TMG-L Archives

Archiver > TMG > 2001-03 > 0983509538


From: Lee Hoffman <>
Subject: Re: [TMG] FILTER problem
Date: Fri, 02 Mar 2001 00:05:38 -0500
References: <001c01c0a278$db2b5800$25fc5ecf@casper>
In-Reply-To: <028901c0a2b8$ec04e5c0$48537bcb@v2u2q7>


Jan Roberts wrote:
>I agree with Cheri - I find it very confusing when events don't sort
>logically. I know there are always exceptions to the rule (my late first
>husband's sister was born after her father's death, I have a fellow
>researcher on one line who only married her partner many years after their
>children were born etc.) but logically I like to see marriages coming before
>births, deaths after etc.

I'm coming into the middle of this conversation, so I'm unsure of what has
been said before. In any case, Tags on a Person View are sorted
chronologically first and foremost. If a Tag is undated (no Date _and_ no
Sort Date), then it (an other like tags) are placed either at the top or
the bottom of the dated tags as selected in the System Configuration Screen
(Tags tab) (select Tools=>Options from the top menu). You may also select
to not display undated Tags (Unsorted option) in the System Configuration.

If a tag is undated, the user may enter an estimated date which will then
make it a dated tag. However, this is not desireable by some users. For
this reason, the Sort Date was added. The Sort Date will sequence the
undated tag chronologically with the rest of the tags, BUT the Sort Date
will _never_ print anywhere.

I think (reading in between the lines) that what Cheri is wanting is to
provide some other method of arranging tags particularly when changing the
Sort Date for a tag for one person places the tag incorrectly for the other
Principal and/or for a Witness. Assigning Sort Dates so that all parties
have the tag sorted properly can be a bit comples at times. While I have
had this situation occur, it is not one that occurs often although
apparently Cheri does have it a lot.

>One of my particular *complaints* is when married
>name tags are automatically created - based on the marriage date - and they
>appear before the marriage tag. Means an automated process which saves time
>(great) defeats its purpose because you have to then manually edit the tag
>to give it a sort date after the marriage date.

This is another point that some users make in regard to undated tags (and
this may be Cheri's rather than the paragraph above) is that there should
be a general sequence to tags such that undated tags always are sequenced
in a certain order -- such as Birth, Baptism or Christening, Education,
Graduation, Employment, Marriage, Illness, Will, Death, Burial, Probate.
The problem is that except for Birth, all other tags can and often do come
at different times in a person's life. There could even be an Illness
before Birth (although usually we don't record it for the child even if it
results in a mis-carriage or stillbirth). I have even seen where a
marriage was performed for a couple of which one party was deceased --- a
minor technicality. <g>

As for the married Name tag coming before the Marriage tag, I see your
point, but can't get too enthused over it as I don't print those tags in
reports and the sequence in the Person View doesn't bother me. Even if I
printed the tags, I don't think it would bother me as I would be editing
the report so that it read something like "She changed her name to Jones
when she married John Jones...." Thus the tag would be in the correct
order anyway.

>I have also mentioned
>before the situation where a daughter / son-step relationship tag (therefore
>having no sort date facility, and no facility to enter the actual date
>either) shows the incorrect age of the step-parent at the event, and also
>sorts incorrectly. In my case, it shows I became a step-mother at age 13
>because the *event* is tied to my step-daughter's birth date. And even
>though I became a step-mother to my step-son on the same day it shows that I
>was 19 when that *event* happened. And both of these *events* sort before
>my first marriage, because they are linked to the birth dates of the
>children. So I have had to create *Other* tags to deal with these events,
>but the incorrect age information / sequence of events still appears because
>I have to retain the daughter / son-step relationship tag to enable the
>relationship to show up.

This and other things in regard to how adoptive/foster/step children are
treated in genealogy reports will hopefully be addressed in the
genealogical community someday soon. However, so far, no one has come
forward with a satisfactory method of deailing with these problems. My
wife has a cousin whose mother died and she was adopted by her aunt (and
uncle). Her father recently died long after her adoptive father. But how
do you treat her -- under her adoptive parents or her natural parents? As
it is now, she is listed under her Primary parents whichever they are. But
both are correct as she was really raised by both set of parents although
after adoption (age 10) the percentage of care, etc. switched.

As for the birth date situation, I see the problem. My wife's GM married
second a man who was older (he was 53 and she was 26) and had a grown
family. One of his children still lived at home (age 18). However, what
is the solution? The adoptive/foster/step child's birth date doesn't
change. The Adoption tag shows the date the adoption took place and could
be used with foster or step situations as well, if desired. Substituting
the adoption date for the child's birth date in the adoptive parent(s)'
views would be just as misleading as showing the birthdate.

The NGS Quarterly published articles in 1995 and 1997 which are now
included in a new edition of the NGS publication "Numbering Your
Genealogy". While this doesn't directly address the problem of dates, it
does address some of the problems of how to treat adoptive or foster
children and how to show them in genealogy narratives. But many problems
still exist in how to treat adoptive/foster/step children. This area of
genealogy was virtually ignored until the past thirthy years of so, and is
just now being addressed. Part of the problem is how all aspects of the
problem should be treated in a narrative.

The other part is how to treat the problem in TMG and other computer
programs. While this is a true problem, I don't think we will see much in
the way of resolution until the other part is resolved -- how the narrative
treat the problem. Even then, I don't know how to best display an adoptive
child in the adoptive parent(s)' Person View without being misleading.

>I certainly don't want to appear to be critical of Bob or of TMG (I
>sometimes think Bob must wish he'd never developed TMG when he is bombarded
>with *why can't it do....?*), but as he is so willing to try to accommodate
>users' wishes then we should be able to feel free to make those wishes known
>in the sense of it being constructive criticism.

Posting constructive criticisim on TMG-L is not and never has been a
problem. That is how we get a lot of the features added to the program.
Bob does listen and wants those suggestions. The only thing is that when
we ask for a feature, we need to be prepared to suggest in some detail how
the feature might be implemented (how it should work from the user's
standpoint) and be prepared to counter any questions that are raised. In
short, you might be required to "defend" the request.

>(By the way, I turned off the option to be asked if I want to create a
>married name, assuming it would do it automatically if I said I didn't want
>to be asked each time. Now it doesn't create a married name, so how do I
>turn that option back on?)

Select Tools=>Options from the top menu for the Systemk Configuration
screen. Select the Prompts tab and select the "Prompt for Married Names"
option on the upper left.

----------
Lee Hoffman/KY
E-mail:
TMG Tips: <http://www.tmgtips.com>;
My website: <http://www.tmgtips.com/lhoffman>;
--------------
A user of the best genealogy program, The Master Genealogist (TMG)

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