Daryl Edmonds

I realise the answer to this query can many and varied but I am wondering what the experienced TMG users use as a source sentence for the events that don't have a date. The main events I'm concerned with would be the date of birth when I have the christening date but no birth date & the death date when I have the burial date but no death date. I've been using "Author's estimation, relying on all relevent available data", but that looks a bit ambiguous to me. What do others use? I hadn't been entering the birth events if I didn't have a date, as christenings occassionally can be quite some time after the birth. eg. I have one example of a father being christened at the same time as his first child! Death dates can usually be "guestimated" to be usually within a few days before the burial (and often the following day) unless there's been a coronial inquest or an autopsy required. However, without a birth event being entered, parents aren't named in TMG reports or SS. I've now started entering the birth, with just a sort date, which overcomes the report issue, but I'm having trouble getting my head around a suitable sentence to use in the source output.

Thanks, Michael, I guess I'm doing something similar, although I don't include what my reasoning behind "all avilable relevant details" might be, at this stage; that might be something to aim for in the future!

I have had my computer completely rebuilt and now have a 1TB hard drive. I intend to partition this into C Drive and D Drive. The query I'm making refers to the discussion that was had on the thread titled "Moving data to "D" Drive" back in June. I regularly transfer the data between my three computers and the other two have a "user_data" folder that the TMG backups go into (as did this one before the rebuild) but the program was on C Drive. Now I have to do a new installation would it be easier for me to instal the whole program on D or is there a valid reason why the program itself should go on C and I move the backups, etc., onto D?

Thanks Terry, I'll stick with the defaults and set up a folder on D:\, that's how my previous setup worked, anyway; I just wanted confirmation that it was the way to go.

I am trying to set flags for various family groups by generating a focus group and then doing a "list of people" report on the focus group, setting the flags under the Secondary Output tab. I've done a couple and they have worked successfully and as expected. But I have one group which has 1551 people in the focus group but the "list of people report" only lists 1209. Where did the other 300+ go or what am I not doing correctly? I thought I did things the same in each case. (Edit) Once again, it was my own fault. The "Name variations" box was inadvertently ticked, so some people were being listed more than once!

Thanks, Jim, I hadn't thought of that before. I'll keep it mind for next time.

In the Variable (Name Tags) section in the Help files, it says "[P] . . . . . . . (always produces He/She)". When I use [P] I get the full name all the time. Most tags after the initial use of the full name I have used [PF] to make the output a bit more readable, but it gets a bit tiresome reading John did this, John did that, John did something else. I would much prefer the use of a pronoun (he/she) in most of those occasions. I realise I can change the sentence to something like "[D] he was living [L] <[M]>" but the way I read the Help files, I shouldn't need to. Or am I missing something? Where and under what conditions are the pronouns produced?

You are looking at the wrong help topic since you are primarily discussing event tag sentences. You want: Sentence Construction / Variables (Event Tags) Thanks, Jim, I realise now I was looking in the wrong section. Unfortunately the mind isn't as nimble as it used to be

Janis, Thank you for your reply. It would be the [D] at the beginning of the sentence that would be the culprit. Thanks for setting me straight. I like the idea of the sentence in your PS regarding the [RP:%] variable; I'll use that quite often, I'm sure, as I often like to have the date at the beginning of a sentence, particularly if I have an exact date. The sentence I included in my query was from Help>Variables>(Name Tags)

When I got my laptop a few years ago I was advised to create a backup folder with the same name as the backup folder on the desktop, which was D:\User_data\The Master Genealogist v7\Backups. That works well when updating and moving backups for restoring the other computer to the newer data. I've now "invested" in a 10" netbook and have installed TMG7, mainly for use in research centres, libraries, etc. My problem is that the netbook only has a C:\ drive. It's supposed to be 160GB but there's only 127GB free. Could I take a section (perhaps 30-50GB) of that drive and make into a D:\ and create a "user data" folder; if so, how do I go about that without interfering with the existing programs?

Thanks, Jim. I've just started using Win 7 and wasn't aware that those tools were available. All good; TMG 7 up and running.

I seem to be finding it harder to sort out my own problems as I get older I'm having a problem with a marriage sentence, trying to include the Principals ages into the story. The sentence I'm using is: <[D]> <[PF],> [A], married <[PO],> [A] <[PARO]><[L]> The output I was expecting would be: On 15 Oct 1918 Henry, 25, married Ivy May Green, 19, in the residence of Mrs. T. Green. The output I get is: On 15 Oct 1918 Henry, 25, married Ivy May Green, 25, in the residence of Mrs. T. Green. When you look at Ivy's sentence is says: On 15 Oct 1918 Ivy, 19, married Henry Robert Jones, 19, in the residence of Mrs. T. Green. I would have thought it should be possible to include both parties ages in the same sentence. I guess it is something simple that I've missed.

Thanks, I knew it was something simple.

When I enter place names in my data I have usually put a dash (-) in front of Australia so that the word isn’t printed in reports as, in the case of Western Australia or South Australia, I feel it looks untidy with the unnecessary repetition as in Western Australia, Australia. However, when I print a report the sentence finishes with a comma and full stop (Perth, Western Australia,.). Is there some way I can stop the comma being printed in such sentences? I'm using TMG 7

Thanks, John & Terry. As you suggested, the errors were self-inflicted where I'd put either a comma or full stop as <[L],> in the sentence structure.

Yes, I know, Robert, but they all seem to have a trailing comma in most reports, even when they're not needed, as in the following case. I have recorded a death and the last place field [L] is South Australia and I the put the cause of death as a memo. But the report reads ". . . Adelaide, South Australia, The cause of death was . . . . ". I wish I could put a full stop after South Australia. I know I could probably restructure the sentence (and often do) but I would like to be able to just type in data without having to review and edit a lot memos.

When I open the "add person" screen it has always, in the past when adding children, had the family surname pre-filled. Today it's decided not to do that and I have to fill in the surname myself. I've run the different maintenance options, ran the relationship option in "preferences", closed and restarted the program, all to no avail. Anyone know what to do next? Thanks, Worked it out; my own stupidity was the main cause!

Yes, Terry, that was the problem. I should have explained what I did in case others had the same problem. I had put both given and surnames in the first line

I've been travelling, entering data in my laptop and, now that I'm home again, went to restore my desktop data to match my laptop, which I've successfully done many times before. This time, when I try to do that, I get the following error message: "There are problems with CDX files. Please let me know about it ASAP. Sher". I think I read somewhere that they are index files. How do I fix them, if I can?

Thanks Robin, I was about to say "don't worry, it's been fixed" when your reply came in. My computer was getting sluggish (seems to be a Windows phenomenon, anyone know a cure?) so I closed all programs and rebooted the computer. When I reloaded TMG it created a new index, etc. and the restore went without a hitch. I'll file your repair method away for future reference.

When I opened TMG this morning I got the following error message from Microsoft Visual FoxPro: "Microsoft Visual FoxPro Fatal error: Exception code=C0000005 @ 2010.03.13 10:09:26 AM. Error log file: C:\Program Files\The Master Genealogist v7\VFP9Rerr.log Called from – tmgappobj.msetlastperson line 48 {c:\programe files\common\libs\appobj.vct} Called from – appobject.show line 286 {c:\programe files\common\libs\appobj.vct} Called from – tmgappobj.show line 3 {c:\programe files\the master genealogist v7\libs\appobjtmg.vct} Called from – tmgmain line 548 {C:\Program Files\The Master Genealogist v7\tmg\programs\tmgmain.prg c:\program files\the master genealogist v7\tmg7.exe" The program is "dead", ie. it is not responding to mouse clicks. It was OK when I closed it down yesterday. It is on an XP computer; I also have it on a laptop running Windows 7 but I'm not game to do a resore on that one in case I import the problem. Assistance required, please. Thaks in advance. Daryl.

Can I produce a Descendant Box Chart of only two or three generations and, if so, how? I want to produce a chart for a forthcoming family reunion but it is a large family with 800-900 people in 7 generations. What I would like to do is put out a chart for the first 2 generations and then individual descendant charts for for the children of the 20 of the third generation who had offspring. How do I go about doing that? There doesn't seem to be an option to use a Focus Group.

Thanks

When a Descendant Indented Narrative report is published I would like the output to be a bit more reader friendly. What I mean by that is: when there are several children in a family they all include the phrase eg. "XXXXX daughter of George Alexander GRANT and Mary Kate WARE" "XXXXX son of George Alexander GRANT and Mary Kate WARE", etc. it gets a bit tiresome reading son/daughter of XXX and YYY up to a dozen times, depending on the number of children. Is there a way to list the children, their birth details (date and place) without listing the parents every time. We know who they belong to because it is an indented chart. I'm sure it would look tidier when published and make for lighter reading

Thanks Andy