Lessons learned from moving information from my personal tree to a CET using a GEDCOM

NCVAresearch

I am in the process of creating a CET from my Roots Magic database. I have found it useful to study how fields in Roots Magic map to my CET. By several trial and error attempts using about 20-ish individuals in my GEDCOMs, I have learned a number of things that others may find worthwhile. If you use a different genealogy software, your experience may differ slightly.

GEDCOMs were designed before CETs were conceived so data transfer from one source to the other is not as simple as it appears. Most fields transfer well to the CET. However, sometimes fields post in unexpected places in my CET. Based on how this information is treated by the GEDCOM, I have made tweaks in Roots Magic so that the data posts more efficiently.

Here are two examples of what I ran into that required updates in Roots Magic:

1)There are four different places that explanatory information can be added to a source in Roots Magic. GEDCOMs handle each place differently. I use two of them. The type of information determines which place I use. I also add two blank lines to make the information more readable in my CET.

2) Roots Magic goes to great lengths to allow a user to write a canned histories from your genealogical data. It is helpful that purpose. GEDCOMs also pick up this extraneous footnote data and post in sources in my CET. To me, this extra information clutters up my source and can be a bit repetitive. I just delete the information in Roots Magic I do not want the GEDCOM to add to my CET.

During the process of mapping, I have found a couple of things that I have passed on to the programmers. For instance, the source date does not post as expected.

Hope all this is helpful to you.

Tomie K. Avant

Thank you very much for helping test CET and forwarding issues you encounter. I have passed your comments to the engineering team. Again, thank you for your time.