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Jim Byram

v9.04.0000-GEDCOM export / Enhanced option / Discussion

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The new GEDCOM export option is just that... an option that can be selected or unselected. No one is required to use it. It serves the needs of the vast majority of TMG users who wish to migrate to the most obvious alternative choices. It obviously can't be designed to serve every user and to accomodate every program users might want to migrate to. Bottom line... This is a limited practical effort to make it easier for as many TMG users as possible who wish to migrate to other software.

 

 

By the way, the modifications to the TMG export facility leaves intact what I consider to be the greatest deficiency in its gedcom export facility - namely the requirement that the owners of a joint event have to be married or at least be the joint parents of a child. Changing this to allow the event to appear as separate events under each individual should be relatively easy.

Custom tags (non-family) with P1 & P2 will also export if the tag type is set to export as an acceptable GEDCOM 5.5 individual attribute or event tag (i.e., enter an appropriate tag name into the GEDCOM field on the Tag Type Definition Screen). They will appear under P1 and P2 in their individual records. For example, you could export a custom event tag having a P1 and a P2 as a GEDCOM RESI tag. The custom tag name will be lost.

 

Taking advantage of this would work poorly if the new GEDCOM export option were used. For example, if such an event had witnesses, you would end up with two tags in individual GEDCOM records each with all linked witnesses and no way to know that the two principals were P1 and P2 of an event tag in the TMG database.

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Tom,

Most of us, including Jim I strongly suspect, would argue that using GEDCOM even with this proposed Enhanced Export option is only suggested if there is no other feasible alternative. If as you suggest a program exists to directly read TMG project files and construct import input specific to a given product, then that is destined to be a better solution for transferring to that product. But until those programs exist, this option is likely to be very useful to those users who do not wish to wait for such direct-import programs.

 

I, for one, continue to recommend people wait for such programs, and not to use GEDCOM as a transfer mechanism, even with this useful extension option.

As for your comment about two-principal events, Jim explained what TMG export will do with a particular parameter setting for such events.

Custom tags (non-family) with P1 & P2 will also export if the tag type is set to export as an acceptable GEDCOM 5.5 individual attribute or event tag (i.e., enter an appropriate tag name into the GEDCOM field on the Tag Type Definition Screen). They will appear under P1 and P2 in their individual records. For example, you could export a custom event tag having a P1 and a P2 as a GEDCOM RESI tag. The custom tag name will be lost.


This will occur, Tom, but notice carefully Jim's comment that "the custom tag name will be lost". Using his example, if you set TMG Tag Type XYZ to export as RESI there is now nothing in the GEDCOM output to distinguish this XYZ TMG tag type output from any other TMG tag type which is also set to output as RESI. Thus this setting has limited value if you want to export several different two-principal custom TMG tag types and keep their output separate in the GEDCOM.

Also note that there is now nothing in either of the duplicated GEDCOM tags to indicate that the other principal was ever linked to this tag. That linkage is lost.

(If you do wish to try this, I would suggest instead of using a GEDCOM tag type such as RESI which may be being exported from TMG by some other tag type, to use one of the two legal individual tag types not used by TMG: CHRA and CREM. But since they are standard GEDCOM tag types, the importing program may recognize them for their true propose. However, at least using these names any tag type(s) set to one of these GEDCOM tag types would be identifiable and separate from normal TMG tag type output.)

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