* Backup and Restore via Windows: Witness Roles question

[wellera]

Hi

Great Plugin and very helpful for me to bring my FH customisations over to a new new PC.

I think I may have discovered a small glitch and hope it is helpful.

On my source PC I have defined various witness role types - eg "Informant and Present at death" and defined sentences to go with each role. However, when I used the plugin to configure FH on the new PC, these new definitions were missing.

I first spotted this on the facts tab on a person who was a witness to a death event. If it was one of my defined witness role types, the event simply showed "Death" rather than the sentence associated with the Death witness role type.

I was able to recreate my witness role types manually, and thankfully this fixed all the related events, so it wasn't too big an issue.

Hope this feedback helps improve the Plugin.

Andrew

[Mark1834]

Thanks for that feedback, Andrew.

That's an odd one. Witness roles are not saved separately, so it sounds like the wrong version of the Fact Set file is being used. Taking your example, do you add a new witness role to the standard Death fact, or to a cloned custom copy that eclipses the standard fact?

Do you by any chance use Directory Junctions to relocate where your Fact Set files are stored. They will need setting up manually on the new PC, as the plugin copies to and from relocated folders ok, but does not recreate the redirection.

[Mark1834]

Another thought - did you restore to FH6 then upgrade to FH7? It’s possible that has overwritten your customisations to standard facts.

[wellera]

It was FH7 to Fh7 backup/restore. (v7.0.18)

[Mark1834]

OK, we can rule that one out. What about my other question please - did you modify the standard Death fact or clone it to create a custom version that you then edited? Once I know exactly what you did, I can try to replicate it.

[tatewise]

Andrew, please confirm that the affected Fact Set scope is System global and not Project local.
The Backup & Restore plugin(s) only handle System global customisations (not just Fact Sets but others too).
The FH Project Full/Medium Backups hold the Project local customisations (not just Fact Sets but some others).

[wellera]

Hi Mike

I'm not sure of the technical way to confirm "local" or "global", but I created a new Gedcom on the source PC and checked if the witness roles I'd created in my original Gedcom showed up. They did, so I'm assuming that means they are global and not limited to a particular Gedcom or project.

(BTW My Gedcom is "standalone" and not part of a FH Project, in case that's relevant)

Hope this helps

Andrew

[wellera]

Hi Mark

Sorry I missed a couple of your questions:

OK, we can rule that one out. What about my other question please - did you modify the standard Death fact or clone it to create a custom version that you then edited? Once I know exactly what you did, I can try to replicate it.

No - it's the standard death fact that I've added witness role types to.

Thanks for that feedback, Andrew.

That's an odd one. Witness roles are not saved separately, so it sounds like the wrong version of the Fact Set file is being used. Taking your example, do you add a new witness role to the standard Death fact, or to a cloned custom copy that eclipses the standard fact?

Do you by any chance use Directory Junctions to relocate where your Fact Set files are stored. They will need setting up manually on the new PC, as the plugin copies to and from relocated folders ok, but does not recreate the redirection.

I'm not sure if it a directory junction, but my Windows setup has "My documents" moved to a specific folder on drive D: (exactly the same on old and new PC). All of my Gedcom and related images etc are under "My Documents" on D:
Nothing else configured "oddly" on my systems as far as I can tell.

[wellera]

In case it's relevant, the old PC was Windows 10. New one is Windows 11.

Andrew

[tatewise]

I'm not sure of the technical way to confirm "local" or "global", but I created a new Gedcom on the source PC and checked if the witness roles I'd created in my original Gedcom showed up. They did, so I'm assuming that means they are global and not limited to a particular Gedcom or project.

The way to differentiate Project local from System global Facts Sets is to use Tools > Fact Types... then click the Fact Sets... button and check the Scope of each Fact Set. Project Fact Sets always take precedence over System Fact Sets.

How did you create the new GEDCOM file? Did you copy the original GEDCOM file?

Witness Role tags can exist in a GEDCOM file (or Project data) without a matching Witness Role being defined in a Fact Set.
Conversely, Witness Roles can be defined in a Fact Set without necessarily appearing in the GEDCOM file.
That is because Fact Set definitions are held in a separate .fhf file and not in the .ged file.
System .fhf files are handled by Backup & Restore plugins. Project .fhf files are handled by Project Medium/Full Backups.
The GEDCOM file itself plays no part in migrating Fact Set .fhf files from PC to PC.

So when you say you checked that Witness Roles "showed up" we need to know explicitly where you looked.

The Windows version is not significant.

[wellera]

Thanks Mike

The way to differentiate Project local from System global Facts Sets is to use Tools > Fact Types... then click the Fact Sets... button and check the Scope of each Fact Set. Project Fact Sets always take precedence over System Fact Sets.

Using "Death" event as an example, it's showing as a standard event.

How did you create the new GEDCOM file? Did you copy the original GEDCOM file?

File, Gedcom file tasks, New Gedcom file (ie completely new file to test if my fact sets were residing in the old Gedcom)

Witness Role tags can exist in a GEDCOM file (or Project data) without a matching Witness Role being defined in a Fact Set.
Conversely, Witness Roles can be defined in a Fact Set without necessarily appearing in the GEDCOM file.
That is because Fact Set definitions are held in a separate .fhf file and not in the .ged file.
System .fhf files are handled by Backup & Restore plugins. Project .fhf files are handled by Project Medium/Full Backups.
The GEDCOM file itself plays no part in migrating Fact Set .fhf files from PC to PC.

So when you say you checked that Witness Roles "showed up" we need to know explicitly where you looked.

I created a death entry in the new test Gedcom, and clicked the cog to add witnesses. I added the son of the deceased in the witness dialog box, and when I clicked the dropdown for "role", the role types I had created were present. So I concluded they were not project specific.

Andrew

[tatewise]

That would certainly seem to confirm that the Fact Set has a global System scope.
So that leaves the question why the Backup & Restore via Windows plugin does not copy it across to the other PC.
A stab in the dark, begs the question, are you sure the correct backup file is being copied to and restored on the other PC.

Bear in mind the Backup & Restore via Windows plugin will happily restore a backup made by my Backup & Restore plugin.
So have you used mine in the past and copied the wrong backup by mistake?

As an experiment try transferring by using my older Backup and Restore FH Settings plugin. Does that succeed or fail?

[wellera]

That would certainly seem to confirm that the Fact Set has a global System scope.
So that leaves the question why the Backup & Restore via Windows plugin does not copy it across to the other PC.
A stab in the dark, begs the question, are you sure the correct backup file is being copied to and restored on the other PC.

Bear in mind the Backup & Restore via Windows plugin will happily restore a backup made by my Backup & Restore plugin.
So have you used mine in the past and copied the wrong backup by mistake?

As an experiment try transferring by using my older Backup and Restore FH Settings plugin. Does that succeed or fail?

I'll try another backup/restore tomorrow using the older Plugin.

I'm confident I was using the right backup files (in my folder "D:\Family Weller\Documents\Andrew\Genealogy\General\Software\Family Historian\Backup and restore FH settings (via Windows)".

I've uploaded that folder to https://www.dropbox.com/sh/yziy24ehrfsx ... wolna?dl=0 in case that helps diagnosis.

On the positive side of things, the Plugin did a brilliant job of bringing all my other settings across (report/diagram/sentence customisations etc etc)

Thanks again Mike

[tatewise]

On a quick look at the Dropbox files I can see nothing amiss with the Fact Set files.

[Mark1834]

I’ll try another backup/restore tomorrow using the older Plugin

Could you try both plugins please? I’m reasonably confident that it is a Fact Set issue rather than a plugin issue, but if you see no difference that will confirm it.

[Mark1834]

Thinking about it in more detail, a second backup and restore (with either plugin) wouldn’t prove anything as your files are in a different state to when you did it the first time.

To do it thoroughly, you should completely delete FH from your new PC between tests, but that is probably too drastic!

I have thought of a possible scenario that could explain what you have seen. You originally modified the standard Fact Set file, and when restoring to the new PC, this file would not be restored if it meant overwriting a more recent Fact Set file on the new PC unless you selected the Overwrite option in the plugin menu.

This is a difference between the two plugins. The old one offers file by file confirmation if it sees this situation, while the new one prefers a simpler “always” or “never” option.

If that is the case, it illustrates why modifying the standard Fact Set file is unwise, and it is better to create a cloned custom copy.

[tatewise]

To be fair the old plugin offers 'all' or 'never' or 'one by one' options.
Once a date difference is detected you can choose from those multiple options to overwrite or not overwrite just the one file or apply that choice to all future files.

[Mark1834]

It’s probably worth including this scenario in the KB comparison of the two plugins.

The older one works at the file level, so offers greater fine control for this situation, while the newer one works at the folder level with user-selected general options. This sacrifices the fine control for a simpler interface and significantly quicker operation, particularly when updating an existing backup or when restoring.

Neither approach is intrinsically right or wrong or better than the other - they are just different design choices and priorities.

[wellera]

OK, I've tested with both the old and new Plugins - and got different results!

1. Backup and Restore Family Historian Settings v3.5
2. Backup and Restore Family Historian Settings via Windows v1.2.1

The "via Windows" plugin didn't restore my Death fact witness roles. The other Plugin did.

The steps I took were:
1. On target PC, I deleted one of my Death witness roles to make sure I could check if it was restored. (Tools, Fact Types, Death/edit, Roles and delete my "Informant and present at" entry).
2. Check it's missing when viewing a person's properties / facts list. It was missing, so the event showed up in the list simply as "Death" without the witness role sentence (as expected)
3. Run both Plugins on the old PC
4. Restore using "via Windows" plugin and check results ("Informant and present at" witness role had not been restored)
5. Restore using Backup and Restore Family Historian Settings v3.5 - the witness role was restored.

[Mark1834]

Before we get too carried away, the video referee has to intervene - did you select the "Discard any changes..." option when restoring using the Windows plugin? If you didn't, this is exactly the scenario I described above. The backup file is older so will not overwrite the newer file on the target PC.

[wellera]

Before we get too carried away, the video referee has to intervene - did you select the "Discard any changes..." option when restoring using the Windows plugin? If you didn't, this is exactly the scenario I described above. The backup file is older so will not overwrite the newer file on the target PC.

When I ran the "Restore Family History Settings" (just after I'd restored using the "via Windows" plugin) it correctly spotted I was going to restore over newer settings on the target PC. I clicked "Copy All Old Files" which I took to mean it would restore from my backup regardless of finding newer files on the target PC.

Hope that makes sense.

Andrew

[Mark1834]

Andrew,

I've confirmed with my own testing that if you run a backup, create a new witness role for a standard fact, then restore the backup using the Windows plugin, the witness role is not restored unless you choose the "Discard any changes..." option.

The plugin is therefore behaving exactly as designed. The old plugin checks each file and asks specifically, while the new plugin uses the option set by the user.

I should explain that the opening comment of my previous post was not taking a pop at you. It was aimed at a rather ill-judged post that has now disappeared without comment or explanation, which rather changes the context of my comment. Only forum moderators have the ability to rewrite history and cover their tracks in this way, so please moderators, don't abuse it and change the context of what we ordinary users are posting...

[ColeValleyGirl]

Mark, in this case, it was me, removing unnecessary provocative comment that wasn't adding to finding a solution.

[tatewise]

It appears we are not allowed to engage in light-hearted banter now that IMO was not provocative.
I will have to be very careful what I post from now on as even the smilies are ignored.

[ColeValleyGirl]

You can't control how a comment will be read, Mike, no matter your intent. And smilies are visual noise that my brain (and I suspect others) filter out, even if I could be bothered to learn the difference between them.