He,She,They in sentences

[gillibrandd 0]

When I produce a report that has multiple witnesses with the same role e.g. 2 daughters in a census record, then the standard sentences produce "They was". When there is onle one daughter it produces "She was"

 

As these sentences relate to a single person should the sentence be "He/She was" not They was!!!

 

Regards

 

Derek

 

 

Derek, I moved this to the proper section - Terry

[Terry Reigel 0]

Derek,

 

Role variables produce the name(s), or appropriate pronoun, for everyone with that role. The only exception is the [R:rolename] variable when used in the sentence of that role. So when there are multiple people with the role and you use the variable [RP:Rolename] it produces "They" rather than "He" or "She."

 

The simplest solution is to just hard code the He and She in the sentence. This requires that you create both a male and female sentence.

[gillibrandd 0]

Terry

I had worked out that you could do it manually. In the UK there are 8 censuses 1841-1901 and about 38 roles per census. So it would need changing in circa 300 places just for the census. Then there are the other events as well!!!

 

The use of They relating to a single person seems a bug to me. Why does the variable [RP:Rolename] produces "They" rather than "He" or "She."

 

In what context is this correct?

 

Regards

 

Derek

[Michael Hannah 0]

Why does the variable [RP:Rolename] produces "They" rather than "He" or "She."

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.

[Terry Reigel 0]

The use of They relating to a single person seems a bug to me. Why does the variable [RP:Rolename] produces "They" rather than "He" or "She."

 

In what context is this correct?

It seems to me it's always correct - the variable is addressing everyone with that role, so if there is more than one person "They" is the correct form. Seems to me the more logical question is when could it ever not be correct - or more to the point, why does [R:rolename] not list everyone with that role when used in the sentence of a person assigned that role? To me, that's the illogical case. Every other role variable, and that one in every other context, does deliver output based on everyone with that role.

 

There have been suggestions to create separate variables to deliver the single person output, which it seems to me is the logical solution. But that has not materialized so far.