Preparing to Transition

For those preparing to transition to another Genealogy software program.

This is one of several videos on transitioning to another Genealogy Software program. I think this is important to understand a few things about Family Tree Maker if you are going to move your genealogy database from Family Tree Maker to another program.

The move will be different based on the VERSION of Family Tree Maker that you have AND the Genealogy Program you might move to. This video is to help you find the Version of the program you are using and what you need to do just before you make that move.

Family Tree Maker started in the DOS days, and the Version numbers were just that, a version number. For example, my first version was Version 3.4. The Version number when up to Version 9, then Version 10, then Version 11. BUT in 2005, then changed to Version 2005, then 2006, then back to Version 16.

In 2008, then structure of the program was moved out of the DOS environment into the Windows environment. The Version numbers then started with FTM2008, FTM2009, FTM2010, FTM2011, FTM2012, and FTM2014.

In the Version 16 and earlier, all Media Files were INCLUDED in the FTW (file extension), making the files very large over time. This important to note for your transition.

Starting with FTM2008, the Media Files were in a < filename > Media folder. You would have a Filename for the Data, and a < filename > Media folder for all of the Media Files. Those media files would normally be in Media folder, but some users and their own filing structure for their media, maybe leaving those media files elsewhere on the computer. The program "knows" where they are so there are links from the database to those media files.

For Back Ups: as long as you manually back up, or Back Up as I demonstrate in this video, those Media Files will be in the Back Up file. For Version 16, the back up file extension would be FBC. For FTM2008 - FTM2014,the file extension is FTMB. Both the FBC and the manually generated FTMB file include those media files. IF you find a FTMB file that has the words "Automatic Back Up" that FTMB file would NOT include the media files, only the Data. The automatic back up would be generated if you just closed down the program without manually backing up the file.

In upcoming blog posts, I will deal with GEDCOM files. A GEDCOM will NOT include any media files. It is important thing to understand, with this transition, is the links to the Media Files. In FTM2008 through FTM2011 a GEDCOM file will NOT contain any information linking to the media files. With FTM2012 and FTM2014, the GEDCOM WILL include Links to those media files.

Here is a link to a number of blog posts on this

http://ftmuser.blogspot.com/search/label/GEDCOM

Here is a blog post I did about transferring a GEDCOM to Roots Magic

http://ftmuser.blogspot.com/2013/12/blog-post-on-hold-update.html





Bottom line here, KNOW the Specific Version of Family Tree Maker that you are using and Compact and Back Up your file when the option is offered using the Compact File utility.

Me: No Change. FTM2014 and all of its features work for me.

_______________________________________________________________
Copyright © 2015 by H R Worthington

Blog Post on Hold - update

A couple of days ago, I mentioned that I was not going to do further blogging about using a GEDCOM file to transfer this one file from FTM2014 to Legacy Family Tree 8 nor Roots Magic 6.

Blog Posts on Hold

But after the Ranting about how bad FTM2014 is, on Facebook, I am going to amend that. There are reasons, as I mentioned, because the transfer is via GEDCOM. However, there is some very good news in what FTM2014 does when exporting a GEDCOM file.

I have successfully transferred files from FTM2014 to both Legacy Family Tree 7.5, and Roots Magic 6. Each included links to the Media files on my hard drive. I have also been successful in sending a GEDCOM to a user of Roots Magic, and had the Media Folder of the FTM2014 file, in Dropbox, with the GEDCOM file. Everything, including the Media files were opened in Roots Magic 6 (as expected).

Trying to help a FTM2014 User, who is leaving FTM2014 for another program, I did an extra test this evening, just to make sure I remembered correctly from previous tests, specifically to Legacy Family Tree version 8, which has been recently released). I had done Version 7.5 earlier, so I wanted to just double check.

When the file was imported, there was a warning message that I was missing 56 Media files. WOW !!! that's a bummer. But wait ...... There is an Error Log from Legacy that I looked at, while Legacy was trying to find those 56 files. I was doing something else but Legacy still hadn't found those files after about 1/2 hour. What's up with that. They are ALL in one folder, can't be that hard.

So, I looked at that log or error message file again, a little closer, and I realize that they ALL were images from Find-A-Grave. In FTM2014, it had marked ALL of the Find-A-Grave images as PRIVATE. They aren't my pictures, so I do NOT want them to be online.

I thought that when I made that earlier blog post, that I had checked that I had the media files in Legacy, and I remembered correctly, so this error message concerned me. Not only did the links to those images make it, BUT in the GEDCOM there was some indication that those images should NOT be included in that GEDCOM. So, FTM2014 did what it should have, including marking those Private Media files is such a way that Legacy shouldn't and didn't find them.

Lesson Learned, The export worked as it should.

_______________________________________________________________
Copyright © 2013 by H R Worthington

Genea-Musings Scenario 1 (Roots Magic 4 to FTM2012) - Part 3

Final Follow up on Genea-Musings Scenario 1 (Roots Magic 4 to FTM2012)


Randy's final comment was:

• If a user creates a GEDCOM file using FTM 2012 (or any other program) that includes Media file links to files on the user's computer, and then transmits that GEDCOM file to another computer (his own or someone else's), the user will have to send the Media
  file folder contents to that other computer.  If the link text to the Media files do not reflect the file folder names on the receiving computer, then the links will have to be changed, or the Media will have to be properly linked to the Persons or Facts.

This is, I think, the heart of the GEDCOM transport where Media files are involved. The GEDCOM gets the Data from one place to the other. The Media files are NOT part of the GEDCOM, as I hope has been shown in earlier blog posts, only links to them.

What must happen 'next' is to get the information in the Media Folder, for that file, from one user to the other. The "sending" user needs to look at the contents of the Media Folder, for number of Media files, and the Size of Space used by the Media Folder, using Windows Explorer.

Using Windows Explorer and navigating to the Media Folder for the test file for Roots Magic 4, and Right Clicking on the Folder Name, there are 2 files in that folder and the total size of the folder is 252 KB. That entire folder will probably fit into an email.

Email limitations for more Media files and larger Media files other options will have to be explorer to get the Media to the other user.

When the receiving user receives the Media Folder or files, they would have to be saved where that user wants them saved. If the receiving end user is also using Family Tree Maker, they can be saved in the < filename > Media folder for that file. The "Find Missing Media" or CTRL+F5 feature can be used by that user.

If the receiving end user is a Roots Magic 4 user, each of the Media files would have to be manually inserted into Roots Magic 4.

I am only using Roots Magic 4 as an example. AND this is not a negative comment on Family Tree Maker nor Roots Magic 4. This issue is a generic GEDCOM issue. As I have said before, I am not an authority on GEDCOM, I only know that the "industry" has not uniform way of Sharing our genealogy research.

So, when sharing our research, both the sender and receiver of a GEDCOM, which includes Media files, have work to do.



Copyright © 2011 by H R Worthington

Genea-Musings Scenario 1 (Roots Magic 4 to FTM2012) - Follow Up

As a Follow up to:Genea-Musings Scenario 1 (Roots Magic 4 to FTM2012)

Another user of Family Tree Maker posted feedback on Scenario 2, and posted her results in the comments to Randy's post.

I want to complete Randy's comments and observations where he said:

• When I create a GEDCOM file in FTM 2012, my assumption is that any Media links associated with selected Persons and Facts included in the FTM 2012 database should be included in the GEDCOM file.

This is a true statement. The file that I talked about, using Roots Magic 4, was a GEDCOM file created by FTM2012.  When this was done, and the GEDCOM file was imported into Roots Magic 4, the image was NOT in the newly created Roots Magic 4 file.

One thing I learned about GEDCOM files, between genealogy programs, is to Review the .LOG file. That .LOG file will contain error messages about information that was not imported into the receiving program.

• Unknown info (line 18472)
      0 @M40@ OBJE
      1 FILE C:\Users\Russ\Documents\Family Tree Maker\Inferential Genealogy Study-2012_Current Media\Howard-James_M-DavidR.jpg
      2 TITL James M and David R Howard Co. A, 1st Md. Inf. (Dave Mark, Baltimore, Md.)
      2 DATE 7/23/2011 5:01:14 PM
      2 TEXT First and Second Maryland Infantry, C.S.A., page 205

That error message is why the image was not in RM4 when I opened it. The Link was there, however, and this is only a guess, that the format used in the GEDCOM from FTM2012, was NOT what RM4 expected.

This is one of the many GEDCOM issues, that will not be addressed on this Blog. I am not a GEDCOM expert, only know that there are far to many technical issues that I am not qualified to address. I am a user of Family Maker and I have experienced GEDCOM issues between applications in that past.

To answer Randy's comment, yes the Link is there. Did it work, No!

Randy continued:

• When I created a GEDCOM file in FTM 2012 from the Scenario 1 database, and then imported that GEDCOM file back into FTM 2012 (I could have used another program), the links to the Media items were included  the Scenario 1 database and are in the /Family Tree Maker/"Scenario 1"/Media file folder on my computer.

I think I answered this in my earlier post on this topic. Opening that GEDCOM file back into FTM2012, (GEDCOM to FTM2012), yes, the links AND images will be there. However, the actual Media files will remain in the "Scenario 1" Media folder. The GEDCOM points to where that Image is located, Opening that GEDCOM in FTM2012 will find that image in that folder.

But, Randy said "I could have used another program", the answer is different. The Link is there, but the format of the Link may not be implemented the same in FTM2012 or Roots Magic 4. As a user, I don't know, which is right nor which is wrong, but the hand off did NOT work between the two, as seen in the .LOG file.

Randy continued:

• However, when I created a GEDCOM file in FTM 2012 from the Scenario 2 database, and then imported that GEDCOM file back into FTM 2012 (I could have used another program), there were no links to the Media items in the Scenario 2 database and no Media files in the /Family Tree Maker/"Scenario 2"/Media file folder.

The above also applies to "another program"


Copyright © 2011 by H R Worthington

Genea-Musings Scenario 1 (Roots Magic 4 to FTM2012)

A Genea-Blogging friend, Randy Seaver, has posted a number of blog posts about the new Family Tree Maker version 2012 program.  I have been commenting on his posts, but I wanted to test out and post my findings here:

Exploring Family Tree Maker 2012 - Post 6: Understanding Media Items

Here is his Scenario 1:

* Scenario 1: When a GEDCOM file, created by another program or online database, is imported into FTM 2012, then the images of the Media are included in the FTM 2012 Media workspace, are put into the /Family Tree Maker/"Scenario 1"/Media file folder on my computer, and links to those Media files are included for the Person(s) and Facts involved in the FTM database. If this FTM 2012 file is exported to a NEW Ancestry Member Tree, the Media images are included in the Ancestry Member Tree.


For this Blog Post, for Scenario 1, a Roots Magic 4 will generate a GEDCOM file. The file in Roots Magic 4 has one image in it for this test.


To the best of my knowledge, a GEDCOM file will NOT include any images in that file. You can open and edit at GEDCOM file with any word processor and it will NOT include any images or media files.

For part one of this test, I created a test file in Roots Magic 4 and generated a GEDCOM file (created by another program). Here is the header information from that GEDCOM file:

0 HEAD
1 SOUR RootsMagic
2 NAME RootsMagic
2 VERS 4.0
2 CORP RootsMagic, Inc.
3 ADDR PO Box 495
4 CONT Springville, UT 84663
4 CONT USA
3 PHON 1-800-ROOTSMAGIC
3 WWW www.RootsMagic.com
1 DEST RootsMagic
1 DATE 13 OCT 2011
1 FILE Scenerio-1-RM-GED.ged
1 GEDC
2 VERS 5.5.1
2 FORM LINEAGE-LINKED
1 CHAR UTF-8

This file is opened by the Windows program Notepad.exe Nothing fancy about this program and there were NOT images in that file.

There IS a link to the Media file that is in this Roots Magic file.

1 OBJE
2 FILE C:\Users\Russ\Documents\Family Tree Maker\Inferential Genealogy Study-2012_Current Media\Howard-James_M-DavidR.jpg

This entry is the LINK to that JPG file that is on my computer.

The next step is to Open that GEDCOM file, created by Roots Magic 4 with FTM2012. The Import Status indicates that  there is one image.

You will notice ONE multimedia file. That is because of the link to that image already on this computer.

Here is that image:

However, looking in the Media Workspace for this image, you will see where this image is located.

The image that is in the above screen capture is the SAME image that Roots Magic uses. The Path to that Image is Identical.

What this means, is that for a Media item to show up, that has a Link to any image, that Image MUST be on the computer in the Path that is indicated in the Link in the GEDCOM file.

For this test, to check out my theory, I MOVED that image from the folder that is indicated above so that FTM2012 would not see that file.

Now you will see that FTM2012 can NOT find that file, although the image is still showing.


Since I saw the thumbnail, I clicked on it to see if the Error Message was correct. This is the screen that appeared.

I selected the "Let Family Tree Maker search for this file." It found the image.

That image is now in the Media folder for this file, where it should be.

The link will point to where the file was, in Roots Magic, and FTM2012 found it on import. Moving the image, FTM2012 can find it, IF it is on the SAME computer, as long as the filename is the same.

Another option is in the Media Workspace, Media Menu, Find Media.

This option will search for ALL Missing Media files.

This is that Missing Media file, if there are others, they will be listed in this window, If FTM2012 finds the file, the options are to Copy the file to the Media Folder for this file or to put a Link from this family file to that image, in the other folder. The choice here is to Copy.

This scenario shows the ability for FTM2012 to read a GEDCOM file, from another genealogy program, in this case Roots Magic 4. Embedded in that GEDCOM is a Link to an image / media file that was used within Roots Magic 4, The key here is that the IMAGE / Media file MUST be on this computer.


Lets say that Randy sent me that GEDCOM file via Email. He would have to send that Image, with the SAME filename to me in that email or a separate email, and I would have had to saved that image on my PC. FTM2012 has a feature to Find that Media file, as long as the Filename is the Same and that it's on this computer.


Copyright © 2011 by H R Worthington