The ahnentafel numbering systems works backwards in time, but numbering forwards in time is complicated, because a couple may have multiple children and should a spouse die the other one could remarry and have more children. Does anyone know of a failsafe numbering system running from ancestor towards descendent? Sent from my iPad John Ferman Minneapolis, MN

John, Failsafe as in no numbers ever getting duplicated? You can let your genealogy program assign unique numbers as you enter new people, but those numbers are basically meaningless unless you always enter families in a meaningful order. Most of us don't learn about people that way. New babies get born in families we already know about, etc. Different programs use different formats. Here's what my program, RootsMagic, provides. If I start with a given person and ask for a report of his or her descendants, that person is listed as roman numeral I. If they were married multiple times, the report lists the marriages in chronological order, and if I've asked to have the marriage dates included, it includes those dates. Under each spouse's name, it lists each child in chronological order, with an A., B., C., as many as are needed, in front of their name, and indents them each the same amount. I can control whether the spouse's name appears, (usually you'd want that) and the marriage date and place if you specify. Below each couple with indentations, their children are listed in order, and they are numbered with 1., 2., 3., as many as needed. I like to add spouses, because I want to know the children of each marriage. If there are any, they are indented again and shown as a., b.,, c., as many as needed. The next generation is indented yet again, and the children are given lower case Roman numerals—i., ii., iii., etc. This system allows for five generations so far, which is all I needed in the most recent report I produced. One small stickler was that the originating person had been married twice, with one child from the first marriage and three from the second marriage. This meant that under the first marriage, there was one child numbered A, and under the second marriage, an A, as well as B and C. There are numerous great grandchildren, but since the person labelled A from the second marriage had no children at all, each other person in the chart appears to have a unique identifier. However in general, in cases where someone was married twice, you couldn't count on unique identifiers. Nonetheless, I've seen this kind of numbering system used in, say, the New England Historic Genealogical Society's *Register*. Once you get used to reading a chart like this, it's not particularly confusing. On the other hand, my genealogical program, which happens to be RootsMagic, also will create a descendant report with a neat box around each person's name, indentations to show parental relationships, and lines to show how families are related to each other. It is a version of the top-down genealogical chart we're used to seeing in books, in more concise form. This one can be saved/printed in PDF format. Hope this clarifies things a bit. I am sure there are multiple other formats. Doris On Thu, Apr 30, 2015 at 8:05 PM, John Ferman via <norway@rootsweb.com> wrote: > The ahnentafel numbering systems works backwards in time, but numbering > forwards in time is complicated, because a couple may have multiple > children and should a spouse die the other one could remarry and have more > children. Does anyone know of a failsafe numbering system running from > ancestor towards descendent? > > Sent from my iPad > John Ferman > Minneapolis, MN > > > Norwaylist Archiveshttp:// > archiver.rootsweb.ancestry.com/th/index?list=norway > > RESUBSCRIBE UNSUB > http://lists.rootsweb.ancestry.com/index/intl/NOR/NORWAY.html > > guidelines http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~norway/guidelines.htm > ------------------------------- > To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to > NORWAY-request@rootsweb.com with the word 'unsubscribe' without the > quotes in the subject and the body of the message >

Hi Doris, What happens if you find that an early g...ggrandfather had another child who you just found out about? In entering that person will all succeeding people have their number automatically change? Just curious.:} All the best Barbara On 5/1/2015 3:57 AM, Dori s Waggoner via wrote: > John, > > Failsafe as in no numbers ever getting duplicated? You can let your > genealogy program assign unique numbers as you enter new people, but those > numbers are basically meaningless unless you always enter families in a > meaningful order. Most of us don't learn about people that way. New > babies get born in families we already know about, etc. > > Different programs use different formats. Here's what my program, > RootsMagic, provides. If I start with a given person and ask for a report > of his or her descendants, that person is listed as roman numeral I. If > they were married multiple times, the report lists the marriages in > chronological order, and if I've asked to have the marriage dates included, > it includes those dates. Under each spouse's name, it lists each child in > chronological order, with an A., B., C., as many as are needed, in front of > their name, and indents them each the same amount. I can control whether > the spouse's name appears, (usually you'd want that) and the marriage date > and place if you specify. Below each couple with indentations, their > children are listed in order, and they are numbered with 1., 2., 3., as > many as needed. I like to add spouses, because I want to know the children > of each marriage. If there are any, they are indented again and shown as > a., b.,, c., as many as needed. The next generation is indented yet again, > and the children are given lower case Roman numerals—i., ii., iii., etc. > This system allows for five generations so far, which is all I needed in > the most recent report I produced. One small stickler was that the > originating person had been married twice, with one child from the first > marriage and three from the second marriage. This meant that under the > first marriage, there was one child numbered A, and under the second > marriage, an A, as well as B and C. There are numerous great grandchildren, > but since the person labelled A from the second marriage had no children at > all, each other person in the chart appears to have a unique identifier. > However in general, in cases where someone was married twice, you couldn't > count on unique identifiers. Nonetheless, I've seen this kind of numbering > system used in, say, the New England Historic Genealogical Society's > *Register*. Once you get used to reading a chart like this, it's not > particularly confusing. > > On the other hand, my genealogical program, which happens to be RootsMagic, > also will create a descendant report with a neat box around each person's > name, indentations to show parental relationships, and lines to show how > families are related to each other. It is a version of the top-down > genealogical chart we're used to seeing in books, in more concise form. > This one can be saved/printed in PDF format. > > Hope this clarifies things a bit. I am sure there are multiple other > formats. > > Doris > > On Thu, Apr 30, 2015 at 8:05 PM, John Ferman via <norway@rootsweb.com> > wrote: > >> The ahnentafel numbering systems works backwards in time, but numbering >> forwards in time is complicated, because a couple may have multiple >> children and should a spouse die the other one could remarry and have more >> children. Does anyone know of a failsafe numbering system running from >> ancestor towards descendent? >> >> Sent from my iPad >> John Ferman >> Minneapolis, MN >> >> >> Norwaylist Archiveshttp:// >> archiver.rootsweb.ancestry.com/th/index?list=norway >> >> RESUBSCRIBE UNSUB >> http://lists.rootsweb.ancestry.com/index/intl/NOR/NORWAY.html >> >> guidelines http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~norway/guidelines.htm >> ------------------------------- >> To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to >> NORWAY-request@rootsweb.com with the word 'unsubscribe' without the >> quotes in the subject and the body of the message >> > Norwaylist Archiveshttp://archiver.rootsweb.ancestry.com/th/index?list=norway > > RESUBSCRIBE UNSUB > http://lists.rootsweb.ancestry.com/index/intl/NOR/NORWAY.html > > guidelines http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~norway/guidelines.htm > ------------------------------- > To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to NORWAY-request@rootsweb.com with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message