* All Relatives Diagram

[farm7880]

This is probably so basic and obvious, but why does the eldest child in a family show correctly on the line of siblings on the left of the tree, but then is taken across to the far right of the tree to display with his wives and children, in the process cutting across the descent lines for children of siblings, which I was taught many years ago was a total no-no on a family tree.

It just looks bizarre, why does this man and all his descendant family not stay on the left? Also the man involved has his two wives shown in reverse. First wife on right and second wife on left of him. Why is this?

I can attach screen shots if my words do not explain.
Regards
Andrew

[AdrianBruce]

I believe this is because it's an All-Relatives diagram, not a straight pedigree or descent chart.

FH will have algorithms to draw such a chart, containing a whole series of criteria to follow. Looking at one I just fired-up, one family has just been shifted right (leaving a dotted box where the father came from) because (I guess) the overall width of the chart is reduced considerably as it's been shifted into some otherwise blank space.

Any machine produced design will almost certainly contain several bits where a human says "But I'd never draw it like that". Indeed, the human version might well be better than the machine-version for the author's own purposes. However, the human version will almost certainly have transgressed some principles that in other cases are sensible.

So, FH's All-Relatives diagram will be drawn using criteria and algorithms that, on average, perform well. Any specific diagram, however, might be improved by humans.

On a personal level, things like the All-Relatives diagram attracted me to FH in the first place. However, they get to be so complex that I now prefer to just draw small parts of my tree using the old-fashioned pedigree and / or descent.

[tatewise]

That does sound bizarre.
One thing to try is Tools > Re-order Out-of-Sequence Data that might fix the wives order.

Are you talking about a greyed out Proxy box for the eldest son in the correct sibling position, linked to a Standard box with all his details adjacent to his wives.
This is probably necessary in order to display one of his wife's ancestors.

If that does not explain things then please post a screenshot, with a short explanation of how the All Relations Diagram was created.

[farm7880]

Thanks for the replies.

I created the all relatives diagram by focusing on the root person and then clicking on all relatives button. The diagram is fine in that everybody is there, except for the strange layout.

I tried all the sequencing, check for order, spouse in order etc that I could think of, still the same format.

I hope the attached screen shots will open. I had to do a left and right, hope you can see the join.

Crockford left.JPG (103.27 KiB) Viewed 10318 times

[attachment=0]Crockford right.JPG[/attachment

[farm7880]

Not sure the right side shows correctly, so here is a right, right view.

crockford right right.JPG (61.54 KiB) Viewed 10317 times

[tatewise]

Did you literally use the command Tools > Re-order Out-of-Sequence Data ?

By default the 1st spouse is usually shown on the right, and 2nd spouse on the left.
Use Diagram > Options > General tab Spouse layout options for other arrangements.

I presume you have not hidden any boxes.

Does Diagram > Hide/Show Boxes > Show Hidden Boxes reveal any boxes around John Turner CROCKFORD or his wives?

Has the Diagram been built recently or is it an old saved Chart?

[farm7880]

Yes, literally. Re-ordering complete ) etc............

Tried the wife default and layout options. Reckon I am still default.

Not aware I have hidden any boxes, but the attached may suggest otherwise?

Crockford Hidden Boxes.JPG (44.19 KiB) Viewed 10304 times

Not sure where that came from?

Diagram was created today.

[LornaCraig]

This layout is exactly what I would expect, assuming that it is an All Relatives diagram where the root person is a descendant of John Turner Crockford and Florence Knight. Thomas's 2nd spouse has been shifted to the left so that Florence's ancestors (who are ancestors of the root person) can be placed as close as possible to Florence. This would be clearer if you had any ancestors of Florence Knight in the tree.

I don't think changing the spouse layout options has any effect when the spouses in question are spouses of a direct ancestor in this type of tree. However the default is for out-of-sequence spouses to be numbered accordingly (hence the small number 2 beside the 2nd spouse's box).

[farm7880]

OK, I understand why that small part of the tree might be like that, but why does John Turner Crockford not stay on the left of the whole tree, where there is plenty of room for him and wives and families?

Why does he shoot "randomly" across to the right?

[LornaCraig]

He is not shooting 'randomly' across to the right. Again, this would be clearer if you had any ancestors of Florence Knight in the tree. If he stayed on the left, she would have to shoot even further across from the right to the left, leaving her a long way from her own family. The layout is desigend so that the the two sides of the family meet somewhere in the middle.

Given that you don't (at present) have any other family for Florence you can probably make the tree look more sensible by using the Movement Control Box which is accessed from the icon second from right in the diagram toolbar. Search in the Help files for 'Movement Control Box' for guidance, or read Chapter 10 of 'Getting the Most from Family Historian' (also available from the Help menu).

[farm7880]

Thanks for that Lorna.

Surely, though as Florence Knight has no ancestors on the tree, why move the whole family and descendants to the right? Even if she did have ancestors they would fit on the left?

The Knight and Crockford families would still meet in the "middle", albeit on the left of the tree, right now they meet "randomly" on the right.

Sorry still don't get it.

[tatewise]

Lorna, I have tried that kind of movement and failed miserably in this special case.

For the moment, while Florence Knight has no ancestors, try selecting John CROCKFORD as the Diagram Root and create the All Relatives Diagram around him.
I suspect all the same people will be included.

The reason he and his wives are off to the right is that the convention is Male Ancestors grow to the Left, and Female Ancestors grow to the Right.

As Adrian said originally, it is a machine following rules that sometimes do not look sensible from a human perspective.

[LornaCraig]

Even if she did have ancestors they would fit on the left?

No, they wouldn't. Look at this example (created from the FH Sample project). Anthony Munro has moved towards the right to meet up with Susan Dowling. Where would Susan's ancestors go, if Anthony stayed on the left?

[LornaCraig]

Lorna, I have tried that kind of movement and failed miserably in this special case.

A partial result can be achieved, as follows. In the example above (All Relatives based on Ian Stephen Munro as root), use the Box & Bar control to raise the bar just below Michael Smith Munro and Catherine Reardon. If you move it far enough up Anthony Edward Munro will move leftwards. You then need to adjust some horizontal settings, but it's fiddly and I wouldn't recommend it for someone who is not familiar with shifting diagram layouts.
Even now I don't think Anthony Munro can be moved up to be in line with his siblings, given the starting point of the All Relatives diagram.
Your suggestion of using John Turner Crockford as the diagram root is much simpler, although there might be other people who would not then be included: for example if the original diagram root has another ancestral branch entered in the file, that branch would not be included in the diagram.

[tatewise]

Ah, Yes, I can recreate that, but as you say it is not ideal, because the generations are no longer in the same rows.

In this type of scenario, the problem is the convention of extending the Male Ancestors to the left and Female Ancestors to the right.
What sometimes would work better is if that convention was reversed.
In Andrew's example it would work perfectly, as long as there are not converse cases.

As an experiment, I swapped the SEX of everyone in the FH Sample Project.
(Used a text editor to replace 1 SEX M with 1 SEX X then 1 SEX F with 1 SEX M and finally 1 SEX X with 1 SEX F)
That gives a neater result.
If you change Anthony Edward MUNRO to be Born in 1912 so he is the eldest son it mimics Andrew's scenario.
With a little movement it is possible to achieve an almost perfect result as he requested.

So maybe Calico Pie could add an option to reverse the Male/Female Ancestor left/right convention.

[LornaCraig]

So maybe Calico Pie could add an option to reverse the Male/Female Ancestor left/right convention.

If the reversal applied globally to a whole diagram it might create as many problems as it solved. But it would be useful if it could be applied to selected ancestral couples. I have no idea how easy this would be to achieve from the programming point of view.

[tatewise]

That is an interesting idea, and I suspect the programming should be quite easy, as it just involves swapping the Male/Female roles & rules.
Note that it would also swap those Spouses around, with the Wife on the left and Husband on the right, which would be inconsistent with the rest of the tree.

I imagine that with large complex trees, the pros and cons will be marginal, but smaller trees with only the odd couple where it matters would benefit.
That is why I thought a global setting would be better, because it is only likely to benefit smaller trees and keeps the whole tree consistently reversed, both in Ancestral Male/Female lines and also Wife v Husband / left v right.

[farm7880]

Thank you all, especially Lorna and Mike for your interest and help. Another learning experience for me!
Regards
Andrew