* Importing Marriages from Legacy

[Keithj]

I have just found that I have a variation on this problem. I suspect the cause is similar.

The transfer from Legacy 8 to FH6 worked for most categories of data. I had to edit the Legacy GEDCOM 5.5.1 file slightly to point it at the correct location for the media, and to change "1 CHR" to "1 BAPM" (I'm fussy about Baptism - "Christening" doesn't fit with my theology, but that's another story).

HOWEVER .... NONE of the marriage Media have been assigned to the couples. Baptism, birth certificates, death certificates, census images and the like are fine, but Marriage certificate images don't appear.

If I go to the Media list in FH6, the marriage images are all there. They are shown as (for example):


If I click "Links" and click on the +, I see this:


- but the Media image does not appear against either husband or wife, nor does it appear in the Marriage field for the couple. The very few early entries where I linked the marriage certificate to each spouse separately are OK.

If I go to the Marriage event in the Focus window, I can then create a link to the relevant Media file, so the capability is there.

However, with several hundred Media files that were all carefully linked already, I'm not keen on spending hours doing each one manually.

I tried ticking the blank boxes against the individual names of husband and wife in the second image above, but that didn't work.

The marriages in question transferred without any problem from FTM2012 to Legacy 8 in March this year.

I tried exporting again from Legacy into FH6, in various formats, but in no case did the marriage media attach to the marriages.

[LornaCraig]

Your screen shot shows the media are linked to the Family Records, not to the Individual records. this means the images won't show in the Media tab of either individual in the couple, but you should be able to see them if you click the gear-wheel icon in the media tab and select View Media linked to ..... Make sure the option to Include spouse Family records with Individual records is ticked. The main media window will then display all the images.

If you don't already have the Records window set to display a tab for Family records, you can do this using Tools>Preferences>Records window and ticking Families in the Display options. You will then be able to select Family records to view their associated media in their own Property box Media tab.

[Keithj]

Oh bother Not only the media, but the marriage notes seem to have unlinked, too. That's a few thousand entries gone

Stuff like this (and some a lot more detailed than this):
Name: Esther C Jillings
Spouse Surname: Stammers
Registration Year: 1915
Registration Quarter: Oct-Nov-Dec
Registration district: Blything
Inferred County: Suffolk
Volume: 4a
Page: 3350
Records on Page:
Name
Esther C Jillings
William G Stammers

[LornaCraig]

As explained in my previous post, I think you will find the media by looking at the Family records or by using the View Media linked to .... option. Did that not work?

Regarding the marriage notes, I am not familiar with Legacy so I don't know where it would have put them when it exported the gedcom. But a problem with marriage notes in a gedcom from Legacy was reported back in 2008 in this thread: Gedcom imported from Legacy (5871)

I assume from what you say that the notes are not showing in the Note field for the marriage event in the individual's property box. However there are other places they might be. If they are attached to the Individual records rather than the marriage event they will show on the Notes tab of the individual's Property box. If they are attached to the Family record they will show on the Notes tab of the Family record Property box. If they are part of the Text from Source they will show in the Main tab of the Source record Property box. They might even have been created as Note Records.

I am pretty sure they will be there somewhere. Once you have found them, if you want to move the notes to the note field of the marriage event that can probably be done with a plugin.

[Keithj]

Yes, the notes are all present, in one great big batch in the GED file as displayed by FH6. What they don't do is display against the individual couples.

FTM and Legacy both had the option to record data against a marriage, which was (to me, at the time), the logical way to do it. If the individual married more than once (which many did), then the details of each marriage are recorded against the couple and appear immediately if I click on "Marriage".

Here's the "main page" of Legacy, showing two people:



- and here's what appears if I click on the "Notes" box:



Simple and effective.


The same data imported into FH6 look like this:



and if I click on the marriage and Notes, this is what I see:



The Notes aren't there. I've not found a way to recover them - modifying "Family" records doesn't do it.


If I go to the "Notes" section in FH6, this is what I see:



The details for that marriage are somewhere in there - among several thousand entries - but finding them and linking them would take forever.


Much the same happens with Media images from Legacy. When I transferred from FTM to Legacy, there was no problem. If I read the GED file back into Legacy, the links are still there.

The problem is "how to get FH6 to pick up and incorporate the Notes and Media links for marriages". Thus far, nothing has worked except searching them out manually. I'm sure it's possible, since the information is in the GED file.

[LornaCraig]

Your latest screen shot shows that the marriage notes have been converted to Note Records. What you need to find out is whether this happened during the export from Legacy or during the import to FH. Does Legacy have any options regarding the handling of local notes during export? Did your notes relating to other types of event transfer successfully?

I am still not sure what the problem is with the images. In an earlier post you said "If I go to the Media list in FH6, the marriage images are all there." And your screen shots from your earlier post show that the image for William Watts and And Dodd is indeed linked to their Family record. From what you have shown there is not a problem there. Does the image really not show on the media tab of their Family record?

[tatewise]

Keith, Lorna is providing helpful advice that you are ignoring.
Please deal with one issue at a time otherwise progress will be really slow.

I repeat, as a newcomer I suggest you work through how_to:key_features_for_newcomers|> Key Features for Newcomers which will answer many new user questions.

If you have found your 'missing' Media and Note records then they are probaly linked to the Marriage somehow. To find the records they are linked to use View > Record Links then Go To the record and fully expand all its [+] icons just like expanding folders in Windows Explorer (especially on the Marriage entry). I suspect the Media and Notes will be linked there.

Legacy and FTM have a nasty habit of exporting the local Notes as Note records.
There is a Clean Up Notes Plugin designed to convert individual Note records back to local Notes.

Migrating between genealogy products usually requires a little patience to sort out the details. That it worked well between FTM and Legacy is soemthing of a lucky fluke.

[Keithj]

Thank you for your patience! This has been, by far, the toughest software change I've gone through in many years of Ancestry research. I've obviously been very lucky until now. I think I'm nearly there...

I did try to work through the "Beginners Guide", but something in my PC doesn't like it. Most of the pages had very little if any content. The FAQ links did not work at all. I'll go back later using the iPad (which has no Anti-virus or anti-Flash, although it won't display Flash) and see if that works.

A couple of hours along and careful working through the GED file as exported from Legacy and the version in FH6 showed that the marriage notes were in the exported file, and are still in the FH6 file. Using the example of Stammers/Jillings above, their FAMS record is F242. The GED links that to a variety of places, one of which is N3910, the note detailing their marriage. That note is a single text line. The note did not appear anywhere in the data for either of them or for their marriage.

All other Notes, in other fields than marriage, were present and correct (based on a quick sample of a couple of dozen entries).

I ran the "Clean Up Notes" plugin as suggested, and the Marriage Notes appeared - not under "Notes" but under "Facts" against the marriages. As far as I can see, all the Notes are now shown as Facts against the relevant marriage. Problem solved. Other notes were not affected.

No, the Media for the marriage certificates still do not show. Although the image for William Watts and Ann Dodd is indeed linked to their Family Record, it does not appear in the Media box. Here are the two screens:





Looking at the Family record and using the View Media linked to .... option opens a new box displaying the relevant Media file. If I then click "Add simple link" I can add it to the Marriage record again (it appears twice), and it then displays normally:



It sounds like a good reason to learn how to write a Custom Query or a Plugin.

[LornaCraig]

Ah! In the screenshot from your early post showing the Links tab of the Multimedia window, I missed the fact that there is an entry in the Detail column showing the date and place of marriage. It is this detail (the marriage event itself) to which the image is linked, and that is why the All tab of the Property box for the Family record is showing the multimedia in a separate little branch with the date and place.

After you have linked the image for a second time (to the Family record as a whole) you will find there is nothing in the Detail column for the second link, and on the All tab of the Property box the second occurrence of the multimedia item is in the main branch of the record, after the children.

When you look at the Facts tab of the Property box (for either the Family or the Individual record) you will see against the marriage fact a small icon in the More column. This will look like two little picture frames. This is the sign that there is one or more media item linked to the Fact. To see it, click on the same icon in the tool bar in the middle of the Facts tab.

When you use the gear-wheel icon in the Media tab of the Property box and select View Media Linked to this Record in Media Window make sure the option for Associated Events/Facts is ticked. The media linked to the marriage event should then be displayed with any other media for that record in the Multimedia window.

[tatewise]

To summarise Lorna's explanation:

Media can be attached to an Individual or Family (and also a Source or Place) record as a whole via its Media tab. You applied this by using "Add simple link" but you could have gone via the Media tab itself.

Media can be attached to each Individual/Family Fact (Event/Attribute) via the Facts tab, and can be Shown/Edited as explained by Lorna.

So you could leave all your Marriage Media attached to their Marriage Event and they will appear in Reports and can be accessed via either the Individual or Family Property Box Facts tab via the Marriage Event. Since they apply to the Marriage rather than the whole record, this is a better option.

However, from your screenshot it is a Marriage Certificate, which is a Source Document and conventionally should be attached to a Source Record. Then that Source Record can be Cited not only by the Marriage Event but also the Parent Name fields and Occupation Facts and perhaps Residence Facts. This approach corroborates several entries in your database, but keeps all the Source Document details (Transcript Text From Source, Author, and Publication Info) in one place in the Source Record.

[Keithj]

Thank you, Lorna.

Yes, that shows that the Media are linked to the individual records and not lost. It does what you say, up to the point of "select View Media Linked to this Record in Media Window make sure the option for Associated Events/Facts is ticked." That doesn't make the images display, although if I click on the "two picture frames" under "Facts" in the Property box, then I see a small version.

Here are the screens that I see (using a different marriage where I haven't copied the Media over again):


The Facts tab when first clicked.

If I click on the "double picture" icon at the bottom of the Fact box, then the media image appears in miniature:



If I then go to the Media tag in the Fact box, and assuming I'm picking the right gear wheel:


then I am offered two choices:
- View Media for this Record in Media Window
- View Media Linked to this Record in Media Window

If I pick the second option, then this pops up:



With all those boxes ticked (which seems to have been the default), the Media do not appear.

If I go to the "All" tab in the Propety box, open the + against the "Marriage" box, and double-click on the description of the Media iten, then a box opens displaying it. That has three tabs - Main, Links, and All.
I pick "Links", click "Add simple link" and am then offered the complete list of marriages. I pick the relevant one, and the media image then appears against that marriage.

If all else fails, I can work through a few hundred marriage records where I have images of the marriage entry, and add each one in this way. If there's an easier way, it would be better!

I'm finding, as I work through the "Beginners Introduction" (using the iPad for instructions and the desktop to do stuff) that FH has vastly more features than I anticipated or that I've used with previous software. The FAQs work on the iPad, although the Alphabetical Index offends it - it just loops back.

[Keithj]

Thanks, Mike. I'm not sure I understood much of that. I'll go and read up some more to see if I can get my head round it.

[tatewise]

In the Media for Marriage... window, if you click on the small (thumbnail) version to select it (because there could be several), then the Edit and other buttons are enabled and you can edit the full image.

This is very similar to the Media tab, where thumbnails can be shown and must be selected before being able to Edit.
Although the Media tab does also allow Full/Face images to be shown one at a time by selecting from the list above.

You were almost there with your use of the gear wheel.
When the Media Window opens, check the Media List option top left, and choose All Event/Fact Media to see your Marriage Media.

As I suspect you are discovering, FH typically offers several different ways to access your Media, and allows it to be attached in several different places.

Like any new product you do need to spend time discovering all its features, especially as you have discovered, FH is very feature rich.

[LornaCraig]

When you got to the last screen you have shown, the Select Linked Media box with all the options ticked, did you then click OK in that box? Did the main Multimedia window open? All media linked in any way to the record should be listed in the left hand panel and displayed in thumbnail size in the main panel.

I have not been able to re-create a case where media linked to a marriage event does not show in the Multimedia window when this procedure is followed.

To see more information about each item, double click on the thumbnail image and it will be displayed full size on the Media Record tab with the Links tab also available.

[Keithj]

When you got to the last screen you have shown, the Select Linked Media box with all the options ticked, did you then click OK in that box? Did the main Multimedia window open? All media linked in any way to the record should be listed in the left hand panel and displayed in thumbnail size in the main panel.

Yes, when I OK that, it opens the Media list, showing just that marriage record. If I use the "Create simple link" from there, it then offers me the complete list of marriages to select the relevant one. That works, and creates a link that shows that Media item in the media list for the marriage.

I've not seen any other option, such as "repair existing link". If there were a way to do that for all the marriage media in one go, rather than having to do each one individually, I'd be happy.

Looking at the options Mike set out, it's clear that there is far more sophistication in FH6 than in the packages I've used in the past, and it's the refinements of that that are biting me. Until recently, the only option was to link a JPG with a specific entry - birth/baptism/marriage/death/burial - and that's how my database has been up to now. It seems the "catch" is where I recorded marriage media (and notes) against the marriage event rather than against the two individuals marrying. Everything else transferred in flawlessly. Maybe not as tidily as if I'd started afresh with FH6 and done it properly, but it works.


... apart from the "tasks list" from FTM/Legacy. That seems to have vanished, but I've scanned the last Legacy one into Excel and will update it that way.

[tatewise]

I am trying to put your comments into perspective.

It seems that you have linked all your Media directly to Individual records, except in the case of Marriage Events where you have linked the Media to the Event. That makes sense in as much as it saves linking the same Media to both Spouses.

The GEDCOM and FH have honoured that decision faithfully.
So the Individual records show their Media on the Media tab.
While on the Facts tab the Marriage Events show their Media by right-clicking the Marriage and choosing Show Media, or by clicking the Show Media button below the Facts pane.

Furthermore, if you use Publish > Individual Summary Report all the associated Media are shown for both the Individual and the Marriage.

I would suggest you wait until you are more familiar with the FH capabilities before deciding whether or not to change your Media links.

It sounds as if you are not aware of the Source Citation techniques often used by genealogists to corroborate their findings. That is OK, as not everyone records their family history in the same way.

Finally, the Notes record anomaly has been satisfactorily fixed with the Clean Up Notes plugin.

[Keithj]

Yes, that summarises it well, Mike.

For all except marriages, all data appear where they should.

The Marriage Notes are sorted - they appear in the Facts tab against the relevant marriage: the information pops up when needed. The plugin did the job admirably.

The Media (mostly copies of marriage certificates or photographs of church registers) are linked to the marriage event, which seemed right to me when the option of doing it that way first appeared. However, the images do not appear in FH6 unless I do a fair amount of clicking. That is counter-intuitive, given that there is an unused place for Media to appear, but I will wait until I have done some more familiarisation with the features of FH6 and hopefully found a way to fix them all with one action. Otherwise, it will have to be a one-by-one relinking of about 500 entries. So far, I have relinked about 20 - as I find one in something I'm doing, I fix the missing link.

"Source citation" was not an option until recently, and I have not followed that path up to now. Given the number of entries I already have, and the fact that all logged facts, notes, media, etc quote their source somewhere in the text, I don't plan to change or to go back and revise those I have. Some of this stuff dates back 30 years and more, and data processing options in those days were somewhat limited (remember Visicalc?). Thus far, with seven different "software solutions" I've managed to avoid typing stuff in by copying from a printout into an input screen, although some of the editing has been a little tortuous. GEDCOM made life a lot easier.

I do not publish individual summary reports - or have not done so up to now. I am in regular contact with some distant cousins and some folks with the same surname where we do not yet know the connection. We exchange information - usually notes and media - and I keep a "master copy" on a password-protected website which we all use.

Thanks again to you and to Lorna. Your help has been invaluable - not least in reassuring me that the information is all still there.

[tatewise]

I think 'fair amount of clicking' is an exaggeration. I have counted them. Assuming one of the spouse's Individual Property Boxes is open then:

• Individual Media: 1 click on Media tab and double click a thumbnail image.
• Marriage Media: 1 click on Facts tab, 1 click on Marriage event, 1 click on Show Media button and double click a thumbnail image.

So just 2 extra clicks!

Keith, my mistake, I should have explained about Reports.
Publish > Individual Summary Report means use the command menu Publish and select Individual Summary Report.
Then choose the Individual(s) and a Report is displayed on screen summarising the Individual(s) details all together, including immediate Family, Facts, Notes, Media images, etc.

Some users in your position take the opportunity to review all their records, using the latest toolset, and latest online records, and claim to often discover a new insight into their database with new family links not spotted before.

[Keithj]

Understood, Mike. I didn't count the clicks, but I didn't go that way anyway. I find it confusing to have a "Media" box against the marriage with a message "No media", when in fact there are media. That box works with individuals, so ideally I'd like it to work with marriages too.

I looked in the GED file and found what makes the difference between marriage Media displaying in the FH6 Media box, and not displaying.

The media files have a reference number - for example, O1415.
In a record where the marriage media don't display, there will be a series like this:
0 @F556@ FAM
1 MARR
<various lines>
2 OBJE @O1415@
<more lines>

In a record where they do display (because I added them in FH6), there are some extra lines, thus:
0 @F556@ FAM
1 MARR
<various lines>
2 OBJE @O1415@
<more lines>
1 OBJE @O1415@
2 _ASID 1
1 CHAN
2 DATE <date the change was made>
3 TIME <time the change was made>

The file reference number appears twice in all those.

I tried adding 1 OBJE @filenumber@ at the end of some where the media didn't show, and FH6 opened the file quite happily and displayed the marriage information in the Media box.

I then tried changing 2 OBJE @filenumber@ to 1 OBJE etc, leaving the entry where it was. In cases where the next entry was also 1 ... that worked. If the next entry was 2 ... then it triggered an error. There are about half a dozen of the latter and several hundred of the former, so I can see a fairly quick edit-and-fix tomorrow.

[LornaCraig]

Keith,

It is important to understand that

what makes the difference between marriage Media displaying in the FH6 Media box, and not displaying

is whether the image is linked (via a Media record) to the marriage event or to an Individual or Family record. The images displayed in the media tab of the Property box are images that are linked to the record as a whole. Normally these would only be photos of the individual or couple, but I understand that because of the way your existing research has been recorded you also have images of documents like birth and death certificates linked directly to Individual records.

In the example you have given you have added a link from the marriage media to the Family record. This means the image will appear in the media tab of the property box for the Family record, but you need to be aware that it still won’t appear in the media tab for either of the individuals in the marriage. I think that is something you were looking for originally, but that would require two more links, one to each of the Individual records.

Then you will end up with four links to the multimedia record: one to the marriage event, one to the Family record and one to each of the Individual records. That’s a lot of duplication, and if you ever start to use Reports you probably won’t want the image appearing more than once. This may not matter to you, but it’s something else to bear in mind before you start adding extra links.

[Keithj]

Thanks, Lorna.

No, I wasn't looking for the marriage media to appear against the individuals, only against the marriage. It's really a case of knowing that I have a copy of the marriage certificate (or whatever) when I'm working at the relevant church/record office. FTM and Legacy both showed it. At the moment, FH6 has a "No media" flag in the marriage entry unless I click elsewhere to look for it. That is confusing, but will soon be fixed: it just needs 1 OBJE instead of 2 OBJE against the relevant media reference in the .GED file.

In the early days, when the options weren't there, I recorded marriage information against both persons, but for some years I've shown it against the "marriage" (call it Family group, or whatever - different names in different software). As I update for new data, I move the marriage information off the individuals' records and onto the "marriage" page. There are now very few (if any) examples of marriage certificates showing against both persons in the marriage and not in the "marriage" record.

In that respect, I very much like the way FH6 shows multiple marriages for the same person: there's no chance of confusion. Previous software puts a number somewhere on the page showing how many times the person married, and that is easy to miss.

[Keithj]

Well, that was easy! It took about 20 minutes in total, using Notepad.

Within the GED file section starting @F1@ FAM

1. Find all 2 OBJE @O and change to 1 OBJE @O
That triggered 14 errors where the 2 OBJE was followed by 2 CONT - all of which were text about the marriage, not referring to the media image. Go back to the original unedited file, find those 14 records, and move the 2 OBJE from the middle of that record to the end.

2. Repeat 1 above.
No errors.

All 500+ marriage media now appear in the Media box against the marriage, as in my view they should.

[tatewise]

Keith, it is clear that you are happy with that new arrangement, but may I correct your terminology.

All 500+ marriage media now appear in the Media box against the marriage

Actually the media now appear in the Media tab against the Family record.
In most cases I guess the Family record only has a Marriage event.
But it could have an Engagement event, a Divorce event, and many others.
With your arrangement, all the media associated with any of those events would all appear in the Media tab.
Only by visual inspection can you tell which media item belongs to which event.

However, it seems that is the way you also have arranged the Individual record, with all the media on the Media tab regardless of which event they belong to.

Having said that, it does mean you have quick access to your media from the Focus Window.
Click on an Individual so their Property Box appears and then click the Media tab to see all the Individual media.
For marriages click the Married bar under the couple to show the Family Property Box and then click the Media tab to see the Marriage media.

BTW: I was about to write a Plugin to move the media for you, but you beat me to it with your manual edit.

[Keithj]

Give me time, Mike.

I've changed from FTM (memory leak that caused crashes) to Legacy 8 to FH6 this year. The three use different names for the various events, data fields, and so on. I just use the generic name such as "Birth", "Baptism", "Marriage" etc. I appreciate there are FH6-specific names for the various data fields and that some of the field contents may be different. Over time I will learn them. For the moment, my priority is to get all the data into FH6 and displaying correctly (or if not "correctly", at least "understandably, and not hidden"). I think I've now done that, but it's been the most difficult transition since I went from MS Access to PAF a very long time ago. That no doubt reflects the greater flexibility and capability of FH6, but I can't say I've enjoyed it. The assistance I've had from this Forum has been very useful - I don't think I could have got there without it.

Under the names of the husband and wife in FH6 there is a bar labelled "Married <date> at <place>". If they divorced, that is in the same line. It's clear and non-confusing. Legacy called it "Marriage" but did not make it clear that the person may have married more than once - it just set a "preferred" spouse and showed a number (in a small font) in the individual's data box to indicate how many spouses there were. FH6 shows all spouses, which is much preferable.

Under that there is a grey bar labelled "Children", below which are the children, separately listed.

If I click on "Married", the Property box changes to "Family: ... of <husband and wife>". I'm not sure why it has the colon and ellipsis, but I can ignore those.
Within that there is a Media tab, which was empty until this morning, but now shows the marriage certificate (and sometims where I have added photographs of the wedding and such). If I click on the "All" tab, then it shows the marriage date and place, husband and wife's name, childrens' names, all with dates and RINs. That is perfect.

If I click on the name of either parent or of one of the children, the Property box changes to show the information about those, including Media in the Media tab. The children's birth certificates etc show in the child's individual Media tab. I would not expect them to appear against "Marriage" (or "Family").

If I go to the record for someone who married more than once, then there are several bars labelled "Married <date> at <place>". Each of those entries has its own link to Media, and its own list of the children of that marriage. Perfect!

I'm not sure why I would have a problem with "Only by visual inspection can you tell which media item belongs to which event". Each media item appears with its description - "Marriage certificate for ..." or "Wedding photograph of ..." or "Family group photograph". I can click on each description to see a small version of the individual media item, or double-click on that to open it in a separate window.

At the moment, FH6 hiccups part way through backing up and triggers a "crash" warning at file 8, but then continues normally. That's the next item to investigate.