Genealogy Chat

thanks Mark , it certainly isnt good enough is it ??? how on earth can I get matches when the year of Birth is completely wrong?
I have had a few contacts I have given permission to look at my tree on here who then tell me I am wrong ? yet it isn't wrong on Ancestry or in my FTM programme ?
I may have to reconsider renewing this year?
:-S :-(

Genes Reunited is notoriously poor at importing dates.

Genealogy software stores the dates in whatever format it chooses (you shouldn't need to worry about how it stores it internally) and displays them to you in whatever format you configure in the program's options.

But they should ALL export the dates in standard GEDCOM format which is DD MMM YYYY (there is also support for foreign calendars and BC dates etc).

A date can be partial and have only MMM YYYY or even just YYYY and double dating is supported e.g. 01 FEB 1750/51.

GEDCOM also allows for approximated dates using ABT (about), BEF (before), AFT (after), EST (estimated), CAL (calculated), and periods 'FROM date TO date' and 'BET date AND date' (between).

GEDCOM also has an even more liberal date format known as a 'date phrase' where a date phrase is enclosed in parenthesis e.g 'INT date (some text that you have derived the interpreted date from)' or even just a bracketed date phrase with no attempt at interpretation. Date phrases are poorly supported across genealogy applications and should be avoided.

GR seems to only support GEDCOM import of the non-GEDCOM-standard DD/MM/YYYY (what does it do if you're American and use MM/DD/YYYY?) and GEDCOM standard dates DD MMM YYYY. It also supports ABT for approximate dates which causes the 'tick if unsure' box to be ticked. It appears that GR attempts to extract the year from the date and store that separately - at least for birth and death events. Other imprecise dates are discarded on import!

I also notice that dates are variously displayed back by GR in either DD/MM/YYYY or DD MMM YYYY format seemingly at random!

I can't say that I have ever seen a wrong date appear but I HAVE seen a lot disappear. :-S

Hope that helps,
Mark

Yes, it is not unknown for this to happen.

I think it is to do with the way that your dates have been formatted. Which program did you use to create the gedcom file that you uploaded, and what is the format of the dates?

i.e.

01/06/1900
01 Jun 1900
or something else?

Just reading you post again - you mention abt dates. How are they formatted in your source tree? Is it just these that are causing a problem?


I Use the FTM format:-

Abt. Jun 1878

which load ok

I imported my updated Tree to here and have noticed quite a few have the wrong dates now attached to them ???
For instance
Susannah Grace Pingram born abt 1882 is showing as born in 1905??
I'm not happy about this and wondered if anybody else has noticed the same thing ? :-S