* Sources, Citations and Methods

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Barnowl
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Sources, Citations and Methods

Post by Barnowl »

I have been writing a plugin to address the missing data, UDFs and other problems in data imported into Family Historian (FH) (v6) from Family Tree Maker (FTM) (2014). I have posted this in the plugin section.

Like everyone else I have been struggling to know how and where to save Source and Citation information, and related images . I have not until now engaged in the debate over sources and the two methods suggested for dealing with them, but it always had the feeling of forcing a round peg into a square hole: that neither of the two methods as described seems to quite fit what we are trying to do with data we are dealing with. There are flies in both jars of ointment!
As I see it the choice presented by the Method 1 – Method 2 debate, if I understand it right is:-
1. Every citation has its own source and we can use the “Where in Source” and “Text from Source” in the source window. (I am not quite clear whether it is intended with this method we would at least combine sources of different events for the same person? E.g. Name, Birth, Residence from 1901 Census for Thomas Atkins.) This method creates the largest increase in the number of sources but will never paint itself into the corner of not allowing different citations to say different things.
2. Combine sources as much as possible and maintain a single instance of the citation information in the source record itself, rather than the conveniently situated and labelled citation text and page on the front screen. Just say you have a son and his household living next door to his parents and younger siblings, appearing on the same census page? Surely he needs a different citation, but it is the same source.) While not so large as Method 1 the number of sources still goes up several times over. And to me, while the duplication issue is addressed, the empty Citation boxes on the Individual’s screen seem to imply there is no information held.

There are suggestions that it is possible to have a source as general as “1851 England Census”, as is in fact presented to us in FH after an import from FTM. However this scheme is just not usable in FH, as unlike FTM and Ancestry, FH does not allow an image to be attached to a citation. As soon as you attach an image to such a general source, it immediately becomes the image seen by every record citing the source, for example citations of the 1851 Census, throughout the project. So a new less general source needs to be made for the page of the census illustrated by the image, which can be referred to by every Individual on that page. That is as far as the generalization can go. Frustratingly it is precisely the availability of those images delivered into your media folder “just like that” which makes the FTM import route so attractive in the first place!

Method 1 also does not completely address the duplication problem, as the same source can be cited by more than one of an Individual’s events, and by his Name. Perhaps, as any Individual source must be evidence of Name, Name could cite all of an Individual’s sources whether or not it does currently, and that this could be the only place the citation information will be maintained, the other citations being just a stub pointing you to the Name. Still a bit artificial I think.

It also occurs to me that there is a possible Method 3. Keep the very general FTM-style source and never attach a source image to either the source or the citation. Instead add the image to the individual directly. Initially I didn’t like the idea, as it breaks the immediate link between the source and the image, but it does avoid the huge proliferation of sources with Method 1, and recording data buried in unnatural places with Method 2.

Images would have to be sorted to come at the end of the media list – and then preferably in date order - so existing pictures have priority over them to display in the focus window. Although the immediate link between the source and the image is broken, it is at least possible to store the Source ID in the text of the image in the NOTE tag of the image. The FH API accepts such a NOTE though it is not visible in the UI, which writes Picture Note into _NOTE. A future plugin source viewer would then be able to use the note to display the image.

My plugin initially used a mixture of Methods 1 and 2 (I have dubbed it Method 1.5), creating a combined source for each source document page, but retaining the individual citations, more obviously visible in FH. I then made it have a user selectable Source Method 1, 1.5, 2 or 3, to suit individual user’s tastes.

Nitty gritty definitions:-
It is interesting if ultimately fruitless to debate the correctness of not allowing citations to have images. We have to work with FH’s interpretation as a given at the end of the day. Nevertheless it is the cause of most of the awkwardness in FH with sources, and the reason why former Ancestry users have to learn a whole new way of working with them. In this respect FTM/Ancestry usage does not appear to me to break any GEDCOM rules, whatever else they may be guilty of:-
SOURCE_CITATION: =
[
n SOUR @<XREF:SOUR>@ /* pointer to source record */ {1:1}
+1 PAGE <WHERE_WITHIN_SOURCE> {0:1}
+1 EVEN <EVENT_TYPE_CITED_FROM> {0:1}
+2 ROLE <ROLE_IN_EVENT> {0:1}
+1 DATA {0:1}
+2 DATE <ENTRY_RECORDING_DATE> {0:1}
+2 TEXT <TEXT_FROM_SOURCE> {0:M}
+3 [ CONC | CONT ] <TEXT_FROM_SOURCE> {0:M}
+1 QUAY <CERTAINTY_ASSESSMENT> {0:1}
+1 <<MULTIMEDIA_LINK>> {0:M}
+1 <<NOTE_STRUCTURE>> {0:M}
| /* Systems not using source records */
n SOUR <SOURCE_DESCRIPTION> {1:1}
+1 [ CONC | CONT ] <SOURCE_DESCRIPTION> {0:M}
+1 TEXT <TEXT_FROM_SOURCE> {0:M}
+2 [CONC | CONT ] <TEXT_FROM_SOURCE> {0:M}
+1 <<NOTE_STRUCTURE>> {0:M}
]
… From the GEDCOM 5.5 specification.

In my Method 3 it would perhaps have been nice to reverse the order of things and to have the source be the source of the media, rather than the event. Again it appears that while GEDCOM allows this, FH does not. I am beginning to realize, while FH can quite justifiably say that its GEDCOM is 100% valid, the corollary, that if it is good GEDCOM then FH can handle it, is not necessarily always true.

In the light of the above can I suggest that FH consider making saving an image with a citation possible in future versions. At a stroke it would mean that all the source images imported into FH from FTM would be visible and usable, as the links and media files are already in place and the need for Methods would disappear.
Ian Johnson - researching Bain, Batley, Elsden, Ewen and Johnson families and the village of Easton Royal
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Re: Sources, Citations and Methods

Post by tatewise »

There is a lot there that needs some digestion, but a major flaw is the assertion that FH does not allow images in a Citation, when it does. I accept they are slightly hidden on the All tab, but they are supported, and do appear in Reports.

FH supports all valid GEDCOM structures, but as in this case, some are only visible in the default GUI on the All tab or the Records Window.
Citation linked to Media record, and Citation with local Media object.
Citation linked to Media record, and Citation with local Media object.
MediaCitation.png (19.14 KiB) Viewed 15579 times
Mike Tate ~ researching the Tate and Scott family history ~ tatewise ancestry
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Re: Sources, Citations and Methods

Post by NickWalker »

The 'method 1' and 'method 2' were terms that I invented to describe the methods that my software Ancestral Sources (and before that Gedcom Census) would support. Ancestral Sources has various options however so that these methods can be adapted in ways that you might describe as other methods. From your posting I'm not sure you've quite understood these completely.

Method 1 is really a way to avoid duplication of data in your file. e.g. a census entry with 5 individuals each with an occupation might lead to 15 facts each with a citation being created (census/occupation/birth maybe others such as religion) linked to a source for the census household. That source would include a transcription of the census and link to a multimedia image. Typically the 15 citations wouldn't have any data in them, they simply act as links.

Method 2 involves the least number of sources (e.g. Census 1851) but then all those 15 citations (using the same example) each have a lot more data within them so perhaps 15 copies of 'where in source', 15 transcriptions, 15 links to media, etc. Incidentally the links to media could be in the citation or linked to the events themselves. So method 2 duplicates the most data and if a census reference or transcription needs to be edited then it needs to be done in 15 places. So for this reason I would usually recommend Method 1.

Your method 3 requires the census image to be linked to each individual in the census but method 1 requires it to only be linked once. I don't think it makes sense to link an image of a census page to an individual as that isn't a picture of the individual!

Many hundreds of Family Historian users are regular users of Ancestral Sources and recommend it - I'd suggest giving it a try with the sample FH project to see how the data is saved. It is free (though donations are appreciated if you make extensive use of it).

You may also find the Sources Knowledge Base Article useful

Best wishes

Nick
Nick Walker
Ancestral Sources Developer

https://fhug.org.uk/kb/kb-article/ancestral-sources/
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Re: Sources, Citations and Methods

Post by Barnowl »

Mike:-
You are right, the images are visible in the All tab. I have also discovered that they can be edited, and added to in the All tab for new sources entered. I had got the impression during development of the plugin that you could not create such records in the API. I have tried a simple test and found that it is possible. I fear I misinterpreted an error I encountered trying to write a media link to a citation.

But is that really what FH should offer to tempt FTM users to switch to FH? It really is a second best solution! When you pull up the image it needs to have margins dragged before it is anything like full screen. It cannot be shown in the Windows media viewer.

My plugin will create sources where the images are visible in the media tab of the source.

Nick:-
Sorry if I mis-interpreted your Methods. I did not have use with Ancestral Sources in mind at all, just gleaning from the forums how other people were talking about the two methods, and attempting to provide something that matches them. "All people in a household" as a source strikes me as potentially a problem where a household goes over a page and there would be two images involved. My "Native" 1.5 method takes all people on a census page as a source. Perhaps it would reduce confusion if I called them A, B, C, D as they really don't relate to Ancestral Sources, just different ways to be able to display source images in FH.
I really don't have any problem with the images being held against the person - they are ABOUT him even if they don't DEPICT him - and interpreting the _PHOTO tag means the correct default image is always displayed.
Ian Johnson - researching Bain, Batley, Elsden, Ewen and Johnson families and the village of Easton Royal
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Re: Sources, Citations and Methods

Post by NickWalker »

There's nothing wrong with method 1 collecting all people on one page of a census as the source, except that it can lead to confusion as households are often split over pages. It is worth considering that there is nothing to stop an image being linked to multiple sources so e.g. you might choose to have 3 household sources from a page and all those sources linked to one image of the page they are on.

I wasn't bothered about you misinterpreting the methods other than that the fact you were suggesting that method 1 leads to more duplication than method 2 which isn't the case. I also wasn't suggesting you were talking about Ancestral Sources, but as it is certainly faster and easier to add census entries using AS it is worth trying it out and it might allow you to see the benefits of method 1 (or method A or whatever!).

I do appreciate that AS is more difficult to adopt when you already have hundreds of records in your file (though I know many users have taken the decision to start again with it!) which is where your plugin looks really helpful and congratulations on producing what looks like a very fully featured utility.

Nick
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https://fhug.org.uk/kb/kb-article/ancestral-sources/
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Re: Sources, Citations and Methods

Post by tatewise »

I agree it is not ideal, so when a Source needs Media then Method 1 is best solution.

I do not fully understand other comments about "needs to have margins dragged" and "Windows media viewer". If you mean FH Media Window then you can use Media camera icon, and select View Media Linked to..., then ensure Associate Sources & Source Citations is ticked, before clicking OK.

With Method 1 if a Census Household goes over more than 1 page then just link all the page images to the Source record Media tab. The Source record Text From Source would be a transcript of whole Household. Every member of household would cite the same Source record, possible more than once for say Birth, Occupation and Census facts. Ancestral Sources handles all that semi-automatically.

Also the same Media record can be linked to two different Source records where two households of interest happen to fall on that one page.

Holding document images such as Census pages against every Individual in the household has consequenes on how they appear in Reports that most users find unacceptable. I do not understand where you put the Census citations and transcripts when the images are linked to Individual.
Mike Tate ~ researching the Tate and Scott family history ~ tatewise ancestry
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Re: Sources, Citations and Methods

Post by AdrianBruce »

Barnowl wrote:...
1. Every citation has its own source and we can use the “Where in Source” and “Text from Source” in the source window. (I am not quite clear whether it is intended with this method we would at least combine sources of different events for the same person? E.g. Name, Birth, Residence from 1901 Census for Thomas Atkins.) ...
Not sure whether you've worked this out yet from the other comments, but "Every citation has its own source" (my italics) isn't how it works. I'm not sure if this will help but ...

I have a feeling that FTM (and possibly others) make more, in some sense, of the "citation" data than the GEDCOM format and FamilyHistorian do. Assuming that the citation data you refer to is the stuff in the yellow source pane for a person, then each citation points to one source-record but multiple citations can point to the same source-record.

In IT Data Analysis terms, there is a many-to-many relationship between facts and source-records. The citation in the yellow-source-pane resolves that in standard DA terms (which may not may not help the reader) to one fact relating to one or many citations, and one source-record relating to one or many citations.

Thus if I had a census schedule for a household spread across two images, I'd create one source-record for this schedule first, set up the basic citation detail in the yellow "automatic source citations" window above the source-records, enable automatic source citation, and enter the facts for each person / family. This copies the basic citation detail into the yellow source pane for each individual's facts (etc.). After each data entry and population of the yellow source pane, any tweaking can be done to the citation data, e.g. to add the text from source or change the source for that fact from primary to secondary.

The one source-record will (potentially) link, via citations, to the name, residence, occupation, birth-data, etc., of each person in the household. Potentially each citation in the yellow source pane for each person might be different in the text-from-source (say) but frankly, I find that when I need to see the source text, it's usually easier to zip through to the image. My exception to that is on the birth data where I do enter age and birth place in the text from source, for convenience, as that's one that I do need to reconcile often.

I think that a difference between FH and FTM is that FTM may preserve the basic citation detail from the yellow "automatic source citations" window??? i.e. it keeps permanently the details of the source in one record and the details of the citation in one record. Or am I totally wrong on that? Or irrelevant? Whereas FH does not keep that data in one record - it's copied it into each citation against each of the facts, because GEDCOM has nowhere else to put it.

Feel free to ignore this if you understood it already!
Adrian
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Re: Sources, Citations and Methods

Post by DavidNewton »

AdrianBruce wrote:
I think that a difference between FH and FTM is that FTM may preserve the basic citation detail from the yellow "automatic source citations" window??? i.e. it keeps permanently the details of the source in one record and the details of the citation in one record. Or am I totally wrong on that? Or irrelevant? Whereas FH does not keep that data in one record - it's copied it into each citation against each of the facts, because GEDCOM has nowhere else to put it.

Feel free to ignore this if you understood it already!
I confess to not being a database expert but I have in the past used FTM and am now using FH and this crucial distinction is that in FTM if you copy a citation to paste to other facts then when you paste you have the choice of linking or copying, a choice which is not available in FH which only allows copying. As AdrianBruce says this surely implies a database structure in which citations are primary records, which is not the case with FH.

David
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Re: Sources, Citations and Methods

Post by jimlad68 »

Ian et al

I must say this is all a bit confusing, and I hope I don't make it more so!!

I came from TMG which I understand to be very Event driven, and encouraging witnesses, etc over shared sources. It was only when I came to FH I started to understand the "power/flexibility" of sources as in AS method 1 and as Nick says I am one of those who "have taken the decision to start again with it" (=method 1 as in AS). Ironically this can be done with most genealogy programs, I just think it is the way they produce reports etc that seems to favour different data saving methods, for instance I have experimented sending my Gedcom to Ancestry trees and I cannot find where the source text is, yet its stablemate Rootsweb trees displays them perfectly.

Ian, I much applaud your detailed investigation, I thought I did a lot when I transferred, but yours puts mine to shame, I would just like to encourage you, as some "data method" preparation up front can save so much time later on, and, as you seem very computer literate, you should be able to tweak things via lua etc in the future when you want to change course and I look forward to your knowledge and contributions. I sometimes think we get more pleasure out of "tweaking" than doing, but then the results are the proof of the pudding, but lets make the journey enjoyable.
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Re: Sources, Citations and Methods

Post by Barnowl »

Mike,
My problem with dragging the boundaries is when you go to the All tab and double click on the image file to get it to display, the little black triangle in the yellow circle is not available. I agree the camera icon does help a bit.

The method where the source images are stored against the individual I simply leave the source and citation exactly as it was in Ancestry, as without an image to bother it, it works fine. I will look into the consequences this has for reports. They to have a type 'Document' that distinguishes them from 'Pictures' which may help to deal with that.

I am obviously going to have to do a bit more homework on Method 1 and 2. I still like the Census Page being the source so it has a single image stored against it. Sure it splits households, but it works in the same way as when the image was in the citation.

At the moment I am concentrating on dealing with more UDF cases that I had not dealt with as they did not come up in my data. Then I will revisit sources.

Yes Jim, it is easy to lose track of why you are doing all the tweaking, but it is combining two things I enjoy, so why not!
Ian Johnson - researching Bain, Batley, Elsden, Ewen and Johnson families and the village of Easton Royal
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Re: Sources, Citations and Methods

Post by tatewise »

Ian,
Yes, the All tab does not offer the Edit Media Item window of the Media tab, nor the Multimedia Window.

If you add Media images to the Individual (or Family) Media tab, or directly to a Fact, there are two consequences:
  1. In Reports, they are displayed amongst Photos of the Individual/Family/Fact and unrelated to the associated Source Citation. The Type has no impact on Reports.
  2. You must remember to add each Media image separately from each Citation.
I cannot come to terms with the idea of a Census Page being a Source instead of using a Census Household.
One drawback is it becomes much more difficult to find all the members of any one household.
With a Source record per Census Household, it is easy to find every Citation of that Source which identify just that household's Individuals.
Whereas, with a Source record per Census Page, those Citations may identify unrelated households from one page, or may not include a whole household if split across pages.

Remember that a Census Page has just one Media image & record, but is linked to the Media tab of each Source record associated with a household on that page. Each Source record Text From Source then holds a transcript of one household of people. When you examine a series of Source household records for the same family, then the evolution of the family is clear. I don't see how that works for Source pages, because you have to record multiple street addresses as well as multiple people. Presumably each Citation must also add a Where Within Source to identify the household.

Also in FH, the specific household entry can be put in a Detail Frame that appears in Reports as if cut out of the page.

Can I draw an analogy with Church Parish records and GRO Certificates. In both cases, there is usually more than one entry per physical page, but I would never consider creating a Source per page. I would only create a Source record per event per family, whether other families had similar events on the same day or not. Likewise, I create a Census Event and Source per family household, because for each household it is a different event, with the enumerator calling on one house at a time.
Mike Tate ~ researching the Tate and Scott family history ~ tatewise ancestry
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Re: Sources, Citations and Methods

Post by Barnowl »

Firstly a big thank you to everybody for their feedback.
While I can't say my understanding of Methods is completely clear yet, it is certainly deeper now.
I will return to it when my plugin has dealt with some further import problems I had not run into myself, and is v6.1 compatible.
In the meantime the next version will include Method 0 - which will be to leave everything alone, just as it comes in from FTM! I am beginning to see that whatever re-organisation of sources I attempt, the likelihood is that someone will disagree with it, and I do not want them to be unable to take advantage of the other features FTM_Fixer offers.
I must admit, Mike, that I did not look at all the consequences you mention. In particular I have not worked very extensively with reports as yet. I just started from people not being happy that they were not seeing the images they were used to in Ancestry and FTM, and asking what do I have to do - and where do they have to be - to make them more visible.
Ian
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Re: Sources, Citations and Methods

Post by dbridge276 »

I have read this thread a couple of times now and still haven't got it clear in my head whether method 1,2,A,B,C,D will be best for my family tree long term.

I found the diagrammatic explanation in viewtopic.php?p=65072#p65072 of more help than just the words that are in this thread.

Is it possible that one or other of the experts replying here could diagrammatically explain the differences of each methodology that have been explained, I am a visual leaner and to see these options in diagrammatic form would help me and probably others too.

I am now a user of Ancestral Sources, albeit late to the game and I have many records with old manually entered source information, is there a plugin that will go through by FH project and "Tidy them up" for me?

Preferably along the lines of the method that does not repeat the source information in an FH report,
I have been finding recently that some reports the source info is longer than the info about the individual/family.

Alternatively is someone able to look at my project file and advise what changes to process I need to adopt?
Researching Bridge, Renwick, Parsons, Child, Everett + my wife’s side of our tree Carney/Street, Curtis, Weight, Rush
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Re: Sources, Citations and Methods

Post by tatewise »

There are really only two Methods to consider (the other A, B, C, D, etc, are personal variants that can be largely ignored):
  • Method 1 splitter Source Citations
  • Method 2 lumper Source Citations
Also there is no one Method that should be applied universally to your Project.
It is the Source Citation details that determine which Method is most appropriate for each Source Document.
So some will be better suited to Method 1 and others to Method 2.

The overriding consideration is to avoid duplicated Source Citation data entry in your Project database.

Thus the criteria for preferring Method 1 over Method 2 are quite simple:
  • Do you want to attach Source Document Media images to the Source Citation?
  • Do you want to keep a Text From Source transcript of the Source Document?
  • Is it likely that this type of Source Document will have multiple Source Citations for one reference?
The more Yes answers suggest that Method 1 is a better alternative.

The following screenshot examples hopefully will make Method 1 clearer.
In the Family Historian Sample Project consider Thomas Smith MUNRO [80].
In his Property Box the 7 Apr 1871 Census fact cites Source record Census: 1871 Scotland RG99-12345-342 - Munro.
Also the Birth fact, his Name, and the whole record all cite that same Source record.
(Note that the Citation fields Where within Source and Text From Source are empty.)
ThomasSmithMUNROPropertyBox.png
ThomasSmithMUNROPropertyBox.png (58.6 KiB) Viewed 13488 times
If either highlighted Show Media button is clicked the Source Record Media image can be shown.
(Note that there is no Citation Media image.)
SourceCitationShowMedia.png
SourceCitationShowMedia.png (35.88 KiB) Viewed 13488 times
Close that and click big blue arrow button to view Source record with its Text From Source transcript and Media tab image for the Arthur MUNRO household.
Source1871Scotland.png
Source1871Scotland.png (72.5 KiB) Viewed 13488 times
Click the highlighted Go To Record button with red arrow to select the Source record in the Records Window.
To the right in the Citations column there are 12 Citations identified.
Now use View > Record Links to see the four Individuals who cite that Source with multiple Links.
To see the full details of all 12 Citations use the Where Used Record Links Plugin.

In this example the Media image and Text From Source is only held in one record, and all Citations are empty, so there is no duplication of data, and if anything needs updating it is all in one record.

If Method 2 was used there would be one global Source record for the 1871 Census as a whole, rather than a separate Source record for each household as for the Arthur MUNRO household above.
So the Media image and Text From Source would have to be repeated in all 12 Citations.
If it needs updating then all 12 copies will have to be edited by hand.
If those copies are not repeated carefully, then it can lead to multiple Source Citations in Reports.

On the other hand, some Source Documents such as the GRO BMD Index often do not warrant Media and Text From Source, and a particular entry is typically only cited by just one associated BMD fact. That single Citation can hold Where within Source plus Media and Text From Source if required without duplication. This is a good example of Method 2 where only one Source record is needed for all GRO BMD Index references.

Finally, there is no Plugin that could tidy up your Source Citations because there will be too many imponderables unique to your Project that will require human intervention.

If you post screenshots of some representative Source Citations that you think need modifying then we can advise.
See info:forums#posting_topics|> Posting Topics for advice on screenshot attachments.
Mike Tate ~ researching the Tate and Scott family history ~ tatewise ancestry
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Re: Sources, Citations and Methods

Post by Gowermick »

Mike, at the risk of confusing the OP, the example you show adds the name ‘Munro’ at the end of the census citation title. If there were other families on the same census image, you would need another citation for the same image for the other family!
e.g. if you also had one of your ‘Gordon’ families on the same image, it would require another citation, one with a ‘Gordon’ suffix rather than the ‘Munro’ .

Would it not be better to avoid personalising image/citations in this way, then they could be truly generic. You know it relates to the Munro family, because it was through looking at their data, you arrived at the correct image, so adding ‘Munro’ to the title is somewhat superfluous.
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Re: Sources, Citations and Methods

Post by ColeValleyGirl »

Mike, it depends what you consider the source (the page -- and what happens when the household spans 2 pages) or the household?

I use the household, so include the head of household in my source name.
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Re: Sources, Citations and Methods

Post by Gowermick »

Helen,
I just use the page or pages (e.g. 1861 RG09 Piece 0123 Folio123 Page23). Where a family is split across two pages, the appropriate page is used for each member of the household. :D
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Re: Sources, Citations and Methods

Post by tatewise »

I tried not to complicate things as the OP was clearly struggling to differentiate Method 1 from Method 2.
Your detailed points are all valid but largely personal variants, and could have been elaborated after the OP grasped the basics.
None of them help distinguish the differences between the two methods.
Mike Tate ~ researching the Tate and Scott family history ~ tatewise ancestry
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Re: Sources, Citations and Methods

Post by dbridge276 »

tatewise
Thanks Mike, your explanation and the screenshots helps me (& others?) a lot, these are features I had not realised existed in FH.
Clearly I need to get myself on an intensive course regarding this product.

gowermick
Thanks Mick for your added observations, you are right in what you say as I have a couple of families where they are listed on the same page but a couple of doors away, as many I am sure also have given how close families remained a hundred years ago.
Maybe the solution here is to use just the Census reference no
e.g. RG99-12345-342 from the example and leave any names of the end as one may at a later date establish a link to another family on the page. Remembering that you already have that Census entry will be the challenge, but if no name exists it should prompt that this already exists.

colevalleygirl
good observations and following exchange of views.

As Mike said I think earlier, there is no one solution and I think that's the greatest lesson I have learnt from these replies.

thank you all.

Dave
Researching Bridge, Renwick, Parsons, Child, Everett + my wife’s side of our tree Carney/Street, Curtis, Weight, Rush
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Re: Sources, Citations and Methods

Post by Gowermick »

Dave,
Remembering if a source has been used before, is relatively easy in FH. When you click on add citation, you are presented with a list of existing sources to choose from. If you begin typing in the top left ‘filter’ box, the list slowly shortens to just those sources that meet the criteria entered so far.

e.g. I number my census in a similar manner like 1861 RG09 1236 F256 P09, so as I begin typing RG09 123... into the filter, the list slowly shortens until I can see if I already have this reference. If I have, I just click on it to select it. If I haven’t, I click New and create the new citation. Simples :D
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Re: Sources, Citations and Methods

Post by tatewise »

OK, so lets delve into the one household spanning two pages and two households on one page.
There are several ways of handling those scenarios, and this is my approach.

There is nothing wrong or even unusual about a source document comprising more than one page.
It is quite common, e.g. Wills, Probate, News articles, Passenger lists, many military records such as enlistment, etc.
So if a household spans more than one page, just attach the image of each page to the Source record Media tab.
The Media records will each have their own Census reference down to folio/page as their Title.
Everything else will be just the same as where the household is on one page, except that the Source record Title could include both page numbers.

To cater for two households on one page, I append the name of the head of household to the Source record Title.
Alternatively, you could use the schedule number assigned to each residence, or any arbitrary distinguishing code.
However, there is no fundamental reason why the two Source records cannot have the same Title, as it becomes apparent which is which from the Text From Source transcript.
Both Source records would typically attach identical Media records to their Media tab.
(Unless either household spans two pages, in which case the appropriate pair of Media records would be attached.)

I believe it important to keep the two households and their distinct transcripts in two separate Source records.
Then tools such as View > Record Links and Where Used Record Links Plugin identify the Individual records and facts associated with one household.
If there is only one Source record for the page with two households, it shares the Citations for both households, and so the tools mentioned above will lump together the Individual records of those two households.

Furthermore, if there is only one Source record per Media record per Census page, then the two page household will have some members citing one Source while other members will cite the other Source. That results in the tools above potentially only identifying part of the household. Also it can result in two Source Citations in Reports including multiple members of the same household. I believe these points are a drawback to the Mike Loney approach.
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Re: Sources, Citations and Methods

Post by tatewise »

I am wondering if the earlier illustrated explanations should become supplemental pages to the glossary:sources#sources_and_citations_-_how_to_use_them|> Sources and Citations - how to use them with one for Method 1 and another for Method 2?
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Re: Sources, Citations and Methods

Post by Gowermick »

tatewise wrote: Furthermore, if there is only one Source record per Media record per Census page, then the two page household will have some members citing one Source while other members will cite the other Source. T.
Mike, facts are assigned to an individual, and cannot be assigned to a household. So to quote separate citations for members appearing on a separate sheet is correct. If I examine an individual to see why I entered a particular fact about a census, I look at the citation and I expect to see a reference for the correct page. This applies wherever he was, with the rest of the family, at School or in the Military.

If reports show multiple citations, it is because multiple citations were used. You seem to be adjusting the way you work just to fit the way reports or tools work, but the dog wags the tail, not the other way round. :D
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Re: Sources, Citations and Methods

Post by ColeValleyGirl »

Gowermick -- it depends on what you consider to be 'a source': a line in the census (associated with a single individual), a household (multiple individuals in the same household) or a page (multiple individuals in multiple households) or the whole census (ultimate lumping).

There's no right or wrong, just the way you choose to do it, depending on what matters to you.

A. If you consider a line as the source, then each individual has a completely separate source (named perhaps including the HO/RG page reference and line number) with a single image but many of those sources will share the same image and page reference. The same image will almost certainly be shared among several sources. Leads to a larger number of sources and doesn't let you easily see who is linked to adjacent 'sources' (especially if you restrict 'Text from source' to just the line you consider as the source).

B. If you consider the household entry as the source, then all the members of the household will share a source (named perhaps to include the Head of Household and HO/RG page reference(s)) with one or more images depending on whether the household spans multiple pages. The images may or may not be shared among several sources. Leads to a smaller number of sources compared with A. Allows Text from source to show the whole household; is easier to identify individuals in the same household.

C. If you consider the page as the source, then members of the same household may be split across two sources (each named perhaps for the HO/RG page reference). One page per source, and one image Fewer sources compared with A, the same or more compared with B. Text from Source may or may not show the same household; not so easy as B to identify individuals in the same household.

D. The whole census as the source -- somebody else will have to comment on how they populate Where within source and Text from source in this scenario as I've never used it.

Ancestral Sources tends to steer you towards B, which is also my preference, as I think it's important to look at households in the round (even if facts cannot be assigned to households, only individuals or couples). I do use C for census entries for people in institutions where the 'household' may consist of doxens or more of unrelated individuals over several pages.
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Re: Sources, Citations and Methods

Post by Gowermick »

Helen,
I’ll leave it at that, otherwise I’m in serious danger of confusing OP. Let’s let sleeping dogs lie, wagging tail or not :D :lol:
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