* Exporting to Gedsite format problem

[craigmollekin]

Hi,

I’ve recently been using the Gedsite website creation software with impressive results.

However, there seems to be a problem with the Export Gedcom Plug-in when exporting to Gedsite format.

If a couple do not have any details entered in the marriage fields, it detaches the couple. I don’t have marriage dates/locations for every single couple in my database, so this obviously a problem. I still wish the couple to appear married.

Is there any way around this problem?

I’ve attached two sample Gedcoms, one produced before using the plug-in and one produced after.

Here is what the output appears like online: http://mollekin.net/swintonrecord/g3/p2015.htm#i50373 (William is missing his wife).

[tatewise]

As explained in the Help, the Export Gedcom File plugin makes almost no changes to the Gedcom file apart from adding Sentence Template definitions. This is at the specific request of the GedSite author John Cardinal. So you need to send your comments to him.

[craigmollekin]

Thanks, Mike, I have

[JohnnyCee]

As explained in the Help, the Export Gedcom File plugin makes almost no changes to the Gedcom file apart from adding Sentence Template definitions. This is at the specific request of the GedSite author John Cardinal. So you need to send your comments to him.

Mike,

Just to be clear, it was not my intention to suggest that your plugin was doing anything wrong. I suggested that Craig get your input because I thought you would know when an FH couple has a MARR record and when they don't.

There is no MARR record for the families in question. Lacking a MARR record, GedSite will not create a marriage event, which is the correct outcome.

Based on screenshots sent to me by Craig, there is no Marriage fact for the couple, and that certainly seems like the reason there is no MARR record.

[craigmollekin]

It's certainly going to cause me a major headache if F.H. isn't creating MARR records for couples who do not have date/location entered Is this a query for Calico Pie perhaps? Or is not creating a MARR record somehow complying with the Gedcom standard when date/location isn't entered? If the latter, I wish there'd been some kind of warning, like when entering a wrong date into the software

[PeterR]

Just add a Marriage Event to the relevant Family Record in FH. This will appear in the GEDCOM file as 1 MARR Y.

[Valkrider]

You could always put in a c. year or a year range and that will probably overcome your problem.

[tatewise]

I suspect Craig is focussing on the Main tab of the Individual Property Box where the Marriage details can be entered.
The behaviour there is exactly the same as the earlier entries for Born and Died, etc.
If you do not enter anything, then no Birth Event or Death Event, etc, get created.

So if there is no Marriage data, then there is no Marriage Event, which deliberately caters for the possibility of unmarried couples, and the Status box allows for further clarification.

Do not confuse Birth, Death, Marriage events with Individual and Family records.
As soon as you add a Spouse or a Child or a Parent to an Individual then FH creates a Family record to hold the relationship as specified by GEDCOM.
Adding Individual and Family events to those records is quite separate.

I believe that GedSite should cater for that scenario and show Partnerships even when there are no Family events.
It is exactly the same as showing Parents and Children even when there are no Individual events.
Just show the Family record relationships unconditionally.

[craigmollekin]

Thanks for the suggestions. Adding a circa date might be iffy, what if the married couple never married etc, even if I suspected they did. But just because a couple didn't marry doesn't mean that I don't want them to appear as a couple. But I can't add that they were an unmarried couple either as they might have been married. It's seems a shame that I'm going to have thousands of couples in limbo all because of a missing MARR record

[craigmollekin]

But I now understand the logic behind it; thanks Mike.

[tatewise]

Craig, I suggest you persevere with John Cardinal to encourage all Family relationships to be shown even when no explicit facts.
As I said earlier, the Parent and Child relationships are shown in GedSite when no facts, so why not Spouse relationships when no facts? All other genealogy products show all those relationships without any facts.

[craigmollekin]

Mike, do you know if most/all genealogical software does/doesn't create a MARR record, even if there is no actual data entered? I'm just perplexed as to how people have got along with Gedsite/Second Site if couples are detached from one another when no marriage data has been entered. I can't be the only one who doesn't have data entered for married couples. Maybe it's a throwback to the way TMG did things. I suppose what I'm really trying to dig down to, is the way Family Historian creates/does not create a MARR record, correct and follows how a Gedcom should be created?

[jbtapscott]

Don't know if it helps but I have a good number of couples that have a Family record in FH but with no marriage, etc., recorded. On the website that GedSite generated I do not get a marriage reference / record but it does show (in the relevant section) that "the couple" had x children and then lists them.

Within my FH project (imported from TMG), I just have the two people set-up as the parents of the children (viz. no marriage event / date, etc).

[craigmollekin]

I think if there are children, then the couple are automatically bonded together in the Gedcom, lol. But if they don't procreate, they have to go their own separate ways

I suppose what I'm getting at, is, does most software automatically add a MARR record once you create a couple, or is it Family Historian being compliant by not doing so?

[tatewise]

As far as I am aware software products do not and should not create Marriage Events when no evidence that such an event happened, and that is how Gedcom is meant to be used. It would be a bit like automatically creating Baptism Events, Death Events, Census Events, or any other events, except perhaps Birth Events, when there is no evidence for them.

An often overlooked record type is the Family Record, partly because FH does not include its Families tab in the Records Window by default.

The Family Record is where family relationships are recorded for parents, husband, wife, and children.
As soon as you use any of those Add Father/Mother/Spouse/Partner/Child links, then a Family Record is created.
That is all that is needed to formally define those relationships - NO facts are needed at all - and certainly NOT Marriage Events.
Those relationships do not even have to be genetic, they can be adoptive, foster, step, or anything else.

Returning to GedSite and the Family Historian Sample Project there does not appear to be a problem.
Christopher Ian MUNRO is partnered with Nicola HEMMINGS and have NO Marriage Event or any other Family facts.
In GedSite at the top of the Christopher Ian MUNRO page is listed:

Christopher Ian Munro
M, #26, b. 12 January 1987
Parents
Father Ian Stephen Munro (b. 23 March 1953)
Mother Charlotte Carrington (b. 13 June 1957)
Family: Nicola Hemmings
Daughter Elizabeth Alice Munro (b. 11 January 2006)
Son Patrick Christopher Munro (b. 17 December 2007)

I am not sure what more could be expected?

[AdrianBruce]

I just did a little test in the (free) Roots Magic Essentials and 2 unmarried parents do not have a MARR event created in the exported GEDCOM. Which is correct in my book.

I may be missing the subtleties of what you expected to see, but on the web-site, as expected, it shows William Lent Sheppard to have 2 parents. And if you click the Family Explorer, you see Therese listed there as his (WLS's) partner.

Contrast this to WLS' parents - William Sheppard has a similar Family Explorer entry but also "Family: Maria Elizabeth Reynolds". It's that display that's slightly misleading - it ought to say "Spouse: Maria Elizabeth Reynolds". Or the partner should appear whether married or not.

But Therese is there - just not as obvious as you might have expected.

[craigmollekin]

Thanks, Mike, that all makes sense. In fifteen years of dealing with Gedcoms, I've never experienced anything like this, so it's thrown me a bit.

Adrian; that is an interesting observation, one that I missed. So Gedsite is recording the relationship, just not making it visible in the actual person's profile.

[JohnnyCee]

Adrian; that is an interesting observation, one that I missed. So Gedsite is recording the relationship, just not making it visible in the actual person's profile.

Craig,

That is not correct. There are several options for the heading of the family sections and the "Family:" prefix is only one. If the person is a spouse, i.e., the couple has a marriage record, GedSite will include the marriage event elsewhere in the person page entry.

[craigmollekin]

John - I can see no reference to Therese from this page: http://mollekin.net/swintonrecord/g3/p2015.htm#i50373 But yet she appears in the Family Explorer.

[JohnnyCee]

Contrast this to WLS' parents - William Sheppard has a similar Family Explorer entry but also "Family: Maria Elizabeth Reynolds". It's that display that's slightly misleading - it ought to say "Spouse: Maria Elizabeth Reynolds". Or the partner should appear whether married or not.

Adrian,

Using the "Family:" heading is one option. There are others. The "Family" choice is intentionally vague because there are dozens of possible combinations and characterizing them succinctly in a heading can be challenging. In any case, it's not the intent of that text indicate the marriage or lack of a marriage of the parents in the family. If the couple share a marriage, the marriage record is shown elsewhere in the person page entry.

[JohnnyCee]

John - I can see no reference to Therese from this page: http://mollekin.net/swintonrecord/g3/p2015.htm#i50373 But yet she appears in the Family Explorer.

Did you select the option to show family sections for childless couples?

[tatewise]

No Craig, you must be looking at something different to us, because the relationships I quoted are right at the top of every person's profile.
It says Parents and lists Father &/or Mother if any are recorded.
Then says Family and lists a Partner/Spouse and any Children.

BUT, I have just realised that GedSite only lists a Family if the partnership has Children.
So Craig, for your unmarried couples, do they have Children?
If not, then the Family partner/spouse is NOT listed at the top, even if there is a Marriage Event.
So if there are no Children and no Marriage or other Family event then the partner is not mentioned.

Where is the option to show family sections for childless couples?
Ah! Found it at Person Entry > Family Sections > Edit Item > Spouses > All Spouses instead of Spouses with children.
Seems odd that All Spouses is not the default?!

[craigmollekin]

All I ever wanted, was for couples to be displayed and we seem to have got there in the end via:-

"Person Entry > Family Sections > Edit Item > Spouses > All Spouses instead of Spouses with children."

The MARR record discussion has taken me on a very long walk around the garden!

The balance in the universe has now been restored, lol, or at least in my database anyway.

[JohnnyCee]

Seems odd that All Spouses is not the default?!

Mike,

It's not the default because in most cases, a couple without children has some other event that describes their relationship better than showing the partner/spouse with a lifespan and nothing else. I am not suggesting that the couple is not a family, only that a Marriage event or some other "lived as a committed couple" event will describe the circumstances in more detail and is more useful than a bare-bones family section. For those people who disagree with that design choice, the option exists to alter the behavior.

[craigmollekin]

My concern was that couples weren't appearing as couples. On my website, they were completely detached. This, through myself mentioning 'MARR' records, led to the discussion focusing on the specifics of marriage relationships. But all I wanted was for couples to appear as couples....which they do, if the correct options are selected as explained a couple of posts ago.

So for all intents and purposes, from my viewpoint, Gedsite is generating my websites exactly as I want them to be