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SoCalRivethed

inferred names, and other inconsistencies

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So, I gave up on the old way of entering "place names" as surnames (OF Burgandy, D'Italia, etc). As I could not get a timly resolution to a reoccuring issue I had and/or a detail explanation of why so I can avoid it or fix myslef, I decided to remove a choke point. I split placename type Surnames in too preSurname and Surname fields, reapplied "sortSurname". this has made things run a bit smoother, but now have some new annoyances (v 8.04 and also in v 8.08 thinking the updates migth actually solve a problem).

 

Say 2 people, Old Method surname D'Italia, are changed to the new convention of naming. So preSurname becomes D', and Surname (and sort) Become Italia. BUT, not some show in the explorer picklist eith (D') Italia, and some as Just Italia. henlooking at each individual, there primary name is displaying the saem as well, some /given/ D' Italia, some /given/ Italia. I looked and Given name length, and it seems not to be an issue. It happens to random De, D', Del, Of, Von, Le, L' surnamed incividuals.

 

Second issues is, INferred names, how do I disable this. It was not a issue before, but as I get more granular with my data, and anal-retentive about it, it is now seriously messing up my Schema. I jilts my picklists, my sorting, and to some degree, my reporting and tools (like tthe one I used to change en masse the presurname splits).

 

Anyone? I am here as it takes weeks to get a fix or answere sometimes form wg directly. I have stuck with TMG through all the heartaches, as it allows me control of most of my data. But as I seek more conformity and control, it is starting to frustrate mroe than it is helping.

 

(Sorry if this sounds like an itch only I have need of scratching, but for such a robust and maleable application, it should be able to work within the confines of normal C.R.U.D. queries, as well as fancy built in strings).

 

thanks for looking whether you canhelp or not

 

SCR

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It is unclear to me what you are trying to do. I am just a user like yourself but in my use of TMG I have found that the display and sorting of names is wholly under the control of the user based on what one chooses to enter in each Name field, and what Name Style one uses, and is completely consistent. Further I have found that inferred names is a feature which is also completely consistent. However, both require a bit of a learning curve to understand what TMG will always do with names. As a beginning I recommend reviewing Terry Reigel's on-line TMG Tips, especially his page about Name Variations. See also TMG's included HELP pages, especially the topics: "Data Entry: Names" and "Edit Name Style".

 

First, the topic of inferred names. The Name tag which is made Primary provides values for inferring the GivenName and/or the Surname in other Name tags. If you add an additional Name-Variation tag and leave either of those two fields blank, TMG will "infer" those two fields' values from that Name tag which is Primary. ONLY the GivenName and Surname fields are inferred. Even if there are values in any other fields in the Name tag which is Primary, they are not inferred in any non-Primary Name tag.

 

Guessing what you are trying to do, I can share what I do for names with PreSurname values. To deal with them I created two custom Name Styles and a custom Name tag type.

 

The default U.S. Standard Name Style only outputs the fields of Title, GivenName, Surname, and Suffix. To output any of the other fields (Prefix, PreSurname, or OtherName) a custom Name Style must be defined and used. Since you cannot modify the default Name Style to include all of these name parts, you must create a custom style for that purpose. For this reason I created the custom Name Style "AllFields" which outputs all possible fields. I also created the Name Style "SurnamePreSort" and a custom name tag type (called Name-Surname-Sort) for dual index entries for names with non-empty PreSurname fields.

 

I created the "Name-Surname-Sort" custom Name tag variation for use with names whose PreSurname fields were non-empty, e.g. "van Suffelen". I wish such surnames to sort and appear in indexes both with and without the PreSurname, e.g. both under 'V' and under 'S'.

 

The Primary name is entered as a standard Name-Var tag type, but with the "AllFields" custom Name Style. That style has the following templates:

Output:            [Title] [Prefix] [GivenName] [PreSurname] [Surname] [Suffix]Surname sort:      [PreSurname] [SortSurname], [Prefix] [SortGiven] [Title] [Suffix]Surname display:   [PreSurname] [Surname], [Prefix] [GivenName] ([Title]) [Suffix]Given sort:        [Prefix] [SortGiven] [Title] [Suffix] [PreSurname] [SortSurname]Given display:     [Prefix] [GivenName] [Title] [Suffix] [PreSurname] [Surname]Children/Siblings: [Title] [Prefix] [GivenName] [PreSurname] [Surname] [Suffix]
However, I also enter a non-primary Name-Surname-Sort tag to produce the sort without the PreSurname, but with my custom "SurnamePreSort" Name Style for appropriate display and sort fields for the indexes. Further the sentence for this tag is double excluded ("--") as I do not intend it to ever produce output other than in indexes. Since only the GivenName and Surname will repeat from the Primary Name-Var tag, at least the PreSurname field must be entered in this tag. If there are any non-empty fields other than GivenName or Surname they must also be entered. But neither GivenName nor Surname need to be entered as those two fields will be inferred. In most of my cases I only need to enter the PreSurname in these tags.

 

The "SurnamePreSort" Name Style has the following templates:

Output:            [Title] [Prefix] [GivenName] [Surname] ([PreSurname]) [Suffix]Surname sort:      [SortSurname] [Prefix], [SortGiven] [Title] [Suffix]Surname display:   [Surname] ([PreSurname]), [Prefix] [GivenName] ([Title]) [Suffix]Given sort:        [Prefix] [SortGiven] [Title] [Suffix] [SortSurname] [PreSurname]Given display:     [Prefix] [GivenName] [Title] [Suffix] [Surname] ([PreSurname])Children/Siblings: [Title] [Prefix] [GivenName] [Surname] ([PreSurname]) [Suffix]
This custom style intentionally encloses the PreSurname in parentheses for display and output.

 

As an example, the individual "Adriannus van Suffelen" has two Name tags.

The standard Name-Var tag type is set to the Name Style "AllFields" and has three fields with data:

GivenName: Adriannus

PreSurname: van

Surname: Suffelen

 

Name-Surname-Sort is set to the Name Style "SurnamePreSort" and only has the one field with data:

PreSurname: van

 

The standard Name-Var tag, which is Primary, will sort his surname in the Picklists under 'V' due to the "AllFields" Name Style. The custom Name-Surname-Sort tag, which is non-Primary, will sort his surname in the Picklists under 'S' due to the "SurnamePreSort" Name Style. Thus when sorting the picklist by Surname I get both:

  Suffelen (van), Adriannus* van Suffelen, Adriannus
When sorting by GivenName I get both:
  Adriannus Suffelen (van)* Adriannus van Suffelen
The leading asterisk shows which name is Primary in the Picklists. Note that Name indexes produced by SecondSite will also have both names so you can find the person either way you choose to search.

 

Hope this gives you ideas,

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thank you for your response, and please bear with me a moment, I have had one frustration after another over the past few months, and have resorted to work arounds to try and get stability back and consistent date in TMG.

 

so exhibit a show on induvidual and how he appears in main project window, project explorer, and tag entry screens

 

and exhibit b shows on possibly related individual and the same views

 

notice a is shown in main window, primary name-var as Hugh Ii De Audley, and in the project explorer as (De) Audley, Hugh Ii

 

notice b shows in the main window, primary name-var as Alice Sudley, and in project explorer as Audley, Alice

 

But aside from different Given and SortGiven names, they have identical Presurname, surname, and sortsurname.

 

Image sizes may be a bit large, but they clearly show my issue.

 

And before anyone asks, i changed my data to presurname-surname format, instead of just a combined surname as I previously used, because I am 90% sure my previous crashing issues are due to TMG choking when it tries to match names as I add people.

 

thanks again

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First, your exhibits clearly show that you have TMG set to use "Beginner" data entry mode instead of "Advanced". That setting is in "Preferences // Program Options // Data Entry". While there are some advantages to using "Beginner" mode, it is designed for typical non-complicated data entry. Name Styles cannot be accessed, created, or modified in "Beginner" mode. No entry in the PreSurname field will ever show without accessing and assigning a Name tag a non-standard Name Style, which you cannot do in "Beginner" mode.

 

I suspect that at some point you did have TMG in "Advanced" mode, created some custom Name Styles and assigned them to various specfic Name tags of some people. Then when you updated your TMG version you automatically reverted to the default of "Beginner" mode. If you will now change your Preference setting to "Advanced" data entry mode, you will then see an additional button above "Title" labeled "Name style", and next to that button would display the Name Style that each specific Name tag is using.

 

I may be wrong, but I suspect that if you change to "Advanced" you will see that these two Name tags, "Hugh Ii De Audley" and "Alice De Audley" are using two different Name Styles. I suspect that "Alice" is using the standard Name Style called "U.S. Standard Name", since the PreSurname is not being displayed in the Picklist, which is the default. I suspect that "Hugh" is using some custom Name Style you created earlier, since that is the only way that PreSurname would ever show in a Picklist, especially since the "(De)" is enclosed in parentheses, which is very non-standard.

 

Hope this gives you ideas,

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ideas, yes, solutions, we'll see. off to learn more abut the advance settings. I've been using tmg since v6, in "beginner" mode as I never needed anything else, and do not recall changing name styles. I just seek control, accuracy and consistentcy of my data.

 

To put it another way, why install dual gtx cards in sli, with solid state Primaries, a velocioraptor (in raid 0) secondary serving up your page file and scratch disk, and an 8 bay NAS in Raid 5 if you are just surfing the web and postining on FB. :)

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You must have used "Advanced" data entry mode at one point. Using the default Name Style any data entered in the PreSurname field would never show in the picklist. Since data you enter in that field shows for "Hugh" is must be using a non-standard custom Name Style. That is why the two names display differently.

 

Beginner is fine if you don't need advanced features. But if you are going to be using the PreSurname field, then you need Advanced.

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after toying with it all my remaining wakeing hours, I did enable advanced mode, and changed all name styles to match, think that is the ticket, thanks. I may have experimented with it in my early days of tmg, not realizing I had some in a non-standard form, before reverting back to beginner mode (probably at the 6 to 7 switch).

 

thanks again

 

and now, off to test/tackle stability :)

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If you would prefer to use Beginner mode, but need the advanced custom Name Styles, you can do that. Toggling back and forth between Beginner and Advanced is not a problem. If you like, I can tell you the things you need to do while in Advanced mode to have the custom Name Style always be your default, but then toggle back to use Beginner mode from then on.

 

However, many of us simply use Advanced mode all the time as we constantly use many of the advanced features, like Sort dates.

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I am just leaving it on advanced mode for now. Do not plan on using any of the features other than "viewing" the presurname in the project explorer list. It's more about consistency at this point. :)

 

There is probably 80% of TMG I have not used, or am desirious of using. I only stay with it, as I can quickly (relatively) fix data, particularly placenames, for accuracy and consistency.

 

thanks again

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I am just leaving it on advanced mode for now.

That will work. But since you want to view PreSurname text in the Project Explorer list, the only way to do that is if a Name tag containing text in the PreSurname field is using your custom Name Style. However, if your custom Name Style is constructed appropriately, it could be used for all your Name tags, not just the ones with something in the PreSurname field, which probably would make your life simpler.

 

Assuming your custom Name Style is appropriate for all Name tags, I suggest doing two things:

    [*]Change all your existing Name tags to use your custom Name Style for consistency, whether or not they have data in the PreSurname field.

    [*]Change the default Name Style for all Name tags to be your custom Name Style so it will be used with every new Name tag, such as when adding a new person.

I suggest the first task as otherwise you might later add some PreSurname text to an existing Name tag which uses the default Style and (again) wonder why that text does not display in the Project Explorer or Picklists. This task can be accomplished either manually one at a time, or in bulk with one action using the TMG Utility (TMGU) available as Donorware from John Cardinal here. If you have lots of Name tags, I suggest TMGU is the most efficient way to go, using its function "Change Name Style". If you are using the latest TMG Version 8.08, then his TMGU Version 7.3 is the appropriate version. If you are still using TMG Version 8.04 as you implied in an earlier post, then you will need to get TMGU Version 7.2. (But I would really recommend upgrading to the latest TMG Version 8.08.)

 

I suggest the second task as otherwise every time you create a new person or add a new Name tag you will have to remember to change the tag to use your custom Name Style if you want PreSurmane text to display. This task can be accomplished in TMG. While in Advanced mode, access the Master Tag Type List from the Tools menu. At the top of the Tag Type List set the "Filter:" to be for the Name group of tag types. Now one at a time open every one of these Tag Types for Edit. On the "General" tab in the middle of the screen change the "Default Style:" to be your custom Name Style, and OK the Edit. This will define the Style to be used for any new tags of that type, but will have no effect on existing tags.

 

Doing these two tasks will ensure that all your current Name tags are consistently using your custom Name Style, and every new Name tag you create will use this custom Name Style.

 

Once you do these two tasks while in Advanced mode, you could toggle back to Beginner data entry mode for all your subsequent work. With these Style settings all your current and future Name tags should be consistent, and display PreSurname text.

 

Hope this gives you ideas,

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done and done before I started this mornings string of replies.

 

I did enable advanced mode, and changed all name styles to match, think that is the ticket, thanks.

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