Family Historian User Group

I'm a beginner with Family Historian, up till now I have mainly used a very old DOS program, Pedigree.
In Pedigree sources have a place field. Is it possible to add a place field to Family Historian source records? It would make it a lot easier to transfer data from my old databases into Family Historian.
Where can I look for documentation and examples of customising Family Historian?
Thanks in advance.

I suspect FH is rather more sophisticated than Pedigree, so will take a while to discover all its features.
See how_to:key_features_for_newcomers|> Key Features for Newcomers that identifies the user documentation and other key features of FH.
The Family Historian Sample Project gives plenty of examples.

It is not clear to me how Places play a part in Sources unless there is different terminology involved.

In FH it is primarily Facts such as Birth, Marriage, Death that occur in Places sometimes with an Address.
Sources relate to documents such as BMD Certificates and can be associated with a Repository that identifies where the originals are held, and that can include contact details such as Telephone and Address.
In the Family Historian Sample Project many of its Source records are linked to a Repository record.

It might help if you can provide some examples of the details you need to transfer.

BTW: Does Pedigree allow a GEDCOM file to be exported, which could be imported into FH?

Mike a place can be part of 'source-identifying' information e.g the information for a census record will include the relevant place. It might not be a Place record (in FH terms) but it's still a place...

A typical source might have a structure like

Type: Church Book
Title: Lutheran Baptisms
Place: Trechel, Naugard, Pommern
Repository: Landeskirchliches Archiv; Greifswald

This would be my main source for people born in the village of Trechel.

Most of my sources are like this, specific to a particular village or small area, so I made frequent use of the place field in Pedigree.

What would be the usual way of recording a source like this in FH? Would the place be incorporated into the title?

Yes, you could include the place in the Title or the Publication Information.
They would also appear in the Place field of the Baptism fact in this example.

Echoes from the past - Pedigree.
I used Pedigree too. The Place info from my earliest (individual) census sources is now in the Note field of the fh source record.

Evelyn, how did you migrate from Pedigree to FH?

Is it the same as PediTree? http://www.pugweb.org.uk/pedigree-software/start

If so, then it says it can export a GEDCOM file, which could be used to import automatically into FH.
Any anomalies such as Place fields in Source records could probably be fixed with a Plugin.

There are a great many past postings regarding importing PediTree GEDCOM into FH.
Use the Search... box top right with PediTree to get them all listed.
Study them to see how other users coped with import problems.

Pedigree was my first family history software. I can’t remember exactly when, but it was a DOS program supplied on a floppy disk that I ran under Windows 3.1, so around the early 1990s. PediTree is its Windows successor, from the same programmer (Pedigree Software/Murray Kennedy).

I’ve long thrown out both disk and documentation, but it must have had the facility to export to GEDCOM, as I would have done that to transfer my early data to PAF (and from there to FTM, and now FH).

tatewise wrote: ↑

18 Jul 2020 19:29

Evelyn, how did you migrate from Pedigree to FH?

Not directly, I am afraid. I moved from Pedigree to Generations and when Generations became Apple only, I moved to TMG.
The migration each time was done with a simple Gedcom. I have mentioned before my long term devotion to a book "Gedcom data transfer, Moving Your Family Tree" by David Hawgood. 3rd Edition 1999
I just looked and I have Sierra Gedcoms from Generations on a back up hard drive. But not from Pedigree. However, if you need one, I may have them on a floppy disc - I have a floppy disc reader.

Yes, Pedigree can export a Gedcom, and I have enough computing skills to modify the Pedigree Gedcom to make it more like a Family Historian Gedcom. So, I could easily change all the source places to source notes or publication details, but to me that's a poor substitute for introducing a place field.

Now that I have explained why I would want to add a field, I'll repeat the original question:
Is it possible for me to add a custom field to a source? If it is, where exactly is this documented? What sorts of customisation are possible in FH? (Adding a new field was very easy in Pedigree).

Thanks,
Paul

There are a number of options, but it is worth discussing the implications and objectives of what you are requesting.
As you clearly understand the software structures involved, I won't go into fine details of the options until you ask.

FH adheres closely to the GEDCOM standard specification. It claims 100% compatibity, but that is debatable.
A drawback of custom fields is they are non-standard GEDCOM so rarely migrate from one genealogy product to another, as you have discovered with migrating Pedigree to FH.

Any such 'custom' Place field would use plain text and not be associated with the Place records or any other Place features supported by FH. That may not be a problem for you, but it has to be considered.

1. You could use a standard shared Note record linked to the Source record to hold the place name, so if the place appears in several Source records they would all share the same Note.
   It is managed and appears on the Notes tab rather than the Main tab of the Source record Property Box.
2. You could use the standard Custom Id field and customise the Property Box to label it as Place.
   That would be achieved via the cog Menu > Customize Data Entry dialogue, which can be explained later.
   BTW: The available standard fields can be investigated in the All tab via the right-click context menu.
3. You could retain the existing Pedigree non-standard GEDCOM tag (which might be _PLAC or similar).
   That could be customized into the Property Box with a Place label via cog Menu > Customize Data Entry dialogue.
4. Finally, you could incorporate the place name into Title or Publication Info and is the popular choice of many FH users.

What FH does not support is the creation of new ad-hoc custom fields.

Before making a final decision it is also worth considering where that Place name data might appear in Reports.
Once you have a shortlist of candidates, the Report options can be discussed.

As I said, there are a number of options. The choice is yours.

BTW: FH V7 due out later this year is rumoured to have Source record templates that may support your Place field better.

Unless I am misunderstanding the requirement and / or the GEDCOM spec'n, GEDCOM 5.5 source records actually have a Place item in the standard specification. See this: It appears that a Source Record has an optional Data item, which may consist of multiple events related to the source. The event details comprise a type, a date, and a place. This shows that in its simplest form in the (now modified) Sample Project: And, rather wonderfully, Calico Pie were careful enough - even though I bet no-one uses this - to link the Place from the Source record to the Place Records: FH allows access to this stuff in the All tab of the property box for the Source Record. I think that the values of the Events Recorded may be constrained - at least, FH gives a menu for this.

PS - the way I construct my sources, the relevant place will be part of the title and / or author of a source, so I've no idea about any pitfalls of using this item - reporting it out might be an issue, e.g.

You are absolutely correct Adrian, and I nearly added that as a 5th option.
It does have the advantage of linking to Place records, and can be customised to appear on the Main tab.
Strangely, the Events Recorded field does not even need to be populated and gets automatically created.
That Data structure is not well supported in Reports and ignored by most other products.

tatewise wrote: ↑

20 Jul 2020 09:03

...
That Data structure is not well supported in Reports and ignored by most other products.

That was my guess. I'm not even quite sure why the GEDCOM designers put it there - perhaps it's a pedantic analysis of the data content, which no-one else can see much point for.

Thinking defensively (i.e. considering what other software might make of the file, what FH might use the item for, etc.) I'd be wary of my own suggestion, especially if other options were available. To take Rakow's Church Book example, I'd be inclined to put the Place item into the Author item of the GEDCOM file for FH, perhaps adding "parish" somewhere in the text? (If that's a sensible term...) No doubt other sources will require different (type-dependent?) manipulation. (If all this is obvious to Rakow please accept my apologies!)