Allow open access to download Family Tree User's Ancestral Lines with ALL associated information
Since its inception, FamilySearch Family Tree has held very tightly to the information entered into it by its users.
-NO Gedcom download capability.
-NO ancestral line download capability.
-NO capability for developers or individuals to download an individual's record with SOURCES, DISCUSSIONS, NOTES and MEMORIES.
-Yes, a few "third party software solutions" with limited capability, requiring installing and learning a whole new and different system only to discover the solution is - PARTIAL. And it's not RootsMagic, Legacy or AQ's fault. FamilySearch is holding on too tightly to the data!
FamilySearch does not provide the hooks for other developers to write the software to download individual's ANCESTRAL LINES with associated SOURCES, DISCUSSIONS, NOTES and MEMORIES.
FamilySearch likewise does not provide the capability for individuals who have laboriously entered the information on their ancestral lines to download it, other than printing reams of family group sheets.
Given a mission of connecting families across generations, allowing FamilySearch users to move their ancestral line data - the data from their ancestral tree - wherever will be most helpful to them seems like the best policy.
This does not require that users of FamilySearch be able to re-upload that data, which could be a problem if used to overwrite subsequent changes to records in their ancestral trees.
The members-only capability for moving 4 generations of records at a time with Ancestry.com is good but still laborious.
This is a plea to FamilySearch managers and Church leaders to open up the tap for full-bodied ancestral lines to be downloadable (real, full capability improved GEDCOM could work) from FamilySearch Family Tree by individual users in a format that could be worked on by other software providers like Rootsmagic, Legacy, AQ, ANCESTRY, My Heritage, etc. This would do a lot to further both genealogical and family history work throughout the world's communities, thus furthering the FamilySearch mission of connecting families across generations and Church mission of the Gathering of Israel.