Saturday, May 5, 2018

User Question: Batch Editing of "Source Citations"


The Readers Request for a Blog Post
Working with (or batch-editing) source citations generated by Ancestry.com
First, please watch this Video on this topic:

How do I merge duplicate source citations ?


Why? The term "source citation" in the question. That "term" is two DIFFERENT topics. I hope I explained that in that presentation.

Working WITH Source Information from Ancestry is one thing. Crafting a Citation based in the information used from that record is another.

I have blogged about this many times before, but I ALWAYS move ALL Source Information into the Source Template feature in Family Tree Maker. That feature was introduced in FTM2010 and is based on the EvidenceExplained standard that was present at the time. 

The SOURCE Templates are not as accurate as they should be, but I have been successful getting them as accurate as possible. Please remember that this feature only deals with the SOURCE information. The container of the information.

Crafting the Citation, is the next step. I say "craft" as it is not a science, being that you "this, this, and that". It takes time. 

The "out put" of the Source Template and adding the Citation Details will automatically populate the Reference Note. I have explained that with color coding on what information in the Reference Note comes from the Source Template and what information comes from the Citation Detail field.

To make it easiest for me, I use the Citation TEXT field for my information and do NOT include that, nor the Web Address into the Reference Note.

ANSWER to the Question: 

I will NOT and do NOT Batch Edit ANYTHING in Family Tree Maker, let along a Source or a Citation.

The thought that is always on my mind when working on Citations, is that most, if not all websites, that provide us with Source Information MUST BE Cleaned up, if I want for my Reference Notes to be as close to EvidenceExplained as possible, I must to them ONE AT A TIME !

But, that's just me.
_______________________________________________________________
Copyright © 2018 by H R Worthington

2 comments:

  1. I have been using the FTM source template which puts commas and other single marks of punctuation outside of the final quotation marks for database titles. When I edit the citation to move the comma, FTM automatically removes the italics from the website name (Ancestry in most cases). Is there a way to fix this?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Unknown,

      The purpose of the Source Template is that you should NOT need to "edit" the Citation. The only Edit I do, is to add the "accessed: date" after the root URL.

      I do NOT see what you are talking about, but then I am NOT editing the way you are.

      Russ

      Delete

Please post your comments here

Print Friendly