Family Historian User Group

The Excel routines were useful for tidying and converting my own tree, which was originally developed in Family Tree Maker , which has a more traditional "database" approach that doesn't work well in FH due to fundamental limitations of GEDCOM . It was based on older routines that I used with FTM to...

Not all packages use the Living flag the same way. I have many examples in my Ancestry tree where the Living flag has been set automatically when no death date was specified, even if birth was over 200 years ago!! Not sure if the bug is with Ancestry or RootsMagic, which I use as a “helper” applicat...

I’ve always been scared of losing activation codes and the like, so I generally have up to three copies, as appropriate for the original media: 1. E-mails containing user names and/or activation codes are filed by supplier, with the PST files backed up both locally and in the cloud. 2. A simple spre...

Indeed - my images are solely for personal use or sharing with immediate family, and I never republish elsewhere. I can see how this arises - there is a world of difference between a non-exclusive permission to use and reassigning copyright ownership. The company I used to work for always retained o...

One advantage of putting the source citation in the metadata is that it doesn’t have to be modified to accommodate limitations in file names. For example, RG10/1234 folio 56 p7 is perfectly acceptable in metadata but not as a filename.

I have been experimenting with using the Windows 10 default photos app to "improve" the appearance of source images when presented in reports or other printed material. It's fairly simple to do any of the following (and certainly quicker than in a more complex program such as Photoshop Elements) Cro...

Remember though that every time you create an updated import to Ancestry, it regards it as a new tree, so all your old hints come back again. To avoid this, you have to either keep Ancestry updated in parallel (a pain) or explore the rather convoluted options of merging records via RootsMagic. Unfor...

Rosina, can you give a bit more information about what form these records are in please? A lot will depend on how they are structured today - organised spreadsheet table or a collection of arbitrary documents...? If you have already incorporated the data, what did you use as source citations, or are...

I think we are sorted now, thanks to all for testing and inputs. Trial and error experimenting and a bit of internet research gave me the following: The key difference between what worked and what didn't was the Windows path and filename . Back-slashes do not routinely need escaping in Python, but d...

Thanks for that. I have a hypothesis that I would like to test, please. Attached is a modified script file, plus a copy of the Family Historian Sample Project.ged data file. Could you please save both of these directly to a C:\Python\Data folder, and run directly from the command line (without any m...

Apologies if I’m stating the obvious, but until you are sure the modified script is doing what you expected, it is always prudent to work with a copy of your database, not the original. I found it convenient to create a C:\Python\Data folder and copy my GEDCOM file there. Send output to the same fol...

David - two things spring to mind: 1. Your print statements are not correct. In modern versions of Python (i.e. 3.x), print() is a function with the variables or literals to be printed in parentheses - see other examples in the script. If you want to confirm the file names, simply put what you want ...

Python script attached. Modifying it to use your own filenames and/or list of tags is simply a matter of changing the lines indicated within the file. In my experience, Python is relatively easy to read, so if you have any previous experience of other languages it should be possible to work out what...

Indeed - it is a free download and easy to install. If you take the option to add the Python folder to the Windows path, it can be run from the command line with just the name of the script file as an argument. In this case, py D:\OneDrive\Documents\Python\FH2Ancestry.py Put this line in a batch fil...

Worth updating with my experiences so far - If you are exporting a subset of your data, it is vital that you are consistent in what you save, to avoid any new or missing fields being interpreted as new information. I have very specific requirements for my Ancestry copy, just Individuals and Families...

One key difference between FH and RootsMagic is that the latter does not permit unnamed individuals, whereas FH does. There appears to be a bug within RootsMagic whereby a GEDCOM import containing such entries succeeds without raising any error flags, but it is then virtually impossible to edit the ...

I’m happy this approach works in principle, so I’ll start using it for real and report back later how I get on.

First impressions playing with RootsMagic are quite positive. Its Ancestry integration works well, and it is actually easier to review Ancestry hints within RootsMagic rather than on the Ancestry site or via their iPad app as more relevant information is displayed on-screen at once. I reject all hin...

Thanks Mike. I find the main benefit of hints to be the more obscure references it can produce, so they are worth persevering with for that reason alone, not just the "obvious" gaps in census and BMD data that can be readily searched on other sites. I'll experiment with maintaining the simplified tr...

Thanks Helen - I was afraid that would be the answer... :( A better technique might be to load a series of sub-trees, so the focus can be on individual branches rather than the scatter-gun of all records. I'm thinking perhaps one tree for each grandparent plus recent non-living family, so five in to...

I have uploaded a simplified copy of my FH tree to Ancestry to exploit their automatic hints (which despite the obvious limitations, do occasionally come up with genuinely new information as new record sets are released). I'm not clear about the best way of sustaining this in the future as my FH dat...

There is a variant of this that works well for me on a desktop PC that I built back in 2011 with a relatively small SSD system disk (C:\ drive) and large mechanical hard disk data drive (D:\). It takes slightly more initial setting up, but is then completely transparent in operation. My OneDrive fol...

Indeed - there are an infinite number of ways to do this. I prefer my image files to useful outside FH as well, so generally include sufficient information that it is easily found and unambiguous what it refers to, but if you only ever access them via FH citations, a minimalist approach has its bene...

Couple of other points to consider as well - Always use the original image alongside the transcript - commercial sites create their transcripts in parts of the world where labour is cheap, and the transcribers’ knowledge of UK geography can leave a lot to be desired! Names also get mashed up, partic...

Thanks again Mike - another useful function in FH to study and take on board...! I think I need to experiment to get the best presentation in reports, but it is certainly more logical with my use of Occupation as a single summary field to position it alongside other such fields and not mixed in amon...