to move back and forth between two program. I might be naive, but I don't think it would be difficult to add the capabilities to a genealogy app. Every genealogy record can be viewed as a tree of structured name/value pairs (just think of any GEDCOM, XML, or jSON representation of anything you've seen before). If the askSam capability is that of allowing generalized searches over the values of these pairs, then this is a natural add-on feature for a genealogy app. My inclination is to use fairly strictly defined persona records to hold most codified evidence, but using the askSam approach it seems that much of the strictness could be removed, allowing "evidence records" to be just about anything the user desired, just as long as they were structured in such a way that askSam style searching could handle them. Tom