Nick Matthews wrote: > I will be adding GEDCOM export/import for transfer to/from other programs, but I > am not anticipating "round trip" accuracy, the idea will be to create a > new database from a GEDCOM file and then attach it to your working > database. Doesn't this give you problems? You've designed the database to make a distinction between the personae of original records and the conclusions reached from them. GEDCOM, AFAIK, makes no such distinction. So are you going to export just one of these categories or both? How are you going to tell the recipient? And, most difficult of all, where are you going to import a GEDCOM received from someone else? -- Ian The Hotmail address is my spam-bin. Real mail address is iang at austonley org uk

On 22/05/2011 10:34, Ian Goddard wrote: > Nick Matthews wrote: >> I will be adding GEDCOM export/import for transfer to/from other programs, but I >> am not anticipating "round trip" accuracy, the idea will be to create a >> new database from a GEDCOM file and then attach it to your working >> database. > > Doesn't this give you problems? You've designed the database to make a > distinction between the personae of original records and the conclusions > reached from them. GEDCOM, AFAIK, makes no such distinction. So are > you going to export just one of these categories or both? How are you > going to tell the recipient? And, most difficult of all, where are you > going to import a GEDCOM received from someone else? > There's two ways of looking at this, firstly the program will allow you to enter family trees in the same way as any other program, "conclusion first" and add the supporting evidence later, or secondly, the GEDCOM file is also a "reference document" like any other and is, in itself, evidence. You may take the first approach if you are using a GEDCOM as the start of a new database, whilst the second would be useful if you just want add parts of someone else's tree. A quick note on reference documents, ideally they would fit on a single sheet of paper. Whilst there's no actual limit on size, if the document is large the user should consider creating a summary to work from or breaking it down into extracts. It shouldn't be shouldn't be too difficult for program to automatically break a gedcom down to manageable bits, the user can then select which bits they want to copy across to their database. Nick

On May 22, 10:34 am, Ian Goddard <[email protected]> wrote: > Nick Matthews wrote: > > I will be adding GEDCOM export/import for transfer to/from other programs, but I > > am not anticipating "round trip" accuracy, the idea will be to create a > > new database from a GEDCOM file and then attach it to your working > > database. > > Doesn't this give you problems?  You've designed the database to make a > distinction between the personae of original records and the conclusions > reached from them.  GEDCOM, AFAIK, makes no such distinction.  So are > you going to export just one of these categories or both?  How are you > going to tell the recipient?  And, most difficult of all, where are you > going to import a GEDCOM received from someone else? I guess you support both types of import (and export), and rely on out- of-band information -- i.e. information supplied with the GEDCOM file, but not in it -- to state which type of import is required. If I've downloaded a list of, say, IGI entries from FamilySearch.org, I probably have them in GEDCOM, and they're very definitely of the former type: each INDI is a persona. But if someone gives me a GEDCOM of their family, then this will be the latter type: each INDI really is a unique person, the result of merging many personae. Given that GEDCOM is, and, pragmatically, is likely to remain for some time, the most standard means of exchanging genealogical information, the ability to import and export both forms seems likely to be useful. If it were acceptable to move outside strictly-compliant GEDCOM, then maybe either a FORM value other than LINEAGE-LINKED, or a sub-tag to the FORM tag could be used to state which model is intended. Richard