Family Historian User Group

Although Ancestral Sources is an excellent product, there is always room for improvement as outlined below.
Source Record Fields:
All the Source Record fields should be supported on the Main Screen, including Short Title, Author, Custom id, Publication information, and Repository. The Short Title, Custom id, and Publication information fields each could have an option template similar to the Title Template. The Author and Repository fields should preserve their previous value from source to source, and session to session. This allows a batch of related sources to be entered without having to rekey the same field values, and without switching between Ancestral Sources and Family Historian.
Custom Text Labels:
The Text and Note fields on the Main Screen should support custom text Labels that are compatible with the Family Historian function GetLabelledText. Each Label would be named in the Census Templates in one of three Lists: (1) Start of Text (before any Auto Text); (2) End of Text (after any Auto Text); (3) Note Field. Each Label would be entered at the start of its own new line in the chosen field position. This allows other transcript details from the source, such as Registration District, Parish, County, etc., to be edited into the Source Record without switching between Ancestral Sources and Family Historian.
Gedcom Census Options:
Gedcom Census Options should be automatically imported into Ancestral Sources where applicable.
Custom Option Settings:
The Census > Flag Settings, Tools > Customise settings, and Tools > Options settings should NOT be stored within the Windows Registry. They should be stored within the Ancestral Sources folder per User, or per Project where applicable. There should be Export and Import buttons as in Census Templates Editor. (The buttons are needed even if Windows Registry is still used, to avoid using regedit to save the settings.)
Window Preservation:
All window characteristics (such as position, height, width, pane size, column widths, and cursor position) should be preserved indefinitely within sessions and across sessions, either per User or per Project.
Folder Preservation:
In all windows that browse for files, the last folder used should be preserved and used as the default the next time the window is used. A list of Recent Folders also would be handy. The folder usage should be preserved indefinitely within sessions and across sessions, either per User or per Project.

Thanks for your great work on Gedcom Census and Ancestral Sources which I have used extensively and saved loads of time compared with manual census entry. I am working on some updates to UK Census Templates which I shall post soon.

ID:4593

tatewise said:
All the Source Record fields should be supported on the Main Screen, including Short Title, Author, Custom id, Publication information, and Repository. The Short Title, Custom id, and Publication information fields each could have an option template similar to the Title Template. The Author and Repository fields should preserve their previous value from source to source, and session to session. This allows a batch of related sources to be entered without having to rekey the same field values, and without switching between Ancestral Sources and Family Historian.
Custom Text Labels:
The Text and Note fields on the Main Screen should support custom text Labels that are compatible with the Family Historian function GetLabelledText. Each Label would be named in the Census Templates in one of three Lists: (1) Start of Text (before any Auto Text); (2) End of Text (after any Auto Text); (3) Note Field. Each Label would be entered at the start of its own new line in the chosen field position. This allows other transcript details from the source, such as Registration District, Parish, County, etc., to be edited into the Source Record without switching between Ancestral Sources and Family Historian.

I've noted these suggestions though they will probably be dealt with much further down the development road

Gedcom Census Options:
Gedcom Census Options should be automatically imported into Ancestral Sources where applicable.

This was a deliberate decision because Ancestral Sources has so many more options and facilities that I wanted to force users to look through them and consider them. Also some options in GC are (deliberately) not in A.S.

Custom Option Settings:
The Census > Flag Settings, Tools > Customise settings, and Tools > Options settings should NOT be stored within the Windows Registry. They should be stored within the Ancestral Sources folder per User, or per Project where applicable. There should be Export and Import buttons as in Census Templates Editor. (The buttons are needed even if Windows Registry is still used, to avoid using regedit to save the settings.)

The registry is the standard way to record user settings and avoids complications of people accidentally deleting or moving their settings files, permissions, files being open, etc. A user will always be able to write to the 'current user' part of the registry (apart from very unlikely circumstances). I do agree it might be nice to have the option to use a file instead. Something to consider for a future version. I always intended an 'export' but ran out of time for version 1.

Window Preservation:
All window characteristics (such as position, height, width, pane size, column widths, and cursor position) should be preserved indefinitely within sessions and across sessions, either per User or per Project.

Some of this is already done, but I could do more I agree.

Folder Preservation:
In all windows that browse for files, the last folder used should be preserved and used as the default the next time the window is used. A list of Recent Folders also would be handy. The folder usage should be preserved indefinitely within sessions and across sessions, either per User or per Project.

I do this in most (?) areas. In others I think I've actually gone much further - for example it remembers the folder where images were last accessed for the particular census/year. Is there anywhere in particular that you find this to be an issue.

Cheers

Nick

Hi Nick,

Thanks for your comprehensive response.
I did not expect any of the Wish List items to be rectified soon, but I thought it worthwhile logging my ideas while still fresh in my mind.

Here are the places where folder locations are not remembered:

Census > Census Templates > Export & Import buttons.
(Export button is linked to File > Open GEDCOM File option)
(Import button always offers My Documents folder)

Hope this helps.