Original_To:  TOGENIELIST
Newsgroups: soc.roots
Date:         Sat, 3 Oct 1992 11:59:00 MST
Reply-To:     MCBRAYER@SMC.BITNET
From:         MCBRAYER@SMC.BITNET
Subject:      1. Bath Ohio, 2. Text->GEDCOM

Re: Our friends in Bath, Ohio.

It's people like them that give family searching a bad name.  As I mentioned
in a previous posting, my immediate family and I missed out on our family's
250th anniversary of being in the US because we were wary of a cousin's letter.
One bad apple.........


On another front....

I may have just reinvented the wheel, but I have just finished a preliminary
program which converts a TEXT file into GEDCOM format.  Instead of having the
prospect of entering all my current info into PAF or BK from scratch, I now
have a 1493 name, 450 marriage BK database.

Last spring, when I was getting started in genealogy, I created a TEXT file
consisting of names and relationships gleaned from a book that a cousin wrote
on our family history back in 1926.  I tried to write my own program to draw
a family tree, unaware of available software and their capabilities.  My
genealogy mentor had PAF, and had put in a few of my entries, but I'm a bit
of a rebel and like to write my own stuff. :-)

Last weekend I obtained BK via FTP and have been playing around with it.  I
entered my direct line, and eventually created a GEDCOM file.  Upon seeing
that it was a simple TEXT file with codes for the various pieces of info,
my programming bug bit me and I set out to write a program to convert my
old TEXT file into GEDCOM.  After a few bugs, it seems to have worked like a
charm.  Now all I have to do is insert date and location info.

At 10 generations, with 1493 names and 450 marriages, printing my family tree
in BK utilizes 39 sheets of paper (3 sheets wide by 13 long, 8.5"x11"), with
compressed print.  I'll be killing a few trees once I get the info from the
second book I have into BK (info covering 1926->about 1980, plus corrections
to and other info not in the 1926 book). :-)


Questions:  did I reinvent the wheel (ie, if so, what's available?), and would
anyone be interested in such a program?  In reading the postings on here, it
appears most of you are using PAF, BK and similar programs.  If anyone does
have text files of info laying around (perhaps you need to scan text into a
file, and then need a way to dump it into your existing database?), I would
like to know what sort of format the file is in.  I'm thinking of getting the
program to be user-friendly enough to be non-format-specific.  Speaking of
which, the program is in the very early stages and isn't user-friendly at all.
In fact, it's written mainly for my use, so I can't honor any requests for it
at this point in time.  I will, however, graciously accept any comments and
suggestions.  I'm considering distributing the final product as shareware.
We'll see!  Thanks in advance.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Bill McBrayer                           MCBRAYER@SMC.BITNET
South Mountain Community College        MCBRAYER@SMC.MARICOPA.EDU
Phoenix, Arizona

Lookin' fer MCBRAYER (aka McBrair, Macbrair, McBrier, MacBryre, Mackbrie,
   Mackbray, etc.   Also, BRIER).    Dumfrieshire, Scotland;  South-Central
   Pennsylvania, Eastern North Carolina, Kentucky, Georgia, Alabama, et al.
Comments: Gated by NETNEWS@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU