* AS death and burial input screens.. edit?

[MsScarlet]

Hello! I am a newbie here, just got FH7 last week as an early Valentine's present from my hubby.
And subsequently got AS.
But I am not a new genealogist, just a bit over 40 years at it now.
FTM > TMG >RMG >FH
as you can imagine, all those imports/switching software has my file of 93,000+ people a MESS.
My project at hand is to start a totally new FH7 file... in a long careful one-at-a-time process, using AS entering the vitals for me and all my ancestors "only" for now.
I am lucky because in all those past years I do HAVE all the documentation, and it is all scanned and on my puter.
I am using Method 1, and entering data directly while looking at the documents.
I am in the United States and our documents are so different than what FH7 input window shows, or what AS shows.

Our basic USA State Death certificate has so many more fields.
ie: Embalmer, embalmer address, funeral home, date of burial, place of burial,
Cause of death, contributory cause of death, operation before death, etc.

I have watched many youube videos, read through the help, and the forums.
I think I may have overwhelmed my brain with all this new information!
I am trying to actually change the input window in AS, to match my documents.
I have not found any documentation that will allow me to do that, so am I correct in assuming now, that is not possible?

My head is spinning with
Death settings
Death source Template settings
Options -Death Settings
Standard Death Auto-text Templates
Auto-Text Templates screens
Template Keyword and Functions...
Aughh!

So if I actually figure out how to get all the information from a COD (Certificate of death) into AS and subsequently into FH7, getting that back out to view or use... would involve an edited Sentence structure, is that correct?
If so there are no "Key Words" for those fields: Embalmer, Funeral Home, etc.
Since I am starting totally OVER from scratch.. I want to get this "right" and consequently have a "pristine" file to actually publish "before I die" hopefully.

Are there folks on this forum from America trying to use FH7 or AS, and how are you working around issues like mine?
I just LOVED my TMG, and I really feel that FH7 together with AS was sent from Heaven to replace/improve that!
So I need to figure out how to use them and enjoy them as someone "not British"
Please do not be offended if you "are" British!! At this point, I really wish that I was.
My DNA results show I am 50% Germany and only 10% England & Northwestern Europe

Thank you in advance for any KIND or HELPFUL replies.

[laz_gen]

You could create custom facts within FH for each of the data items you want to capture.

You could also customise the property box to include your new facts in the Main tab or even in a new tab, perhaps creating a data entry form to mirror the death certificates you have.

However I do not think it is possible to customise Ancestral Sources in the way you want.

See https://www.fhug.org.uk/kb/glossary/custom-fact/

Also https://www.family-historian.co.uk/help ... omize.html

[NickWalker]

The main screen in AS has a number of input boxes to enter data into and the majority of these will fill in fields within facts (for example occupation facts, residence facts, etc.) but there are inevitably items of data on a source that won't get stored in facts and so these are just recorded in the transcription of the source that appears at the bottom of the AS screen.

So in the case of the 'USA State Death Certificate' what is required is an 'Auto Text Template' to mimic that certificate. This would allow a transcription to be made - clicking the Auto button and choosing that template would generate the source text with many of the boxes filled in by data entered into the text boxes above (occupation, cause of death, etc.) but some of the boxes would inevitably be blank because there aren't specific fields in AS for them (e.g. funeral home). Therefore the source text would need to be manually edited before saving to fill in these gaps.

I note that some of the fields you mention are regarding the burial rather than the death - in the UK we usually register a death before a burial so that information doesn't appear on a death certificate. AS has a separate mode for recording burials. The burial mode does also have many of the same fields and allows for creation of burial and death facts so it may be that treating the death certificate as a burial source would be more useful.

The main issue though is that there isn't an auto-text template built into AS for the USA State Death certificate so you would either need to create one (and this isn't easy unless you are reasonably confident with basic programming-style constructs - it's not dissimilar to using functions in Excel) or use one that someone else has created. Unfortunately, no one seems to have shared any death certificate auto-text templates in the FHUG knowledge base. Alternatively you could make use of the 'Generic (data only)' templates that are built in - these will capture all the data entered into the source text but you would need to then manually add the other data from the certificate.

[tatewise]

Even UK documents sometimes have extra details not specifically supported by the AS default dialogues.
The key information that can be recorded in FH/GEDCOM fact fields is supported.
Other details must be added to the Auto Text box at the base of the AS dialogue which become the FH/GEDCOM Text From Source field in the Source Citation.
Some recent postings have asked similar questions about additional data in Census and Marriage documents.
1921 Census Template (22771)
Marriage Input Screen lacks {DateREGISTERED} (22778)
The solution in each case is to create an Auto-Text Template to capture the extra data.

[BillH]

The main issue though is that there isn't an auto-text template built into AS for the USA State Death certificate

For a long time there was not one death certificate for the USA. Every state had its own unique death certificate with different information than other states. At some point, I think it was around 1910, this was standardized so all states now use the same certificate.

Also I've found there was wide variance even within a state over time before it was standardized.

So to create a template that contains all data that might appear on any state's death certificate at any time might be quite a chore I think.

That is why, for older death certificates, I put a lot of this type information in the note.

Bill

[MsScarlet]

So in the case of the 'USA State Death Certificate' what is required is an 'Auto Text Template' to mimic that certificate. This would allow a transcription to be made - clicking the Auto button and choosing that template would generate the source text with many of the boxes filled in by data entered into the text boxes above (occupation, cause of death, etc.) but some of the boxes would inevitably be blank because there aren't specific fields in AS for them (e.g. funeral home). Therefore the source text would need to be manually edited before saving to fill in these gaps.

Nick, I really appreciate the time you took to write such a detailed reply, Thank You! I am trying to learn how to "properly" use the "Source-driven data entry" technique and I must say I would be totally LOST without AS to help me along. Your software is Obviously a labor of love. I am following your suggestions and reading about "Auto Text Templates" and making notes in a word document. I have not been in school for over 40 years, All this "learning" stuff requires chasing out the cobwebs from that part of my brain.