Michael Hannah

Glad we could help with ideas. For the sake of others reading this thread, your guess was right. The [P] variables in the Name-Var sentence gets its values from the Primary Name.

Hi Mike, Jim was being polite, so let me be the one to be blunt. There are no such variables defined in TMG! It might make a good wish list item, but no matter how hard you look there is nothing currently defined in TMG to let you do this. Sorry, P.S. A possible workaround is to use the [N] variable with appropriately filled in Name-Var tags. Note that the variable [N] used in sentences for Name-Var tags does not infer empty values from the primary name in narrative report output but will only output (all) the data entered in the name parts of that tag. So a Name-Var tag that only contains the surname would output as you desire with the sentence "[PFS] surname is [N]". Maybe if you explained how you want to use this it might be easier to suggest a better workaround? I am a constant user of split memo parts, so would probably create a custom sentence with memo parts and re-type the name part I wanted to output in a memo part.

Hi Derek, The variable [RP:Rolename] will always produce "They" whenever there are multiple people assigned to that Rolename. It will produce "He" or "She" only whenever only one person is assigned to that Rolename. This is not a bug, it is by design. I believe your problem is with the use of "was" and "were" as well as the use of this Rolename variable in the sentence for that person. For further comments see Lee Hoffman's book GMOTMG, p. 77, for his admonition to avoid using the role variable in the sentence for that role. As Terry recommended, for the sentence for that role do not use the [RP:Rolename] variable. Instead create two sentences for that role, one male and one female, and hard-code the he/she.

Also simple in TMG. Find the father and note his ID number. Go to the child's display and at the top of the child's Details window double click on the word Father which will open the Tag Entry for the parent/child relationship. Simply type in the ID number of the father in the Parent box and click OK.

Just a wild guess but, could you be excluding living people and somehow one of the parents is now flagged as living?

Other than the "unique endnotes" that Terry already mentioned which limits to one, I am not aware of a report oriented option to control how often a source is cited. What I normally do to reduce the number of footnotes/endnotes is to cite every appropriate source to an event, but then I "exclude" all citations other than what I consider to be the most definitive or complete sources. For most reports I choose the option to not print excluded information and will not get these citations.

Norm, Since you got all your tags imported as a "Story" type event look at the TMG Utility to change all these "Story" event tags to "Anecdote" event tags in one quick action. For details look here.

Hi Mike, The good news I created a small GEDCOM file from your examples and imported it using the TMG Advanced import wizard. The structure for 1 NAME Margaret /Harcourt/ 2 GIVN Margaret 2 SURN Harcourt imports using the option you specified of "Read NPFX/SURN/GIVN" as a single primary Name tag with the appropriate Given and Surname. No problems that I can see. I also tried 1 NAME Lulach "The Fool" King Of /Scotland/ 2 GIVN Lulach "The Fool" King Of 2 SURN Scotland 1 NAME The Fool // 2 GIVN The Fool 2 SURN 2 NICK The Fool and that gave the appropriate primary Name tag with the appropriate Given and Surname. In addition it produced an additional Name-Var tag with Given of "The Fool" and also created a Name-Nick tag with Given of "The Fool". This is just what I would have expected of these GEDCOM constructs, and see no problems. I get no surnames "Unknown" and no other problems. The bad news As far as the constructs of: 1 ADDR 2 _NAME Lulach "The Fool" King Of Scotland and 1 EVEN Name 2 TYPE Unknown The advanced import wizard defaulted to suggest the GEDCOM ADDR tag be imported into an Address tag, and the type "Unknown" GEDCOM tag be imported into an Event-Misc tag. For my first test I accepted these defaults. Using default tag assignments The resultant Address tag had no location or any other kind of data, but filled the memo with the text: Unknown GEDCOM info: Lulach 'The Fool' King Of Scotland This is what I would have expected, since the value of "_NAME" following the digit 2 is not a standard keyword for GEDCOM version 5.5. The only documented keywords subordinate to an ADDR tag other than continuation lines are: ADR1, ADR2, CITY, STAE, POST, CTRY Thus the keyword _NAME is not recognized. However, since this information is subordinate to this ADDR tag I think it is appropriate for TMG to put this into the TMG memo. However, whatever program is producing this construct is not producing recognizable GEDCOM. The resultant Event-Misc tag loses the word "Unknown" since that was considered the name of the GEDCOM tag, and the text "Name" following the keyword EVEN is put in the memo. In my opinion this is also appropriate as the best TMG could do. Forcing assignment to Name-Var tags As a second test, in the advanced import Wizard I forced both of these TMG constructs to import not as the default but as Name-Var tags. The first construct produced a Name-Var tag (in addition to the Name-Var up in the normal Primary spot) with its own Primary designation!! But as you noted when you open this tag it shows the Address fields, not the Name fields, yet the pull-down list of tag types to which it could be changed are only tags from the Name group!! In my opinion this is a bug in the TMG import. Since there are no subordinate "NPFX/SURN/GIVN" fields, which you claimed by the import option would exist, TMG import should not recognize this construct. It "sort of" created a Name-Var tag yet it "sort of" is not a Name-Var. TMG is really confused at this point with this GEDCOM construct that does not conform to the basic standard. I have reported this to WG as a bug, but since it is very rare and caused by a construct that does not comply with the basic GEDCOM standard I suspect its priority for a fix will be low. TMG import is smarter with the second construct. It identifies the GEDCOM construct is not a recognized standard name structure and the import refused to create a Name-Var tag. Instead it created an Event-Misc tag. However, this time in the memo it puts the text "Name Type: Unknown" which accurately reflects that GEDCOM claimed this was some kind of Name tag with some kind of "type" that was the text "Unknown". I think this is the best TMG could do with this GEDCOM construct. Conclusion I believe the symptoms you are seeing are caused by two conditions. First, most importantly, is a GEDCOM file containing constructs that do not conform to the basic GEDCOM 5.5 standard and thus are not recognized by TMG. Second is the attempt to force TMG to create a Name-Var tag from a GEDCOM construct that is not a recognizable name structure. It tries, but gets very confused. Hope this helps,

Hi Mike, Since you indicate you are comfortable with editing the GEDCOM file, could you open the file in a text editor and copy/paste one of the people's lines of data in that GEDCOM? I would need to see everything for that individual from their "0 @num@ INDI" line, through and including the "1 NAME xxx" line plus all lines after the NAME line that begin with a number greater than 1, up to the next line that begins with either a 1 or a 0. Something about the combination of your NAME entries and the import options you are choosing does not seem to make sense.

Hi Norm, I am glad to offer suggestions as GEDCOM export in TMG is so reliable that I cannot understand why you are having problems. Thanks for the added details, they help, but I am still unclear. Your need for GEDCOM is clear and meaningful. But how do you know that these tags don't export? What are the symptoms you are seeing that makes you believe this? A GEDCOM file is simply a text file, so you can open the exported file that TMG creates with any text editor, like Notepad, and actually view the output of the TMG export. Are you sure these "missing" tags are really missing? Perhaps they are simply now in a format or structure that some subsequent program you are using to import that file does not understand? Yes, these setting seem appropriate. I cannot see or understand what could be causing a problem. Could you open the export file that TMG creates in a text editor and actually verify that these tags are not in that file? If they are being exported and in the file but your subsequent program can't recognize them, then we can focus on that instead.

Hi Norm, I assume that by this comment you mean you went to the Tag Type Definition and on the Other tab you modified the text for what the GEDCOM Export tag would be? As Terry said, if you make the wrong selections, the tags won't export. Anything you put in that field must be the exact name in all caps of one of the very limited types of actual GEDCOM pre-defined tags. Further this TMG tag type must make sense to export as that type of predefined GEDCOM tag. That is what Terry means by "There are also issues with how many principals a [TMG] tag has and who they are with [exporting to] certain [predefined GEDCOM] tag types." A list of valid GEDCOM Version 5.5 tag types and their tag name abbreviations published in 1996 can be found here. That is why TMG has the option for exporting a TMG tag as an otherwise undefined generic GEDCOM tag. That is the purpose of the radio button to export the TMG tag as the defined generic "1 EVEN" GEDCOM tag type with the GEDCOM subfield being filled in with the label from the TMG Tag Type. Note that the GEDCOM structure has not changed or been redefined since 1996 and thus GEDCOM tags do not and cannot include many of the valuable new features possible in TMG tags, such as witnesses, etc., etc. Hope this helps explain things about this very old GEDCOM format,

I went to the Genes Reunited site and it indicates that the GEDCOM import file must be version 5.5 and an ANSI character file. TMG defaults to version 5.5, but the TMG Help specifies that the default character set for TMG export is ANSEL. Did you select ANSI as the character set for the TMG export? Since your smaller tree was successful I assume that you did. The Genes Reunited site also says: Is it possible that this export does not conform to these Genes Reunited rules?

You are most welcome, Barrie. Yes, in future a different question should be a different Forum Topic. Keeping topics separate helps other users find answers to similar questions. Yes, you understand TMG correctly. In the past other users have proposed "wishes" for more granularity of footnote reference placement as possible future enhancements to TMG in the hopes that Bob Velke may choose to implement such enhancements. However, that is the way TMG currently works. And Bob never comments on whether or not a wish may or may not appear in a future version. There are two possible features of TMG that could be used as "work arounds" to cause footnote references in different places. First are embedded citations. There are both advantages and disadvantages to using these. For further details see the TMG Help on that topic. Second, is the concatenation of two tags feature ("[+]") I mentioned before. You can construct one tag with some part of the sentence and the footnote references will output at the end of that tag sentence output. You can then have a second concatenated tag sorted to come next in the narrative with its footnote references at the end of its output. It takes a bit of work using either or both of these methods, but you can get the output just about how you want it. However, I know of no other current ways to get footnote references in the middle of sentence output.

Welcome! We were all new to TMG once, and this is a good place to ask questions, so keep them coming! I find the best place to start is always with TMG's built-in Help documentation. In the Contents, under Data Format, there is a topic called "Citation" (or search for the term citation). In TMG you add a Source once to the Master Source List, then you can make as many citations to that source as desired for multiple event tags, such as a Birth Tag. The next best (free) "source" for learning about TMG would be Terry's Tips web pages. He even has a tutorial on sources here. You also might be interested in purchasing either Terry's or Lee Hoffman's books about TMG. As a user I have both of them and find them both valuable. Hope this gives you ideas of how to "find your way around TMG",

Hi Barrie, I tried a number of tests with various reports. As best I can tell, the options about Memos are designed to only apply to the [M] variable. If you include any split memo specification in your event sentence (e.g. [M0] or [M1]) then TMG assumes that you are taking full control of memo placement for that event tag and does not apply the report Memo option to that event memo. I think this is by design, especially so that the [M0] feature works. So I believe you cannot use this feature in the way that you wish. However, I think I have come up with a work-around that might do what you want, thanks to the new TMG feature to concatenate sentences. I created two separate event tags, e.g. two Birth tags, and assigned their Sort Dates to sort immediately following each other. For such an event tag I created a custom role which I called "OptMemo". The first tag would use the normal role and sentences with the memo parts you want to include. The second tag would use the "OptMemo" role whose sentence contains nothing but "[+]" (without the quotes but with the brackets, see Help under Special Sentence Variables). I then put the optional memo text in that second separate tag. Since there are no [M] variables of any kind in that second tag, the report Memo options for Embedded or None work just fine on that memo. With TMG there always seems to be some way to do what you want, just not necessarily what you might think of first. Hope this gives you ideas.

I agree with Terry that I prefer to cite every source I use for a person to all appropriate event tags for which that source provides information. Further, if I ever just wanted a list of all the sources associated with that person (or some group of people) the standard List of Sources report filtered for the appropriate Subjects would give me that. However, if you are still intent on citng a set of sources to a person, and not citing them to that person's normal event tags, you might consider creating a separate custom Tag Type in the Other group, perhaps called something like "OtherSources". You could cite all these otherwise uncited sources to that one custom tag. For Narrative reports you might make its sentence something like "[P] was also mentioned in other sources." I would probably set this tag's Sort Date so that it was last in the narrative. Then any report creating a narrative with this tag would reference these citations at the end of this sentence, which due to the Sort Date would be at the end of the narrative. A separate Tag Type like this would also give you the option of choosing for various reports whether or not you included this tag type in the report and thus choose whether you only got the references you cited to normal event tags or also got these otherwise uncited sources. Again, I don't think I would do it this way, but at least this might give you ideas about how TMG could be used to accomplish what you seem to want.

Happy to help!

You are explaining it just fine. The key is the term nearest I emboldened in TMG Help. The relationship 30th ggaunt is a nearer relationship than 33rd great grandmother. As the Help says, direct line does not take precedence, nearest takes precedence, and 30th is nearer than 33rd. At least that is the way that I understand how the program works.

This is easy. Don't create a new project and then try to Import. Instead, just use a List of People report, select your Focus Group as the Subject of the report, now open the Report Options and select the Secondary Output tab. Select the option to Create New Project, and specify the filename and location of the new project. That report will automatically create a new Project with just the people from the Focus Group. I think that is what you want, right?

I assume when you say "relationships are applied" that you are talking about TMG's Relationship Calculator? Since you are only getting unexpected results for this one person, is it possible that what you are seeing is correct? A person can have more than one relationship by tracing through different ancestors. From the TMG Help: "The Relationship Calculator will determine the nearest blood relationship between two designated individuals in the data set. It will also indicate the common ancestors on whom each relationship is based. The calculations are based on the primary parent records and do not include relationships based on parents that are recorded as non-primary. The Relationship Calculator can also calculate the relationship between two people when the relationship occurs through the spouse of one of the individuals selected." I emphasized "nearest" in the above as it is possible/likely that when you link in the parents TMG finds a nearer blood connection than would exist through only the spouse or children. The relationship you are seeing without parents linked must be either through children or spouse, so makes me suspect that there actually is some other nearer relationship through the parents. Could this be the case?

Glad to help.

Patsy, A quick search in this forum on "OLE error" found this posting here. It recommends simply re-downloading and reinstalling the 7.03 version of TMG over the existing version, which appears to have solved this problem with some other users.

Hi Rich, Like Terry, I don't understand what you are trying to do. The important point is that people do not have a single location (we tend to move around ). Only events (which in TMG are Tags) have a location. You could filter a List of Events report for all tags where State Equals a particular state. That report could also filter for events whose Date was between some specific range. On that List of Events you could output and sort these events by the county, and also output the Principals names and ID numbers to help you locate these people. You could even set a temporary custom Flag on the Secondary Output to flag all these people. That Flag could then be used to filter a separate List of People report that output their BMD information. That is the best my imagination can think of at the moment. Hope this gives you ideas.

Hi Peter, Like you, I cannot think of a way to do this directly within TMG. Looks like a good candidate for a "wish list" item. The only idea that I came up with to help in manually setting the flag, one person at a time, was to produce a List of Events report with a filter of Tag Type Group is Birth ANDDate Has Modifier END I then created that LOE report as type Comma Separated Value with only the output columns of: Date, Tag Type Label, Prin1 ID Then I opened that report in a text editor and searched for exactly ' s ' (that is a lowercase s with a space both before and after). That will find the "Say" dates, and that report line gives you the ID number of the person. You can then jump to that person (using Ctrl-I or the GoTo button) and set their flag. Very tedious if you have a lot of them, but at least you can find them. If you don't have too many this may help.

Some will suggest a separate custom tag for an organization, such as Masons, if your line has many of these. However, I choose to create custom tag sentences that are very general, and then use a split memo for the details. For example, my custom sentences for the Associatn tag that I use for all such memberships in organizations are: Principal: [P] <was|and [PO] were> [M1]<with [WO]> <[D]><[M2]><[L]>.< [M3]>Witness: [W] was [M1] with [P1] <and [P2]> <and [WO]> <[D]><[M2]><[L]>.< [WM]> [M1] provides details about the association and [M2] provides details about the location in both the Principal and Witness sentences. [M3] is an optional trailing comment for the Principal(s), [WM] for each Witness. A simple example of a split memo for one person might be: a Mason||in lodge 542||He was elected to Grand Master twice in his life The resulting sentence might be: Fred Jones was a Mason from 1943 to 1976 in lodge 542 in Rapid City, Iowa. He was elected to Grand Master twice in his life. Hope this gives you ideas,