Family Historian User Group

Hi folks

I note you have a page regarding my Family Tree Analyzer program at fhugdownloads:contents:family_tree_analyzer|> Utility ~ Family Tree Analyzer and I wonder if you would be so kind as to update the information.

Firstly FTAnalyzer was written by myself Alexander Bisset it was only hosted on Codeplex (a Microsoft code hosting website) never "by Codeplex".

Secondly due to Codeplex closing down I've had to move the site to a new home on a different code hosting site "GitHub". I've setup an easy to remember webpage though http://www.ftanalyzer.com I've also setup a Facebook page for people to ask questions http://www.facebook.com/ftanalyzer and a twitter account @ftanalyzer if people prefer to contact me that way about the program.

Many thanks.
Alexander Bisset
Author Family Tree Analyzer

Thank you Alexander for that update.

I think I have updated the fhugdownloads:contents:family_tree_analyzer|> Utility ~ Family Tree Analyzer page correctly.

In return could you please update your http://ftanalyzer.com/Family%20Historian page where it says:
Use the menu bar command “Tools-Work with Fact sets”
to instead say:
Use the menu bar command “Tools - Fact Types”

I have just tried out this FTAnalyzer programme and found it useful in finding anomolies in my Gedcom file which FH did not find. I especially like the colour coded pages for census omissions with direct linking to the selected website to try and find the missing census. This makes it easy to see where a census should be available for an ancestor. It does occasionally try and fill in incorrect census notes to the wrong person and assumes that all data in notes, such as info from death records, are correct when they do have errors especially the birth year of the deceased. Despite some issues it does a good job finding identifying info and giving a different look to the presentation of the facts.

Pentris wrote:I especially like the colour coded pages for census omissions with direct linking to the selected website to try and find the missing census. This makes it easy to see where a census should be available for an ancestor.

Try the Lookup Missing Census Facts plugin and this will do exactly that all from within Family Historian.

It has a useful plugin from FH but I do not find it as useful in the initial stage. If you are trawling through the facts for a single person and notice a missing census then ok. If like me after 30 years of records cannot remember what is missing then not quite so good. As per the attached screenprint I personally find a picture worth a thousand words to more quickly identify missing census for someone I have not visited for the last 10 years. In the print I can easily see that Robert Powley may have two missing census records. The hints in FH have not come up with these possibilities probably due to obscure spelling changes in the census. Using the plugin it has provided possible links to these census for me to check along with 12 other entries for people that I have no interest in.
Sometimes in research another way of looking at a problem is not a bad thing.

You can easily do this with a query. There is one in the Knowledgebase and I have modified that to suit myself to present something similar to your screenshot. Additional columns can be added and I suspect colours instead of Yes or Find.

Valkrider,
I am looking for a simple query like yours in which, judging by the output, you have used an if..then..else construct for each row, to give you the "-" or "YES" or "Find"

Any chance you could post an example of the expression used? It seems silly for me to re-invent the wheel

Mike

I have attached my custom query to this post so you can play with it.

It is the Columns expression that determines whether it says "-" or "YES" or "Find".
e.g. for the 1841 column:
=TextIf( (%INDI.BIRT.DATE% > DateAt(1841,6,6)) or (%INDI.DEAT.DATE% < DateAt(1841,6,6)),"-", DateIf(Exists(%INDI.CENS[year=1841]%), "YES", "Find" ) )
i.e.
If Born after Census date or Died before Census date then show "-"
else if Census exists then show "YES" else show "Find"

Valkrider,
Thanks, just what I was looking for. No matter how I tried a similar expression, FH rejected the syntax, and I couldn’t determine what I was doing wrong.

Tatewise,
Yes, I’d already sussed that out, but as you can see from above comment, I couldn’t get the correct syntax.

Thank you both

Mike, the snag with this kind of expression is they rely on specifically Birth and Death event Dates, which you may not have recorded, or only have approximate or range dates, especially prior to 1837. That is where the =Estimated... functions come into play that detect many more events.

The trick to building such complex expressions with multiple functions is to start with a simple outermost function.
=TextIf( %INDI.BIRT.DATE% > DateAt(1841,6,6), "-", "?" )

Then add the Death date check:
=TextIf( %INDI.BIRT.DATE% > DateAt(1841,6,6) or %INDI.DEAT.DATE% < DateAt(1841,6,6), "-", "?" )

Separately, build the Census date check:
=DateIf( Exists(%INDI.CENS[year=1841]%), "YES", "Find" )

Finally combine together:
=TextIf( %INDI.BIRT.DATE% > DateAt(1841,6,6) or %INDI.DEAT.DATE% < DateAt(1841,6,6), "-", DateIf( Exists(%INDI.CENS[year=1841]%), "YES", "Find" ) )

Note how the = must be omitted from inner functions like DateIf(...).

I often use a plain text editor to compose and edit the expression, then paste it into FH until it is happy.
It is also easier to check for matched pairs of parentheses, with expression split over several lines, before joining into one line and copy pasting.
You can also keep a history of how it was built with previous trial attempts until success is achieved, as it is a combination of getting both the syntax and the semantics correct.

FTAnalyzer has the choice "Unknown Fact Type," which seems to flag any user created fact type. Looking at the "Fact" tab it seems all user created facts are in CAPS.

What is the purpose of the "Unknown Fact Type" choice? I know what user facts I created in Family Tree Maker, so why have it? Is there a use for it I haven't discovered? For sure, I don't want, or need, a multi-page report listing what I consider to be non-existent "errors."

OcalaDick

@OcalaDick,

if you have questions about the use of FTAnalyzer you need to direct them to the author - see links provided in the opening message on this thread.

Each Unknown Fact Type is in CAPS because that is how they are defined in GEDCOM, and nothing else is known.
Even the standard facts are defined in CAPS in GEDCOM, but most genealogy products give them a mixed case standard name.
e.g. BIRT is named Birth Event, DEAT is named Death Event, etc.

In some products, including FTM and FH, some predefined Fact Types are NOT standard GEDCOM facts.
So those would be classified by FTAnalyzer as Unknown Fact Type along with your own custom Fact Types.
Users less experienced than you may be unaware that such predefined Fact Types are actually non-standard, and in GEDCOM terms, are an. Such non-standard Facts may not migrate well via GEDCOM to other genealogy products.

FTAnalyzer offers 23 tick options on the Errors/Fixes tab, and as the Family Tree Analyzer Guide Part 3 - Errors & Specialist Tabs says "You can control which errors you want to see by selecting the checkboxes, and this selection is remembered".
Also on the Tools > Options > General Settings you can tick Ignore Unknown Fact Type Warnings.

I have used the Export Gedcom Plugin to create a Gedcom for FT Analyzer. It imports OK but reports that none of my locations have Lat/Long coordinates. However, if I check FH my locations do have coordinates.

Are the locations not correctly formatted for FTA?

Just to confirm, I checked the Gedcom file. Here is an example:

0 @S1154@ SOUR
1 TITL Ω Place Record: Altrincham, Cheshire
1 AUTH Place Rec Id [P5]
1 TEXT Map Plot:
2 CONT Latitude: N53.3835609
2 CONT Longitude: W2.3533433
1 NOTE Source Type: Place Details

The recognition of FH Place records with Lat/Longitude is I think a fairly recent update.

Anyway, in the Export Gedcom File Plugin, on its Extra Options tab, set Place Record 0 @P%d+@ to Keep Custom Record and that seems to work.

Please confirm that works for you, and if so I will make that a default setting in the next version of the Plugin.

If you spot any other discrepancies then please let me know.

That's better. They import now, but it has highlighted I still need to clean up some of my locations!

The nice thing with FT Analyser is that you can map against a background of the National Library of Scotland's historical mapping.

Thanks.

I let FT Analyser read the project gedcom directly since it is only reading the file. Is there a problem with doing this?

FT Analyzer should do no harm to your GEDCOM and it will ignore the Media (OBJE) records
Some of the FH custom tags such as File _ROOT and _PLAC records are supported.

All other custom tags are probably ignored, and that will include all custom Attribute (_ATTR) facts, but you may not be concerned about including them in the analysis. The Plugin converts such attributes into custom Event (EVEN) facts.

I don't know if FT Analyzer recognises the symmetric format for same sex partners that is used by FH.
Most products prefer the asymmetric format of one HUSB tag and one WIFE tag regardless of sex.
The Plugin makes that conversion too.