Mike Talbot

Since only a few of your charts have the problem, have you tried moving the offending chart sections manually with VCF? These techniques allow you to please yourself no matter the original TMG generated chart layout. You can select and move large sections at one time, no need to move every box individually. Once you get comfortable with the editing features of VCF, you will find hand editing to be fun. You will amaze yourself making even good charts, better, with hand editing. You can have the charts that you want before WG fixes the problem. Please forgive me if I have misunderstood your chart issue. Good luck, Mike Talbot

TMG output of charts to VCF is the greatest feature of any commercial genealogy program. A glaring inconvenience of VCF is the way that external images are imported and rescaled. My wishes: 1. Use standard "drag and drop" procedure for importing images 2. There is no way to rescale the image while accurately maintaining aspect ratio. Fix: use the corner dots of selected image to rescale image while maintaing aspect ratio. Use the side dots of the selected image to rescale in one direction, only. To add an apple to this orange, have TMG output the Relationship Chart to VCF. The current (word processor) relationship chart posseses none of the beauty of a VCF chart. It does not do images and a bug truncates long person and place names instead of making multi-lines. Having a VCF "Relationship Chart" would be a great boon, it fixes all of the many shortcomings of the current chart and makes it pretty. Thank you, Mike Talbot

Yes. Thank you. I hope others will think so, too. From measurements, 9 gens. will fit on a letter size page. The sample was a scale model to obscure some personal data, the actual chart was an important bit larger. The chart is not only gorgeous, but very useful as well. Relatives love to see it as a relationship chart. When used as a replacement for the Direct Line Ahnentafel Report, you can get to Charlemagne in about 4 attractive pages. Two or three letter pages if you hand edit to double lines of descent columns on a page. There are lots of portraits of nobles and royalty available on the net. Thanks, again, Mike Talbot

That's great news on the shift key maintainiing aspect ratio, when rescaling images. A special thanks for this one. I've made composite Relationship Charts many ways with VCF. The TMG6 current implementation serves as a guide. Even a little seven gen. chart is too time consuming to be practical, manually with VCF. It does prove that it can be done and the results are simply gorgeous. I posted a shorter one in the TMG 6 forum, a while back. The relationship chart would also replace the Direct Line Ahnentafel report for me, which current TMG6 implementation is useless to me since it does not show the spouse of record. Thank you, Mike Talbot

Yes, thanks, that one and another. Sorry about that, I did not know that this forum was off-topic for this forum. Best wishes, Mike talbot

My deepest sympathies, Barbara. At the top of my TMG wishlist is a wysiwyg editor for this forum. This present forum editor reminds me of Compuserve in the 1960s. When I've posted this wish, in the past, it seems to disappear. Good luck to us all, Mike Talbot

Thanks for your quick and accurate reply. The copy worked perfectly to a subdirectory of the flash drive root. Live and learn, Mike Talbot

For those who like to play with different calendars, see: http://geneweb.inria.fr/roglo?lang=en;m=CAL Four different calendars are displayed, the display is set to today's date when you first enter the webpage. You can change a date in any one calendar, then see that date as converted on the other 3 calendars. You might also like to check out the site's co-op genealogy database of 2.2 million people (Roglo). There are dynamically generated reports. Members (there were about 50 member genealogists last I knew) can dynamically update the data on-line and/or off-line. Unfortunately, many folks in the data base are x'ed out, due to France's overly oppressive privacy laws. Many don't need to be x'ed, but the university that sponsers the site takes no chances. They have an accompanying forum that anyone can access. The information there is reasonably accurate. (no database is totally accurate, including mine, and should be used wiith care.) There is a web-friendly version of the software that you can download and try, free. It also functions nicely, off-line. TMG might get some features and speed ideas for version 8. The 2.2 million individuals don't slow it down. Don't get too excited. Overall, TMG 6.12 features are still better for most folk's purposes, including mine. Best wishes, Mike Talbot

The following is from my 10 year romance with TMG. Where to best attach a picture depends on the subject of the picture. For ease of backups and utilities it is best (but not required) to keep all TMG attached pictures in a single folder in the root. Most of my many pictures are of a person's face, coat-of-arms or in a few cases, clan tartan. It is best to attach these to the individual person. Though you can have many pictures (images/exhibits) attached to an individual, one is designated as primary by you. The primary images may optionally appear in VCF graphic box charts (rescaled to fit inside the appropriate box). (see image window and exhibt log for options in attaching and displaying pics during editing of an individual.) Some reports will optionally print all images attached to each individual in the report (when TMG report output is selected to a word processor file). (TMG will not rescale these images, what you attached is what you'll get.) A source may apply to many people, so certificates and documents for an individual should be attached to the proper event. The type of picture attached to a source (more appropriately called a reference), would be a book, set of books, set of documents, CD, website, Great-Grand-Aunt Jenny, Court-House (this would also be a repository), etc. You can use the same pic in more than one place, as desired. I bow to others for advice on event related picture options with reports, I haven't used them. Unless you are a professional genealogist, do things the way that is most pleasing to you (listen to the old Ricky Nelson song). Welcome to TMG, you will enjoy it, especially the hand editing abilities for VCF box charts (I think, it's my favorite), Mike Talbot

From one grumpy old man to another (Sophia Loren and Ann Margret are in my single working dataset): I have never used nor needed custom flags, so can't help and have snipped that portion of your message. Focus groups have always been adequate, where a custom flag would also work. I ‘m not “an expert" nor a professional genealogist. For over 20 years, I have done genealogy for relatives, friends, in-laws, friends of in-laws, in-laws of friends, etc., gratis. Name a mistake, I’ve probably made it, including the agony of multiple working datasets. You never know who is related to whom until you do the genealogy. You don't know who is your in-law's 8th cousin, twice removed until you've researched perhaps a couple of hundred duplicate ancestors before you realize it, or unless you have built a large single dataset and do all work within it. Having a single working dataset is especially important for those who like to do the genealogy of others, either professionally or just for fun. Never, ever delete anyone from your dataset unless they are incorrect and unfixable (or you are served a court order to do so, impossible, if you’re the least bit discriminate in the US). As an example, one in-law, "unrelated", married couple turned out to be 7th cousins of each other. Not a close relationship, you say? Alone, she had about 5000 ancestors found, he had about 9000 (Focus Groups can find interesting details like this). Taken together, they only had about 2000 unique ancestors. Furthermore, they were also distant cousins of others in my dataset. Fewer than 400 new people had to be added instead of 14,000. What could have taken several years was accomplished in a few of weeks. The moral of that story: keep all of your researched genealogy data in one dataset and never discard any correct data from it. Separate projects and datasets do have an important place. Keep data that you receive from cousins and others or download from the internet in them. Use other’s data as clues and references. Never merge another’s total dataset with your own. If you want to provide someone with a GEDCOM of just their own family, it is easy to do by exporting via a focus group from your single dataset. There is no mess. One man’s mess can be your treasure. Best wishes, Mike Talbot

TMG has a memo field with every tag that has a structured date field (and sort date). You can record the non-standard format date, exactly as found, in the memo field. I have seldom encountered original records that contained a non-standard format date, but do so when it happens. (An exception would be the French 1st Empire period.) As part of the great unwashed masses, I prefer a structured standard date format, such as "1 Nov 2007", with or without the leading zero, for reports and charts. (one should never use an ambiguous format like "1-11-2007" for genealogy data). It's hard to see a TMG issue or significant difference with UFT, other than semantics, here. No commercial program would ever support the semi-infinite number of date formats that have been used, worldwide. My only problems with TMG dates are the unjustifiably restrictive year validity checks and failure to address BC dates when most of human history happened. Best wishes, no pun intended, Mike Talbot

The Descendant Indented Chart does include spouses. It is really a very similar report with a few graphic characters inserted for clarity. I don't understand why TMG would neglect including spouses in any report. They neglect the spouse of record in the Direct Line Ahnentafel Report, also. Such potentially valuable reports, without the spouse(s) of record, are completely useless to me. Let us wish, Mike Talbot

A treasured cousin deserves a gift copy of TMG. The instructions to accomplish this seemed easy. But my TMG Gold 6.12 Message Manager only had a "Welcome to the Message Manager" message. I read it, now that too is gone. As implied by the welcome message, I changed preferences "Update Messages" from the default 0 to 1 day. Then exited and restarted TMG. (I'm on an ancient dial-up modem, so seldom on-line and in TMG simultaneously. When I am, TMG is usually running before going on-line.) TMG checked for messages and bragged that I had none. Viewing the "Message Manager" confirmed this. Please!!! How do I purchase a gift copy of TMG Gold 6.12 ??? Thanx, Mike Talbot

Thank you, Mike Talbot

Have done that. There were no previous messages. None, nada, nyet, non, zed. The only message ever there was the welcome message. After reading it, it was gone, too. Tried ticking the display previous message box, again and again, etc. The welcome message comes back, but no other. Repeatable. Another suggestion? Perhaps someone could just send the message to me? Thanks, Mike Talbot

Thanks for your added detail on the confusion caused by the adoption of the needed new calendar. A million years would be way too soon to do it again. I trust the folks 3000 years from now to do the right thing. Best wishes, Mike Talbot

Your history of the calendar was enjoyable. The one fact to add is that "our calendar" began in 1582 AD, commisioned by the Vatican and directed by Pope Gregory XIII. It took until 1752 for Protestant countries, led by England, to accept it. I wonder how many genealogical dates have had multiple compensations applied in an attempt to correct for that period? Messing with the calendar, again, would just cause more historical date confusion and anachronisms in the future. If it ain't broke, don't fix it. (The calendar was broken before 1572.) Modern science confirms that the 1582 Gregorian Calendar is just off by 26 seconds per year. At that rate our calendar will be incorrect by one day, 3000 years from now.

I agree with you completely. The leading zeros and editor gymnastics in dates from 1 -99 and some reports are annoying but I can live with them. The bigger problem is that TMG does not address BC dates. I would settle for just making negative years legal for BC years. The drawback to that (other than being ugly) is that age calculations would be one year off in transitional calculations that crossed AD/BC (there was no year zero nor Roman Numeral for zero, darn it). The TMG date year restrictions eliminate many potential customers like ancient historians, role playing and war gamers, and science and historical fiction writers. Best wishes, Mike Talbot

You can manually fix the image text fields in TMG. Open the image log via double clicking on the image window. Select the image that you want to fix. Right click on the selected image. Click Properties, a menu will appear. I assume by caption and description, you refer to the TOPIC and REFERENCE fields. Manually edit the desired field(s). Let us know if I misunderstood your concern. Good luck, Mike Talbot

You have described me to a tee, except that my surname was not changed at adoption. What I do is make two VCF charts, one of my biological family and one of my adoptive father's family. Then make a composite of the two charts, as follows. Copy the kid's box from his bio-chart. Paste it onto the adoptive family chart. Move the box (and other boxes) around to please yourself. Add a connector line for the adopted kid. I use red connectors for biological relationships and blue for legal. Dashed lines will work for B/W. You can also enter the word adopted, either inside or outside of the appropriate box. Optional, I don't like the lines connecting the spouses on the Descendant Box Chart. Delete the line and move the spouse to slightly overlap the bio-person. This is easier to do (with a bit of practice), than to describe. You can perform a similar procedure to show the adoptive parent on the kids bio-chart. The possibilities in VCF are wonderful, try them. The VCF chart concept separates TMG from the many other good genealogy programs out there. Best wishes, Mike Talbot

That is expected. The once removed means that the cousins are one generation apart to the nearest mutual ancestor. The one in the younger generation will be the 28/9th relationship the older generation will be the 27/8th. This has nothing to do with the age of the cousins, but with the count of the generations between each person and a mutual ancestor. For example a person can be older in years than a biological aunt, but the aunt is a member of the older generation (hence the once removed). Another way that relationships get confusing is that people may descend from a distant ancestor by more than one path. First cousins will have 1 or 2 mutual grandparents. That leaves 2 or 3 grandparents that are unique to each. One (or more) of the unique grandparents might also descend from the so-called progenitor via a closer path. You can prove this to yourself by using the Relationship Chart (report) thrice. Run once for each of the cousins to the progenitor and again between the two cousins, then compare them. That's the way you get multiple relationships. Remember, in multiple relationships ancestors trump aunts/uncles who in turn trump cousins. So if TMG finds one is an ancestor it does not look to see if that person is also a cousin. Best wishes, Mike Talbot

Yes, there is a lot of that going on, these days. <g> There has also been some of it throughout history. I agree with the above replies and use a custom "unmarriage" tag in the marriage group, sometimes. There is another way, using only TMG standard tags. The TMG standard NOTE tag allows you to link 2 people together and gives you a date and memo field to explain the relationship. The single NOTE will appear in both persons data and provides a one-click swiitch between the two parties. Which tag and parameters to use, in a specific instance, depends on how and if you want that relationship to appear in reports and charts. Run a few brief experiments to see which method you like for whom. Remember, that if neither tag is perfect for a special case, you can easily hand edit reports output to a Word Processor file or to a VCF chart. The main objective is to document what is important to you in your database. Best wishes, Mike Talbot

The A-Direct Line report requires you to specify 2 people. In your example, yourself and your 6g.grandfather. There is a binocular icon to the right of each of the 2 people. Click each of them and you can set each of the two people from the picklist. I keep the setting of "Use the current Focus Person" for all reports, then you only have to enter one person. You also need to check options and make sure the (Max) Number of Generations is set to greater than 9 (the default is 250 but this has caused trouble, so I usually keep it at 32). Good luck, Mike Talbot

Again, I second your wish. It's hard to understand the antagonism of some users against your suggestion. It isn't like you are advocating taking away their 5 or 4 gen. Tree Views. If it were Wholly Genes saying that it would cost more than they were willing to spend, now, then I could understand. You can construct 6 generation VCF charts that fit nicely, clearly and with full (b m d) dates, images and places on a 19" monitor. So it's feasible. My 19" monitor is physically smaller than my old 15" CRT, so sacrifice of living area is not really an issue. Keep the faith and with best wishes to all, Mike Talbot

With a wysiwyg editor, one could compose, format and spell check complex posts off line and copy them to this forum in a few seconds. With this editor, one must spend much online time formatting one's posts. The editor, sometimes, even screws up your careful online formatting (it hates multiple blanks and other things that are good for post clarity). Cheers, we can live with it if we must, Mike Talbot