* Labels & Label Values or Notes - what is good gedcom

[stewartrb]

I have a Fact I call "Event".

Name: Event
Label: Event
Fact Set: Custom

Old Versions... No old versions found

I use it so I can record something taking place somewhere on a date.

{individual} {note}< {date}><, {place}><, {age}>.

It produces a sentence that looks like

"He purchased, with his brother Jan, 400 acres of land in Piscataway township, near Brunswick on 26 April 1709, in Middlesex County, New Jersey."

I imported many such Event facts as well.

Their sentence format is

{individual's} {label} was <'{value}'> {date} {place} {age}

Right now it produces a sentence that looks like

"His Event was 'purchased, with his brother Jan, 400 acres of land in Piscataway township, near Brunswick' on 26 April 1709 in Middlesex County, New Jersey."

I'm not sure which version is "standard," i.e. Good GedCom Practice.

It's not the only such old Fact that has info like this in the "value" of the "label".

A query (Fact, Value, Fact Owner 1, Fact Owner 2(default addition), Note) shows 8,575 non-null Values.

And in a few, very few, I also have a note pretty much repeating, but not always duplicating, the information.

And with the Result Set, I don't see that I can copy whole blocks of Values and Paste them over into the Notes spot.

A vast majority of these Facts appear to be Occupation, Physical Description, and mostly Title.

[tatewise]

This is the often misunderstood difference between the two GEDCOM fact types known as Event and Attribute. They both can have a Date, Age, Place, Address, Note, etc, BUT...

An Event such as Birth, Marriage, Census, and Death cannot (legally) have a value.

An Attribute such as Occupation, Physical Description, and Title can have a value to define the Occupation, Title, etc.

In Tools > Fact Types that type is in the Type column.

The Sentence Template code {value} and Query column Value only apply to Attributes.

You have clearly defined your custom Event fact as an Event whereas the imported Event has been treated by FH as an Attribute because it had a value.

The near duplication of Value and Note is almost certainly a side effect of the importing process and the (I suspect FTM) misuse of CONCatenation tags for long text lines. These are one of the many issues being addressed by the import Plugins and FH V6.1 under development. BTW: Are you using FH V6.0 or V6.1?

[stewartrb]

I am using 6.1.

I don't think it's FTM since I never used it long enough to do enough genealogy with it to warrant an export back out of it. TMG, RootsMagic, and Legacy, I did.

I am using Event as an Event, not an Attribute.

EVEN {EVENT}: =
A noteworthy happening related to an individual, a group, or an organization.

And I see that it's proper for the value to be part of an Attribute.

n DSCR <PHYSICAL_DESCRIPTION> {1:1}
+1 <<EVENT_DETAIL>> {0:1}

or

n TITL <NOBILITY_TYPE_TITLE> {1:1}
+1 <<EVENT_DETAIL>> {0:1}

The entries on the name line are the Value.

Just not on any Events:

n EVEN {1:1}
+1 <<EVENT_DETAIL>> {0:1}

I'm wanting to deploy a fix for this. (And move data now stored in the incorrect Value field over into the Note field.)

I think the plug-in you mention is going to help improve imports?

Too, each of those Event facts uses the old sentence template. I have a new template. How do I convert those "old style" Event facts into "new style" Event facts?

[tatewise]

Those GEDCOM quotes identify exactly the difference.
What you have defined in FH is an Event.
Unfortunately, the product you imported from put a Value on the Fact tag, so FH imported it as an Attribute.

I don't get too fussed about whether to use an Event or an Attribute.
If it benefits to have a the extra Value field then I use an Attribute.

If you don't like the Sentence Template structure then edit it to say something different.
You don't have to use the {label} code, so just use the same as your Event, but swap {value} for {note}:
{individual} {value}< {date}><, {place}><, {age}>

[stewartrb]

My current Event fact reads just like I want it too.

{individual} {note}< {date}><, {place}><, {age}>.

(Tools, Fact Types, selecting Event, Event, Custom, and Edit.)

All these outliers are legacy Events. And they are not reading like I want them too.

I believe I only have the ability to edit the current Event fact to my liking.

I don't have the ability to edit this old legacy Event fact anymore.

It does not appear under Old Versions on the current Fact Definition screen.

And it is maintaining a sentence structure I can't adjust anymore on a global basis: {individual's} {label} was <'{value}'> {date} {place} {age}

Screenshot

Capture.GIF (117.57 KiB) Viewed 7345 times

His Event was 'yada yada yada.' That's what I'm trying to fix.

It would be less of a problem if I could edit it's sentence structure.

[tatewise]

You can edit that Legacy Event Sentence Template as folows.

In Tools > Fact Types click Show Hidden on the right.

Click on the Fact Set column heading to bring <none> and Visible <undefined> to the top.
That should reveal your Legacy fact as Label Event and Type Attribute.
Select its Label and click Edit... then answer OK to the warning message and choose the Fact Set.

You can now create the Fact Definition as you did with your new custom Event.
Set the Sentence Template to whatever you prefer.

Repeat for any other <undefined> imported Legacy facts.

[stewartrb]

Found it.

I was warned about keeping the same name for both an Event and an Attribute, but did it anyway.

I'll be keeping the Event (Attr) (the value I gave the label) hidden so it won't appear anymore. And I've fixed the sentence so these Events will read like I want them to as well.

I do see I have many more of these double Facts, which are both Event and Attribute.

I have an Inventory (post death) Fact that is both Event and Attribute. IPM which is both.

I have a fact called Living that is both 2 Events and 1 Attribute. I have a custom fact called (Label = and Name = ) "a Relation" that is both an Attribute, and 2 Events.

Ultimately I'd like to clean up my data (much like I cleaned up the UDFs) and have my custom "Event" fact be defined as a single Event Fact, and otherwise recover all the data I have in the Attribute version of the Fact into the Event version of the Fact that I'll keep.

For the time being, I know what the deal is and how to handle it.

Thanks.

[tatewise]

The Change Any Fact Tag Plugin is ideally suited to changing custom facts from one to another, or to a standard fact.

But changing an Attribute with a Value into an Event (without a Value) is a challenge, so the Plugin puts the Value in a Source Note.

The best option is to change Events into Attributes even if they are not strictly Attributes. For all practical purposes there is no difference apart from the Value.

Alternatively, move every Attribute Value into its Note field, then the Plugin will never encounter a problem.

After all the various facts have been changed, then the redundant Fact Type definitions can be deleted.

[stewartrb]

"Alternatively, move every Attribute Value into its Note field, then the Plugin will never encounter a problem."

That's the trick. It seems I'd have to go through my database record by record catching these all.

I have a read-only list of them via Query. Using the Result Set doesn't allow me to cut the data in the Value column and paste it into the Note column.

The Change Any Fact Tag plugin puts the Attribute value into a SOURce Note.

(When you use SOUR I'm assuming you mean a Source Record?)

Could I reprogram the plugin to move the value into the Note field instead?

[tatewise]

No, Source Note means what it says, and not a Source record.

Modifying the Plugin might be possible but quite tricky.

Probably easier if I wrote a little Plugin for you that moves Values to Notes for selected facts.
The moving is easy, but selecting the facts might be a problem, unless you want every custom Attribute dealt with.

[stewartrb]

The only Fact I would like to see this happen for is the Attribute Fact "Event (Attr)" and converting them so that they are the same as the otherwise gedcom legal Event Fact "Event".

Cond: Exclude unless...
Expr: =FactLabel(%FACT%)
Oper: matches
Valu: Event (Attr)

These Event (Attr) amount to 1,225 Facts that should, or I would like rather, to be structured like Events, not Attributes.

[tatewise]

With hindsight, I think the easiest way forward is for you to use the Change Any Fact Tag Plugin on whatever Facts you wish, so that every Value is saved in the Source Note of the Fact.

Then the Plugin I write can simply move every Source Note value to the Fact Note of the same Fact, preserving any Fact Note text that may already exist.

[tatewise]

The ATTACHMENT Move Source Note to Fact Note Plugin Version 0.1 Dated 25 Jan 2016 will move every Source Note to the Fact Note of the same Event. Just click on its orange link to install into FH.

As a precaution use File > Backup/Restore > Small Backup before running any Plugin.

Once you have used the Change Any Facts Tag Plugin successfully, then run this attached Plugin.

The Plugin may run for a while with nothing apparently happening - just let it finish and it will produce a Result Set listing the ~1,225 changed Events. If you double-click a Note item, then the Event will be displayed in its Property Box.

After running the Plugin you can use Edit > Undo Plugin Updates before closing FH to reverse its changes if at all uncertain about its success.

[stewartrb]

Thank you. I will run this tonight and let you know. I do appreciate it.

[stewartrb]

That worked, and my data is cleaner for it. Thanks!