* Generic Type

[Johnwrosser]

Is there a way of viewing all the 'generic types' in all the individuals in my tree? I fear I may have inadvertently duplicated some.

[tatewise]

John, I'm not quite sure what you are asking.
Generic Types are not directly associated with Individuals but are a Source record field.
They are meant to be duplicated, i.e. Every Birth Certificate Source record should have Generic Type such as Birth Certificate.

To get a list of them all use Tools > Work with Data > Generic Source Types...
That tells you how many times each one is used and the Records and Where Used buttons list the Sources that use them.

[Johnwrosser]

Yes, Mike, that is what I wanted but is there a way of viewing duplicated or more types for a person? I guess it would mess up the statistics?

[Gowermick]

John,
As Miketate said, a source can be used more than once for each individual, so in that sense, an individual may have duplicated sources, but used for different facts. e.g. a birth certificate can be a source for date of birth and place of birth.

It may be the case however, that you have inadvertantly created two identical generic sources e.g. Birth Certificate.

The simplest way to spot these is to use Tools > Work with Data > Generic Source Types..., sort them into order then scroll down looking for duplicates. If you do find a duplicate(s), select a pair at a time, then Edit>Merge the records. This will reduce the pair down to a single entry.
Unfortunately you can only merge 2 at a time, so if you have 3 duplicates, merge the first two, then merge the result with the third one. Keep doing this until all duplicates have been merged.

[tatewise]

John, I don't understand why you are asking for such duplicates for one Individual because it would be perfectly normal.
For example, every Birth Certificate provides several sets of information.
Not only does it provide the Date & Place of Birth of the child, but also the Occupation of the father and the Residence of the informant.

So a person could have a Birth Certificate source citation for each of the following facts:
Birth event for the person.
Occupation as the father at the birth of the 1st child.
Residence as the informant at the birth of the 2nd child.
The more children then the more Birth Certificate source citations are likely.

Why are you concerned about such circumstances?

[Johnwrosser]

Mike,
If I enter a birth generic type from a GRO birth record and then from the actual certificate, then there will be 2 births instead of 1 for 1 person. Surely when the statistics are done there will be more births than expected?

[Gowermick]

John,
Although you have two generic sources for the birth, you DO NOT add a separate birth fact for each source.
You have one birth facts, to which you attach two generic sources.
i.e one fact, two sources

You are confusing generic source with generic fact, but there is no such thing as a generic fact.

You have facts and you have Generic Sources, don’t confuse the two.

[neil40]

Mike,
If I enter a birth generic type from a GRO birth record and then from the actual certificate, then there will be 2 births instead of 1 for 1 person. Surely when the statistics are done there will be more births than expected?

Surely, that's 2 sources/facts about the birth and not 2 actual births otherwise they would show as 2 identical children in your family view?
All events can have a multiple sources as you discover them, from 'hearsay' to offical documents.

[tatewise]

Ok, so you are not talking about duplicated Generic Source Types at all.

You are now talking about duplicated Facts (Events & Attributes).

When adding a Birth Certificate and there already is a Birth Event then add the new citation to the existing Birth Event.
Don't create a new Birth Event for every new source citation

On the other hand, Census Events occur every decade so it is normal to have duplicate Census Events.
The same goes for Occupation and Residence facts. You would expect duplicates of those.

So exactly which duplicated Facts are you interested in?
I suspect it may only be Birth Events and Death Events that you are talking about. Please confirm.

[Johnwrosser]

Exactly Mike, I'm looking at those events.

[tatewise]

So exactly which duplicated Facts are you interested in?
I suspect it may only be Birth Events and Death Events that you are talking about. Please confirm.

Surely you don't want every duplicated Fact because that would include all the Census, Occupation, Residence, etc, facts that would expect to be duplicated.

[Johnwrosser]

I'm concerned about just bmd facts which if I've duplicated or triplicated in error will affect the statistics of the tree.

[tatewise]

Try the three attached Queries that list the records where more than one BMD event exists and lists the first three.

[Johnwrosser]

Thank you Mike.

[jelv]

The first of those just found me a duplicate birth event I didn't know about. The puzzle is that the citations show that both were created by Ancestral Sources.

Easy to fix by Copy/Paste the citation from one birth to the other and delete the redundant birth.

[NickWalker]

The first of those just found me a duplicate birth event I didn't know about. The puzzle is that the citations show that both were created by Ancestral Sources.

Easy to fix by Copy/Paste the citation from one birth to the other and delete the redundant birth.

There is no way you can tell (without looking through backups) that a birth was created by AS. AS will add citations to existing births so you may have created the duplicate birth fact yourself and then AS has added a citation to it later. There are options in AS (off by default) to allow the creation of multiple births, but if you don't use those options then AS won't create a duplicate.

[jelv]

I was surprised and baffled - it's a one off and sorted so not worried.

Out of curiousity, when adding a census would AS spot/warn that there were multiple births?

If there were already two I'd have expected AS to add the citations to the first both times.

[NickWalker]

I was surprised and baffled - it's a one off and sorted so not worried.

Out of curiousity, when adding a census would AS spot/warn that there were multiple births?

If there were already two I'd have expected AS to add the citations to the first both times.

Yes it would update the first one that it finds in your file. Perhaps AS created the first one and then later a second one was added in FH but this new one was sorted so it was earlier in the file. Then when you have added a citation in AS subsequently it would add to the new one.

[tatewise]

FYI: The next version of my Show Project Statistics plugin will report duplicated BMD events for Birth, Baptism, Christening, Marriage, Divorce, Death, Burial & Cremation.

[jelv]

FYI: The next version of my Show Project Statistics plugin will report duplicated BMD events for Birth, Baptism, Christening, Marriage, Divorce, Death, Burial & Cremation.

Excellent!

[fhtess65]

Nice addition, Mike - thanks

FYI: The next version of my Show Project Statistics plugin will report duplicated BMD events for Birth, Baptism, Christening, Marriage, Divorce, Death, Burial & Cremation.

[tatewise]

The Show Project Statistics plugin Version 2.9 Date 15 Mar 2023 is in the Plugin Store.
It now reports any Duplicated BMD event as promised and also includes Fact Sort Dates in the date checks.

[neil40]

Nice plugin, and additions. Thanks Mike