Bob Velke wrote: > Tony Proctor said: > >> Although there are several genealogical bodies around, I'm not aware >> of any >> that have taken this initiative [to design a data model], or feel any >> need to. > > The "Genealogical Data Model" (GDM) was started by GENTECH, The data model of genealogy, t least up to about 10 years ago, weas very simple. Every person had exactly one mother and one father. Period. (Today a baby can have two mothers, five years from now, a total of 47 parents, 46 chromosomes and the mitochondria, but we won't worry about that.) That's a very simple data model. You have people, and you have that relationship. That's what genealogy is. Then you can accrete tons of data on top of it. Once you accrete, there is one clear fact: there simply is no "data model". There is no way to pre-guess every possible data connection between the main items, which remain the individual and their parents. You can accrete "relations" between genealogically unrelated people. No one can ever make a "standard" to encompass all this. Doug McDonald