Family Historian User Group

Hello all,

I'm looking for some guidance on using Census events. Firstly what is the difference between a Census event and a Family census event ? Is it as simple as the first being an individual and the second being two or more related people ?

Up to now I haven't used any census events - I have added an occupation event and a residence event. I now discover that there are some very useful utilities that need the census event to report on 'coverage'. In particular I have been looking at the 'Census and BMD analysis' from Cole Valley Girl and the inbuilt census reports and queries.

If I want to change it will mean a lot of re-typing [frown] so I'd like to understand the benefits.

I'd be very interested to hear what others do and how useful they find the census reporting.

Thanks in anticipation
Peter


ID:3754

I just use Nick Walker's gedcom census program (free download from this site) and it creates the events for me.

As Irene says use GEDCOM Census to enter your census entries. It saves lots of time and does an excellent job of creating consistent entries.

Amazing - responses within minutes !

How does Gedcom Census cope with existing entries ? Do I have to re-enter it again ?

Does Gedcom Census keep a separate database of 'Households' I guess I need to understand better how Gedcom Census interacts with FH and its data. I'll have a good read of the helpfile

Thanks, Peter

Gedcom Census doesn't do anything that you couldn't do manually in Family Historian, it just lets you do it more quickly and with less repetitive copying and pasting. Importantly, because of the wide variety of options for how people record census entries and the way that the GEDCOM standard allows multiple copies of data to be held with potential inconsistency, it doesn't attempt to allow editing of existing census data, it just enables you to add new census entries. It really depends on how your existing census entries are held. A lot of users have told me that once they began to use Gedcom Census it made them want to go back and re-enter their census data as they like the way GC does things and wanted consistency in their recording methods.

And no it doesn't create a database of census households, all of the data it creates is within the Family Historian GEDCOM data file.

With regard to Nicks comment > A lot of users have told me that once they began to use Gedcom Census it made them want to go back and re-enter their census data as they like the way GC does things and wanted consistency in their recording methods.

I must agree! After a couple of tries of using GC, I realised how useful it was. I then tried several of the options until I found the details I required and then re-entered ALL of the Census data for both of the Trees (now Projects).

One possible for the GC Wishlist would be the option for a Family gathering - such as a Wedding or 50th Wedding Anniversary so that all those who attend could be listed on a known date.

Nick - Gedcom Census is an excellent addition to Family Historian - many thanks for making our lives easier.

Bilko

The bit of the original question that I'm still not clear on is
' ....what is the difference between a Census event and a Family census event ?'

Hopefully an answer to this would provide me with some clarification of when the different events should be used.

My supplementary question is ' Are their advantages/disadvantages to either?'

I think Census is the only GEDCOM 5.5 standard event that can be used with either Individual or Family.  The only difference is in the type of record to which the event is attached.

The huge disadvantage of using a Family census event is that it is not clear what is meant by 'family'.  In general not all members of a family would have been present when the census was taken.  Some may have died before the census, others may have been born after the census, and others may have been away temporarily, or have left home permanently.

I believe it is much better to record each census event only against each Individual recorded at the address for the particular census.  And I certainly agree with everyone else who recommends that the best way of doing this is to use Nick Walker's excellent Gedcom Census.

I think the basic answer that I and most experienced users would give is don't use Family census events.

A family record usually consists of parents and a number of children. A family census event would therefore appear to apply to all of the members of the family. However, in most cases this isn't true. For example in 1841 there might just be the parents, then in 1851 some of the children may appear, by 1871 some of the children may have left home, some died, etc. So rather than use a single family event it is best to use an individual census event for each person. Naturally it would usually take a long time to create all these multiple individual census events so researchers will use family census events, however misleading they may be, as a shortcut.

It was when I realised the limitations of the family census event and the time-consuming nature of entering the multiple individual census events that I developed the Gedcom Census program for myself and then later released it for others to use 'by popular demand'.

Nick

Thank you for your swift replies - they are really helpful.

To date I had been using the individual census event, but I wondered if I was misunderstanding/mis-using it, so I thought I should get a clearer of understanding of the family census event.

I have used GedCOM census in the past (it is a while since I have entered any census events) and found it to be an excellent tool. Thank you Nick.