Editing GEDCOM Files

[Bryman]

Thanks for the suggestion, Alexander. I have followed your instructions and given Textpad a try but found it still rather basic. The coloured text helps a bit but I had been rather hoping for something to break up the many lines of text into more manageable chunks.

I created a 'small'ish .ged file from a test to investigate Tim's instructions for generating CENS facts and then manually inserted a few blank lines and leading blanks to see the effect of various amounts of indentation. I found this to produce a file which was much easier to understand and navigate around. If this had been 20 years or so earlier, I would have been very tempted to create my own reader/editor but I think that my 28 years of software development is now rather out of date. I would be happy to get involved in such a project but would need technical guidance from someone else more knowledgeable than me (other than you, who is already too busy).

As I further my family research, Gedcom files created from my tree(s) are growing steadily and I am finding that use of Notepad or Textpad is awkward, at best. Recently, I was wishing that I was still able to use an editor like the one that I worked with extensively on mainframe systems more than 20 years ago. After a little on-line searching, I think that I have found the answer to run on my PC, called SPF Lite. It is a complete shareware development environment but I am only interested in the editor. The author missed the mainframe capabilities so much that he decided to write his own version after retirement and has now added extra features that he finds useful.

One of the big attractions for me is the ability to exclude/hide lines of the file being edited. With Gedcom files, the records for an individual may be hundreds or even thousands of records away from details of the family or sources. That makes scrolling backwards and forwards, or repeated use of CNTL-F with varying search arguments, very cumbersome. SPF Lite is able to display the associated records similar to those shown below:

Command >
****** ******************** Top of Data ********************
------ ---------------------------------------------------- < 000012 > ----
000013 0 @ind00076@ INDI
000014  1 NAME Ellen /Weakford/
000015   2 GIVN Ellen
000016   2 SURN Weakford
------ ---------------------------------------------------- < 000015 > ----
000032 1 FAMS @fam00028@
------ ---------------------------------------------------- < 001682 > ----
001715 0 @fam00028@ FAM
001716  1 HUSB @ind00093@
001717  1 WIFE @ind00076@

etc

The line indentation is produced by a simple command macro that I wrote to give even greater clarity.
The possibilities go much beyond this, if needed, and further information can be found from an on-line search.

I realise that this is mainly of specific use to me (due to my previous use of a similar product) and may not be relevant to others but I mention it here in case it may be of some interest to another forum member.

 

[Bryman]

Ooops! I referred to line indentation in my use of the SPF Lite editor but I have just realised that the forum has removed my inserted blanks in my example. There should have been an extra blank in front of any '1' in column 1 (after the generated line number), 2 blanks before any '2', etc.

(Thanks for saving my blushes and keeping quiet about my lack of proof reading.) The product is better than the reviewer.

 

[Tim]

I tried putting the blanks back in, but it's not having it.

 

[Heather]

I tried putting the blanks back in, but it's not having it.

It's giving you a blank look then Tim?

 

[Bryman]

It's giving you a blank look then Tim?

Nice one, but not as blank as my mind!
I should have remembered how to use the CODE and /CODE combination from the bar above, similar to the QUOTE and /QUOTE, to preserve multiple blanks.

This is how to preserve multiple                  blanks!

Perhaps I am not getting involved enough in some forum or other. If anyone sees me wandering around, please sit me down and give me a coffee (or something stronger). It might not help but at least I will be happy.

 

[Bob Spiers]

Perhaps I am not getting involved enough in some forum or other. If anyone sees me wandering around, please sit me down and give me a coffee (or something stronger). It might not help but at least I will be happy.

Thank goodness some humour creeping in because otherwise it is rapidly descending into an Anorak Discussion deserving of a 'Beware all who Enter' logo (perhaps a skull & cross bones) warning at its heading . Sorry but most of it is completely above my head, so please someone sit Bryman down and provide him refreshment and at least bring some cheer to the proceedings. ( love you all really)

 

[Bob Spiers]

Whilst still wearing your Anoraks, will someone kindly tell me why the copy and pasted skull and crossbones 'image' I wanted to insert in my reply, only appeared in the draft version, and not the posted version. Note not a URL link or embedded media just a pure copy & paste of a skull and crossbones. Just thought it would lighten my reply but gave up in the end. I'm sure I've done such before, but forgotten how. It's an age thing no doubt

 

[Bob Spiers]

Ok so I had to pretend I was a 'newbee' again and click on the QA which reminded me I had to upload the image as a file and click on thumbnail. Perhaps I now qualify for an Anorak?

 

[Tim]

Sounds like it

 

[Bryman]

Sorry but most of it is completely above my head, . . .

Don't apologise Bob. I was just trying to help anyone who regularly investigates the contents of large Gedcom files. If my message does not seem to be understood by anyone reading my post then it is probably not relevant to them and I am sorry for any confusion or worry created. My suggestion was just an extra and does not invalidate anything which has gone before or other tools which people may be familar with.

PS. You are welcome to keep the anorak that you have earned.

 

[Bob Spiers]

Don't apologise Bob. I was just trying to help anyone who regularly investigates the contents of large Gedcom files. If my message does not seem to be understood by anyone reading my post then it is probably not relevant to them and I am sorry for any confusion or worry created. My suggestion was just an extra and does not invalidate anything which has gone before or other tools which people may be familar with.

PS. You are welcome to keep the anorak that you have earned.

Thanks for that Bryman and you are right I have probably intruded into an irrelevant ‘grey’ area.

I have used Gedcoms for many years to transfer data from one Genealogical source to another. I know a Gedcom encodes genealogical data and on the few occasions when out of curiosity I have viewed its content –in Notepad or similar – apart from general recognition of what it conveys; e.g. Census references, residences etc., I have no desire to tamper with it. I have similar feelings about HTML language and whenever I have strayed (usually by accident) to ‘inspect its element’ to my non-cognoscenti eyes it is gibberish and best left alone.

Despite all this I began computing back in the 80’s and learned BASIC on a Sinclair ZX80 machine with comparative ease. I even made sense of early MSDOS on early PC’s. But with the advent of Windows from 3.1 onwards, I left coding to others.

That said I have strived to understand HTML derivatives, such as BB codes used in the Forum which conflicts somewhat with striving to understand another HTML derivative used within my Tribal Pages Site, which uses <> brackets instead of [ ]. The two are very similar, but different if that makes sense.

I suppose at the end of the day it is a little like using a car; I know nothing of the mechanics which I leave to others. I have a few computers all in use with multiple monitors (as I have mentioned in other postings) and am regarded by the family and friends as ‘someone who knows about computers’. That applies to their use and fixing their idiosyncrasies, but not, definitely not, to do with software coding; so will forsake the Anorak.

But keep up the good work and don’t mind me.

 

[Tim]

Ooops! I referred to line indentation in my use of the SPF Lite editor but I have just realised that the forum has removed my inserted blanks in my example. There should have been an extra blank in front of any '1' in column 1 (after the generated line number), 2 blanks before any '2', etc.

(Thanks for saving my blushes and keeping quiet about my lack of proof reading.) The product is better than the reviewer.

Fixed it for you, how about adding a link to the software?

 

[Bryman]

Thanks Tim. It upsets the later comments about lack of indentation but perhaps anyone reading this discussion will understand. I think the Gedcom display looks better for having the indents. The simple command macro that I use to exclude lines and perform the indents is . . .

' GED.macro
SPF_Cmd("C ALL '1' 1 ' 1'")
SPF_Cmd("C ALL '2' 1 '  2'")
SPF_Cmd("C ALL '3' 1 '   3'")
SPF_Cmd("C ALL '4' 1 '    4'")
SPF_Cmd("C ALL '5' 1 '     5'")
SPF_Cmd("EXCLUDE ALL")
SPF_Cmd("FIND ALL '0' 1")
SPF_Cmd("FIND ALL '1 NAME'")

Sorry about not including a direct link in the original post but I thought that anyone that might be interested would probably perform an online search for the product name to learn more. Here is the missing link.

 

[Bryman]

I thought that I had checked the number of spaces but something seems to have gone wrong when the above code was posted.
Tim, can you please make the number of spaces in the SPF_Cmd statements for 3 and 5 correct?

 

[Tim]

Look better now

 

[Bryman]

Thanks. Now I can go to sleep contented.