Reader Question: Purpose of the Fact Description field

Another User Question (love these questions)

What kind of information goes in the “description” tab and does that information eventually migrate to the “notes” section?

This is a great question. "It depends" is my quick answer.

Each FACT that is created in Family Tree Maker has Three (3) FIELDS. You can see the Facts in your File, in the Edit Menu, Manage Facts item.

That will bring up a list of All of the Facts that you are using, and where you will Select the Fact you want to Edit, or one of the Places where you can Add a New Fact. You can always Add a New Fact in the People Workspace, Person View, which is where I would add a new fact.

In this case, I selected Address. It is an Individual Fact, that can be shared with any other Profile. You will note the Annulment Fact, which IS Shared. So, you enter that Shared Fact, and it can be Shared with only a Spouse. Most Facts are Individual. 

I chose Address, because you might think that many profiles might use that Address. That is True, but the "shared" fact is not broad enough, and it only intend for a "married" couple. Married defined in the Marriage Fact settings, which does mean that the couple of married. That is a topic for another blog post.

I am going to click on the Fact, Properties button:

And we have Choices on what Fields we want to have with that Fact. Date / Place Fields, Date / Place / Description Fields, Description Only.

The default for this (system created Fact) is Date / Place / Description, which makes sense, right?

Below that is "Fact sentence". There is where you can change that the Fact will look like in a Genealogy Report. Below that is an Example of that that Fact Sentence Looks like.

You will notice that I marked this FACT as "Private by default". I do not want the Address Fact in my Online Tree. I want to see it always in my File, just not online. So, every time I Add an Address Fact, to a Profile it will be marked Private.

The question was, what do I put in the Fact Description?

Before the Places Workspace was improved, I would put the Street Address into the Description Field. With the option to use the Historical Place Name option, I put the Full Street Address in the Places Field.

Here is an example from a Profile.

There are four (4) Address Facts. Each with a Date, Place, but the description field is blank (image to follow). I point this one out for a reason. I have 2 Citations on the 1917 Fact, World War I draft), 1930 and 1940 Census Records, and a 1942 Fact, which was a World War II draft record).  That was this persons residence, from those records over time. I mention Census, because I use the Residence Fact, with Citations to the Census RECORD. But, these two census records had the street address. Here is why I do it this way. Who else lived at that address ?

Seven (7) People lived at that address over time. The use of the Historical Name is how this works.

You will notice that the address is in that upper field.

What is not in my earlier screen capture, is the Zip Code. Why didn't I enter is. Answer: It was NOT in the Record. If I have or know of the Zip Code, like from an Public Record RECORD, I would put that in the Description Field.

This is the image, mentioned earlier, from the People Workspace, Person View. I  entered the Date, and the complete address, on that 1940 Census Record. Not the "Lock" or Privacy setting.

The Options, on the screen capture, is another place where you can Change the Properties for that, or any Fact.

The final question ask, Migration to Notes. NO. All Notes fields, and there are many, are manually added. I have a blog post on Notes, Notes, and More Notes.

https://ftmuser.blogspot.com/2014/04/notes-notes-notes-and-more-notes.html

for all of the blog posts on Notes:

https://ftmuser.blogspot.com/search?q=notes

____________________________________________________________
Copyright © 2019 by Cousin Russ